- When I order Greek food,
I always get a Greek salad, moussaka, and baklava
'cause those are the best Greek dishes, right?
- Oh, no. - No!
- Well, obviously not.
- Fair enough.
I teamed up with GrubHub and three of my subscribers,
Alexia, Yioula, and Ioanna, to help us all figure out
the best things to order off of a Greek menu
according to the Greeks.
GrubHub did give me a discount code,
so if you're inspired to try Greek food
at the end of this episode, use my name, Beryl, at checkout
and that will give you $5 off an order of $15 or more.
(food deliverer knocks)
The food's here.
(percussive music)
- My name's Alexia.
I live in Paris, France, but I was raised in Athens, Greece.
- My name's Yioula, and I'm born and bred here in Athens,
the capital city of Greece.
From the appetizers, I have chosen a very characteristic
and traditional dish, Gigantes.
Gigantes are made in the oven with those gigantic beans.
That's why they're called Gigantes.
- To me it's the best vegetarian or vegan dish.
- It's one of my favorite dishes.
- I'm very excited that the appetizers we have
are actually all going to be vegetarian,
and if you remove the cheese from them
they're going to be vegan.
Because I've seen a lot of you asking
for me to choose more vegetarian friendly options.
Giant baked beans are just, oh, they're a beautiful thing.
Always so creamy and buttery.
Oh.
Oh my god.
I think that there's an impulse, especially for me,
to think that like a bowl of beans
might not be the most exciting dish,
but it's the sauce that makes this dish so good.
And the fact that it has been baked
there is that like kind of crispy carameliness
that the tomatoes have from being in the oven.
It's honestly incredible.
Woo.
One of my favorite things definitely eating
at a Greek restaurant is all of the soft fluffy bread.
This restaurant sent so much bread
in one of those Reese heatable bags too.
I've got bread for days. (chuckles)
I'm just gonna kind of make a little bean sandwich here.
Yum.
This is something I say to my brother-in-law all the time
because he likes eating meat a lot
and I tend to serve him a lot of vegetarian dishes
and I always go like,
"You don't even miss the meat, do you?"
I would say in this, you're not even missing the meat.
It's just so good on its own.
Two thumbs up, enthusiastically.
- Hi, my name is Ioanna,
and I live in Patras in western Greece.
From the appetizers I've chosen Imam.
It's a dish with Middle Eastern influences.
They are eggplant stuffed with onions,
baked in the oven with some garlicy tomato sauce.
- You add some Feta on top or Graviera cheese.
Graviera is a very salty Greek cheese
that crumbles a little bit and can be used on pasta,
which is amazing in my opinion.
It's savory, but the caramelized onions
have this jam texture and add a little bit of sweetness.
- Dunk some bread in the sauce,
so you can soak up all the deliciousness.
Enjoy.
- It kind of reminds me of eggplant parm.
Like doesn't it look a little bit like eggplant parm?
It's eggplant, and tomato sauce, and cheese.
Similar.
Never had this before and I am a huge eggplant fan.
Never done an eggplant episode.
Maybe I should.
Hmm.
It definitely doesn't actually taste at all
like eggplant parm. (laughs)
It just kind of feels like it.
It's adjacent.
There is a lot more spice to this.
I feel like you can kind of taste the olive oil
that it's been fried in.
The onions are just killing it.
I love a caramelized onion.
Caramelized onions with cheese.
This is super different.
It needs, oh.
I almost just dropped a knife covered in sauce
onto this carpet.
This carpet can't take any more spills.
Rajat is going to get so mad.
I kept saying I was gonna put a plastic mat underneath me,
but I haven't yet.
This also feels like the perfect food
to just be eaten with bread.
Mm-hmm.
Wow. This is the winner.
I don't think I've ever had anything like this before.
Even though this dish is in essence a full eggplant,
I don't really feel like it is an eggplanty dish.
So if you're somebody
who's kind of on the fence about eggplant,
I think that you would like it.
It is very much a like tomato
and caramelized onion forward dish.
And then the eggplant is giving a bit of meatiness,
but none of that like smokiness
that you can get from baba ganoush
or that kind of creaminess.
It's just, I don't know.
It's just really good. (chuckles)
And the cheese is good on top,
gives it a little bit of saltiness.
I feel like I've said ness words a lot in that description.
Creaminess, saltiness, meatiness.
I need a thesaurus.
I need some new words. (chuckles)
This is definitely a very good sharing dish
because everyone can just take a little slice off of it.
But if you're feeling greedy,
this would make a great meal for one.
- For next main dish, I would recommend Garides Saganaki.
Garides means shrimps,
and saganaki, it's when we cook stuff,
but with melted cheese basically.
This dish is savory, but it's also a little sweet
because sometimes we put sugar in the sauce.
and the oozing inside the sauce can add some freshness
and herbiness to this otherwise very savory dish.
For me, this dish is amazing.
It reminds me of eating at seaside restaurants
with my family in Greece on the weekends.
So I'm always under the impression
that it's a little bit fancy,
but in reality it's super simple to make.
I really hope you like it.
- We have a guest.
Ma'am, can I help you?
Can I have some Greek food please?
Give me some. (laughs)
This dish kind of reminds me of Spanish tapas
when you would order the sizzling shrimp in oil.
These shrimp are plump.
Wow.
This shrimp was so good.
I feel like I felt something deep within me awaken.
I feel like we're always told like,
"Oh, you can't put cheese and seafood together,
blah, blah, blah."
Put Feta cheese on everything and it will taste great.
This tomato sauce is also absolutely delicious.
It is so fresh,
and like it's just like very bright in your mouth.
It doesn't feel like one of those heavy sauces.
The shrimp, even though it's covered in the sauce,
are shining through.
And I think sometimes like when I, you know,
especially with delivery, I'm like, "Do I want seafood?"
These delivered really well.
These are really good.
Not overcooked at all.
Let's get that bread in here.
You've got some work to do, sir.
There's a lot of sauce and you've gotta pick it up.
Mm.
I think one of the things
that I'm most surprised right now about these dishes
is how bright everything is tasting.
I think the stereotype in my head about Greek food
is that it is heavy and that it is meaty,
and all of these dishes have been almost the opposite.
They've been very Mediterranean feeling,
very bright, very vegetable forward.
But I shouldn't say anything too soon
because the next dish we has the meats. (chuckles)
- As for the main dishes I have chosen you Arni Giouvetsi,
which is literally orzo pasta with lamb meats
or goat meats or beef.
I had this dish today for lunch.
It was amazing.
My grandmother makes it.
It's slowly cooked on the oven and I hope that you like it.
It's one of my favorites and I hope
that I would be able to eat it more often.
But my mother doesn't like it,
so my grandmother doesn't cook it very often
because in my village, it's a dish that is made
and eaten by the family at the funerals.
- That is a lot of meat.
And I like that it's like cleared off of the bone,
so you can really go into this.
I don't think I've ever eaten a piece of meat
like this before.
I've got a big piece of lamb.
This feels very Greek.
I'm just gonna bite into it.
Whoa.
Wow.
That is very soft.
I feel like a traveler in a medieval game
when I'm like, "Wench, bring me a mead and a leg of lamb."
Or I feel like a good cartoon character, you know,
in cartoons where they'll like take a bite
and just eat everything clean off the bone in one bite.
I mean, that's obviously not happening here, but yum.
This is good.
Let's get some of that orzo pasta in here.
I'm gonna be honest,
orzo is not my favorite of all the pastas.
I think it's too similar to rice to me, and it just,
it's just not my favorite type of pasta.
This though is pretty surprising.
It has a lot of flavor.
The outside is cooked like,
it's got like a little bit of crunch to it.
There's like no big weird pieces of fat,
which is something that I think I'm always kind of scared of
when it comes to eating big pieces of meat.
It's very moist still also,
not like a weird dry piece of meat.
As somebody who claims to not be that big of a meat eater,
I feel like every time, especially on this delivery series,
I've eaten meat I've been like,
"I like this one and I don't even like meat."
And like I say it every time,
so at what point do I just change the tune
and I realize like maybe I do like meat
a little bit more than I let on?
I've definitely eaten some things outta my comfort zone
like the Korean pig trotter.
But honestly,
I think this is also outta my comfort zone just
because it's like so big, but I'm enjoying it.
And I think this is one of those experiences
where having somebody give me a recommendation
of something new to try is really beneficial
'cause I would've never done this on my own.
That's great.
From the dessert menu, I strongly suggest Galaktompouriko.
It's a custard pie with honey syrup and filo pastry.
This one hits home for me
because my aunt used to make it from scratch, even the filo.
The honey syrup is sweet with a lemony aroma,
the custard is decadent, and the filo is buttery and crispy.
Without a doubt, one of my favorite Greek desserts.
- I know that you're not meant to play with your food,
but these are like, they're so bouncy.
They feel absolutely incredible.
I am really excited to try this, also smells so good.
Okay.
That's way better than baklava.
The sweetness of this is so much lighter.
I probably shouldn't be eating this with my hands.
I think 'cause I was fresh off that meat dish with my hands
I was still like, "Oh, we eat with our hands."
I shouldn't, sorry.
It has a texture of like a very thick custardy pudding.
It's very soft.
I would say the sweetness is like 5 outta 10.
So it's definitely dessert,
but my mouth, like my cheeks aren't puckering at all,
which I really like.
And this little bit of filo on top is really nice.
I love this.
This is one of those desserts
where everything is kind of familiar,
but at the same time different,
which is kind of exciting 'cause you're like,
"I know what I'm eating,
but I've never had it done like this."
Yum.
It's like the best pudding I've ever had.
That's, that's all I can say.
I already ate a whole square of it. (chuckles)
I loved it.
This episode definitely inspired me
for the next time I get Greek food.
I mean I'll probably still get the Greek salad
because like yum.
But I've definitely been inspired trying all
of these new dishes.
So thank you to everybody who helped me out
in the episode today.
Don't forget that if you're inspired to order
use my code Beryl at GrubHub to get $5 off your order
of $15 or more.
Let me know what other cuisines you would like to see.
I am leaving links to some of our other episodes
in this series for you to check out.
I will see you all next week.