@ernie_in_berkeley, I’m sorry. Had posted it on WFD, with a thorough description, but forgot to do so here. It’s orzo, cooked in chicken stock, then baked with crab, butter and parsley.
Ah. Mom used shrimp.
Which reminds me, our local fisherman is going to have shrimp at the farmers’ market this week…
Mmm, sounds good to me! Comforting combination, love orzo everything.
When the shutdown began, I had a leg of lamb in the freezer, so I braised it in tomato sauce, as I would for youvetsi/menestra. But for some reason, orzo is hard to find around here, even in good times. So, I’ve been eating it with other pastas, especially rotini, which holds the tomato sauce very nicely.
Interesting about the difficulty in finding orzo there pre-Covid; it’s gone missing from the shelves around here, just lately. I broke down and ordered some from Greece through Amazon, and H bought some overpriced stuff from the regular grocery yesterday. Oh, and we love it also, cooked with tomato, and lamb scrapings and juices, so good. Can see where rotini would work well for that too. Now I’m hungry for lamb @ernie_in_berkeley!
Could we have the recipe?
Of course @delicas! Assuming you mean the orzo with crab? If so, I’ll post it shortly, or if it’s something different, just let me know. 
Dinner last night was Psari Plaki, with Psari meaning fish, and Plaki being a cooking method - basically smothering something in tomatoes or tomato sauce, with olive oil, certain vegetables, and aromatics. Cod was used last night. Oh and answered hopes to have a fisherman in the family!! So exciting. DD1 went 70 miles off the coast of Wa, and caught cod and rockfish. They also pulled up some dungie crab pots. We’re saving the dungie for Cioppino or such.
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Beautiful daughter and beautiful fish!
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Why thank you @MsBean! Had to include the pic, because she was so dang thrilled, as was the skipper beside her! None of the men on the boat caught anything that day. They stayed longer so she could catch some fish for them. Don’t know how many she got, all told.
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Plaki is named after Plaka, the neighbourhood in central Athens . Plaki means in the Plaka- style.
Usually it means that the dish has tomatoes, lemon, onions, olive oil and oregano. Some versions- including the one my family makes- use sliced or chopped tomatoes instead of tomato sauce.
This is what my typical Friday night psari plaki looks like:
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That psari plaki. 
Thank you for the inspiration!
I spent many happy days in the Plaka, but Psari Plaki was never on the menu there or anywhere during a rather extensive 3 weeks in country. So…pictured above is the version we know and make. Yours does look beautiful, and seems to have the requisite amount of olive oil @Phoenikia.
@Lambchop, I don’t use Greek amounts of olive oil in any of my cooking. I’m too chubby to follow the recipes as they are written in the old country
I use a couple tbsp of olive oil for a pound of fish .
I’ve been to Plaka on 4 visits . Each visit to Greece was for roughly a month, but I only spend 3 or 4 nights in Athens and Piraeus on each visit, and my last visit was in 2007. I have no idea which seafood dishes are common on menus in Plaka these days. I just meant to clarify the word Plaki meant in the style of Plaka. Whether it is a common dish in Plaka in 2020 is another topic
To be honest, I am not sure I’ve ordered it in Greece, because it’s a typical food at home in Canada.
When I am in Greece, I mostly eat seafood and vegetable dishes. I barely eat any meat or poultry when I visit the Mediterranean.
Here is a recent recipe from It Chef Akis
Another famous Plaka-style dish
Gigantes Plaki
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Thank you for these links @Phoenikia! We too cut the olive oil in our cooking, but remain a bit more generous with it when cooking Greek than most other foods we cook.
I too am thinking that Psari Plaki is more of a home dish, that is also associated with Greek funeral foods. I’ve never been to a reception after a Greek funeral, that didn’t offer it. It kind of brings up bittersweet memories when I make it. Then I’m always surprised how good it is!
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I miss the food in Greece.
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The meal after a funeral (called the makaria) just needs to be fish, as far as I am aware, not any specific preparation. The whole meal is pescatarian.
If bakaliaros / cod is served, it’s traditionally served with beets and skordalia, but that’s how it’s served whether it’s for a funeral or regular fish dinner.
Various cookies and Metaxa brandy are also served at the Makarias I’ve attended.
I’ve been to 3 makaria meals in the past 15 years , and the fish has been rather simply baked or fried.
Kollyva, a mixture of boiled wheat berries, silver dragées, sugar and honey, is served on certain memorial days. https://akispetretzikis.com/categories/glyka/kollyva
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The last Makaria I’ve been to was in 2011 @Phoenikia, and I’m wracking my brain to remember all the food. It was my Sis in law, a sad and premature passing, so that possibly clouds things. I remember Plaki, more typical to the US, I think, in that it was smothered; also shrimp. Literally everything we ate was fabulously delicious. And yes to the Metaxa and Greek cookies. It was all set up in the large foyer/initial reception area, before going into the bigger room for the meal. On a happier note, we enjoyed our nephew’s Greek wedding reception in that same room a few years later.
Oh, and I so remember the wheat in a cross shape with powdered sugar, dragges, and maybe pomegranate arils? The ones I’ve experienced are quite beautiful, as they are in your part of the world also, I’m sure.
That’s the thing about food that intrigues me - all the regional variations, as well as adaptations in adopted countries. My MIL’s family came from Vasilitsi about 30 minutes from Kalamata in the Peloponnese, and FIL & family hailed from the island of Lemnos. So many influences in that small country, from different climates to influences from Venetian and other traders, as well as conquerors and all the wars.
So happy to see you posting again!
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When someone has died, usually one of the things that happens is people stick closely to ritual and especially to local tradition - it helps everyone to know what to do in a difficult time, and it’s comforting. Having moved a few times, it’s clear to me that every area has its own, slightly different, after-funeral food traditions. And in every area, the people know: the way we do it is the way it has always been done everywhere for centuries. 
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I recognize a few words of Greek but mostly I’m clueless about it. In languages that are close to English or French I can usually make a good guess about a word I don’t know. I try to make good guesses in Greek too, but I’m always wrong. 
A restaurant near me has Gigantes Plaki on the menu, and I just learned that “Plaki” does not mean “beans”. 
So, thank you for teaching me one more word. (At my current pace, I will understand basic Greek after about 400 years.)
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