Happy Greek Easter to those celebrating!
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@Phoenikia - your menu sounds good, and do enjoy! The fava beans will be delicious, I’m sure, and love the idea of having them with avgolemeno sauce! Yum. Happy cooking and eating.
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Oh yum, your meatballs sound delicious, as well as your plans for black cod with Meyer lemon. Do enjoy your celebration @ernie_in_berkeley. I’ll post pics later, need to start assembling the pites. The dolmas smell great so far, haven’t done QC yet.
Best wishes on this very special holiday …
At the farmers market today a friend gave me half a case of spinach and a dozen or so big leeks. So, it appears that I’ll be making spinach pie tomorrow. By surprise!
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Thanks 
Saturday coming is a travel day for me. Your picture alone means dolmades as part of my going away dinner on Friday.
I’ll send you my address and shipping details. grin
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We had a nice Greek Easter yesterday - beautiful weather, good company and food! We sat outside in the sun for awhile, then segued into Philadelphia Fish House Punch and appetizers. SIL scaled the punch down, so not too much. It was potent, but tasty. We judiciously sipped from small punch cups - no red solo cups haha.
Did a lot of cooking, ran low on both time & energy, so the Greek muffins and carrot side didn’t make it into the meal. H was delighted about no carrots, because he wanted Greek salad to begin with. So, he made one.
Hurry up plating and pics by the family. Red eggs using dye we found in Greece, Dolmas, tyropita and spanikopita triangles, pilaf, salad, Asparagus Mimosa, and lamb. Forgot to take a photo of dessert, but the Panna Cotta with Rhubarb and Strawberry sauce was delish. Easy to make, too. Bonus on that!
BTW, pic of dessert is the one accompanying the recipe - pretty much looked very similar. It may have even looked a bit blurry in reality by time we ate it too…JK!
Oh, and I harvested the vine leaves from our grape patch last year, blanched them in brine, rolled and froze them. Works great, and I know what’s not on them, like pesticide.
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Your pite is a thing of beauty @JoeBabbitt! Did you grow the spinach? It looks extremely fresh and nice.
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I didn’t grow the spinach. Came from one of the farmers at the market Sunday. Fresh cut that morning & she had a case left. Came with a dozen or so big fat leeks. Yum!
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I had my first (and last) Fish House Punch in high school. A friend’s father made it. Whoa - strong!
Your dinner looks fantastic. I love Greek food, but it’s hard to find in the SF Bay Area.
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@TheLibrarian28’s comment reminded me of an extraordinarily talented engineer who worked for me many years ago. He took me to a Greek festival in Seattle where they had a retsina tasting. To me it was like trying to decide which paint thinner was best (least bad?). The locals seemed to discern differences.
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Which part of the Bay Area? I only ask because my Greek side of my family lives in the Bay Area, and we’ve tried several places when I’ve visited. Unfortunately, I haven’t been to the Bay Area since 2017, when I was there for a big fat Greek wedding. Most of my Greek restaurant visits were 10- 15 years ago, mostly small places in the East Bay, one on Piedmont Ave in Oakland, another closer to Orinda, and one in Emeryville.
The only fancy Greek restaurant I have tried on the other side is Dio Deka in Los Gatos, and that was closer to 15 years ago.
My cousin who lives near Los Gatos buys her Greek groceries in San Jose afaik.
Souvla in San Francisco had caught my eye at some point.
Thanks @TheLibrarian28 - we haven’t cooked much Greek food in the year plus of Covid, so it tasted especially good. Not sure I could ever get tired of dolmas and spanikopitas…
Yes, the Fish House Punch was strong indeed, but we were careful. I enjoyed reading up on the stories about it.
Yes, it’s getting hard to find great Greek food these days, even in the cities. Our favorite one, in Seattle, closed last year, right around the lockdown, due to losing their lease. I’m hoping they reopen somewhere, but it’s far from certain. Fingers crossed.
With regards to Retsina - while I don’t quite think it’s the liquid, alcoholic equivalent of lutefisk, I do agree it’s vile stuff, but with a kick, at least. A big plus is that you don’t go blind from it either! 
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