Going Greek for Friday

I thought we were making hummus.

I’d bought a batch of chickpeas and tahini, lemon juice and garlic, and  picked a couple of authentic recipes.  The package suggested at least 12 hours soaking for the lentils, so I put them in a pot on Wednesday morning.

Greek-mom was waiting, hands on hips, by Wednesday-noon. 

First, the water is wrong, the size of the bowl is too little, it needs to soak longer.

I thought she might be missing the point, and went back to the computer for the recipe.  I pasted the instructions into Google Translate and printed the serving objective in Greek.

Greek-mom shook her head.

Tahini?  Never!       ‘Out it went. 

Olive oil, salt, pepper, tomato juice, onion, a carrot…, she counted off.  I scurried to the store.

 

This afternoon, everything goes on the boil.  First the peas, two hours.  The Olive Oil, Passata, a chopped onion, lots of salt.  It all started to cook down and thicken.  Good, but definitely not hummus.

 

Revithia, she proclaimed.  I wad dubious about putting it through a blender.  On the salad, olives, anchovies… more slicing and dicing ensued.  The cardiologist arrived, and we all decided a family dinner was in order after a hard week.

I’m finally seeing daylight on my fundraising and legal questions; Laura has her dissertation defense on Wednesday, and the Greeks have been hard at their English practice (we read out loud from Dorset Magazine every morning over coffee).

Everyone is getting tired.

So we made a party out of it.  Dinner was simple and superb; the conversation flowed in three languages.  We congratulated one another on how the plants were growing, compared plans for the weekend, and teased one another’s work styles.  We pooled our berries for dessert.

All good fun and a nice evening.  And, secretly I’ve brought back the tahini and still have plans to try a hummus recipe when nobody’s looking.

For the house, I think we were celebrating humans, ‘better than making hummus.