How not to F* up your Greek Salad

Such a simple, universally loved salad, yet people can get it SO wrong.

Kalimera all from a sweltering Athens,

I have Greek salad on my mind these days, mainly because it’s all I’m managing to eat in the insane summer heatwave that has hit this week here in Greece. In today’s newsletter, I’m sharing the do’s and don’ts (of which there are many!) of Greek salad etiquette, from the making to the eating. Along with the ultimate recipe for Greek salad and my favourite spots to eat Greek salad, I’m also including alternative ‘Mediterranean salad’ tweaks that are akin to the Greco but subtly different, picked up from my travels across the Mediterranean to write my new book, Mediterranea.

(If you head to my instagram reel from today on Greek salad etiquette there’s a chance there to win a copy of the book…!)

Incredibly simple to throw together but very easily cocked up, the Greek salad is a dish universally loved. I’ve seen Greek salad on the menu in Thailand, India, Argentina, Colombia, the UK… rarely have I been served a Greek salad on my travels that is actually Greek. On one tragic occasion in my early twenties, I ordered a Greek salad in Thailand, which arrived with tinned tuna lurking between tomatoes and cucumbers. This is not a Greek salad. At my university library veggie cafe in Manchester, I was horrified to see the Greek salad completely dominated by lettuce that simply did not belong there. In another epic failure of judgement, I ordered a Greek salad in Medellin, Colombia, which landed before me with shredded slices of American cheese in its midst. I actually cried on this occasion, but that’s because I was already beaten down by the food scene in Colombia after a month of backpacking.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a complete purist and I love subtle variations on a classic but lettuce and American cheese in a Greek salad really are a no, no for me. Having travelled the breadth of the Mediterranean for my next book, I have seen variations on the Greek salad all over, especially across north Africa and the Levant. In Tunis, the classic ingredients of tomato, cucumber, red onion and olives are given an extra kick of protein with Tuna and boiled eggs. In Turkey, the feta is omitted and the cucumber and tomato are finely diced, more akin to a tabbouleh. In Palestine and Lebanon the Fattoush salad features crisp squares of Arabic pitta bread, sumac, dried mint and occasionally parsley (I’m sharing the recipe for this from Palestinian grandmother Lila below, because I love the addition of the herbs and spices).

Before that, some do’s and don’ts for your Greek salad, laid down as always, by the great Yiayiades of Greece. I’ll begin with a big bugbear of mine: Don’t order your own individual Greek salad at a restaurant. Greek salads are for SHARING! I cringe inwardly at tavernas when I see a table of American girls, each with their own Greek salad. The joy of eating in Greece is trying a little of everything. It’s all about communion in conviviality!

DON’TS

• Don’t attempt to make a Greek salad in winter. The tomatoes and cucumber must absolutely be in season. I’m talking juicy and tasting of sunshine

• Don’t bulk out the salad with lettuce or any other type of salad leaf. Looking at you, University of Manchester library veggie cafe…

• Don’t use any other cheese but feta!! OK I will accept a creamy manouri maybe, for the sake of making it fancy but please don’t stray from Greek cheese!

• Don’t use crumbled feta or tiny little cubes of feta. We want a massive doorstep wedge of feta atop our Greek salad.

• Don’t skimp on olive oil - glug, glug, glug it on there.

• Don’t chop the ingredients too finely, then it becomes more of a Turkish salad.

DO

• Be sparing with your oregano

• Finely slice the red onion and don’t add to much as it overpowers the other flavours

• Roughly chop the tomatoes and cucumber - it’s a chill salad and you don’t have to worry about the slicing. It looks beautiful because of the range of colour that’s going in there from the various ingredients

• Add a finely sliced ring or two of green pepper for decor

• You can add capers and caper leaves, which is common on the Cycladic islands, or rusk, which you see a lot in Crete.

Yiayia Maragarita’s Ultimate Greek Salad

Arriving at Margarita’s is like stepping into a Santorini frozen in time before tourists descended and made this one of the most visited islands of all of Greece. Based in the south of the island, a good forty-minute drive from the town of Oia (packed with selfie sticks and tourists trying to get the ultimate sundown/sunset shots of the iconic sloping Caldera), Margarita and her husband live alone in a house on a hill. It overlooks a red beach that hints at the island’s explosive volcanic history.

The bleating of goats greet me. Margarita has a tonne of animals that roam the periphery of her home. Horses with chestnut manes that gleam in the sun. Chickens and roosters. Dogs that wind between our legs as we prepare lunch at an outdoor table, the inky Aegean Sea our backdrop.

She chops our salad directly into the bowl she serves it in, caring not to make it look delicious but doing so regardless. There’s little need for pomp and food styling, the produce here speaks for itself.

“The local tomatoes here are the best in all of Greece,” she tells me, explaining that the volcanic soil of Santorini makes for hardy produce. “We barely need to water our tomatoes, it’s the ground that feeds them,” she says.

Read on for the ultimate Greek salad recipe, a herby Fattoush salad from the Levant by Palestinian grandmother Lila and my hot tips for the week, including my favourite place for Greek salad right now.