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Harry's Greek Food and Wine Guide Page 4

Wrapped in Pita Bread

greek food souvlaki greece athensMe Pita the unleavened round Pita bread, is a sandwich in roll up form and I am sure many of you are familiar with the type. The meat is usually pork and occasionally of questionable pedigree. Often they will have a chicken gyro set up next to the pork one as well, if its a busy, popular place.

You can order your pita with onions, tzatziki (yogurt-garlic-cucumber sauce) or mustard, tomatoes, and recently french fries, which purists will leave out and order as a side dish.

Some prefer the skewer or kalamaki as they suspect the exact identity of the meat in gyro form. Who says the kalamaki is any better? These are an inexpensive and delicious way to sustain oneself in Greece. A pita with kalamaki or gyros is usually about a euro or a dollar.

greek food souvlaki greece athensSausage or Lou can eco can be ordered also for Pita inclusion. Depending on where in Greece you are, the sausages may be locally produced and therefore better, or like we get 'em back home on the 4th... sort of anonymous looking but all the same. There is also bif-teki or ground meat available in more on the ball places like the great little souvlaki joint near my house in Exarhia. Beefteki is ground beef rolled and put into the pita as a further alternative to pork gyro, the most popular of all, hands down.

The name of this little gem is the 'Agrafa'. Corner of Emanuil Benaki and Veltetsiou St. in Exarhia. (They deliver all over town too: tel: 210-3803-144), Incidentally, Agrafa is an area of central Greece with lush valleys and snow capped mountains which is where the owners are from.

greek food souvlaki greece athensAgrafa also serves rotisserie chicken which I had tonight. A 1/2 chicken was 600 grams or 'grammaria' and ran me $3. .... you can see it below where Panayiotis is chopping it up for me.

He then sprinkles salt and oregano on it for me too! The chefs get the pitas in the next shot half cooked, and then grill them just before serving.

The funny ghoulish looking things, above bottom center, are cooked sheep heads and are for display and to let you know the meat is local Greek domestic stock & whole carcasses which they butchered themselves.

They prepare the Kokretsi which is pictured far bottom right, being rotisseried, with other some parts of the animal, including intestines! Yum! 'Codo-souvli' is 'heer-e-no' or pork, and finger licking good too!

Both of these dishes are served on plates and are weighed by the gram and cost accordingly. In a casual place like the Agrafa, salad and tzatiki are standard too. Beers, sodas, and tonic water to drink but no barrel wine but they will have bottled retsina which I don't care for.

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