Monday, July 13, 2015

Greek Dinner Revisited

Hi friends,

I don't know about you but when it is very hot outside I find it difficult to know what to eat. Only a few things appeal to me. Greek foods seem to agree with me well in this heat. You might remember I made a Greek dinner a few weeks ago.  It was time for another one.


This time I cooked the potatoes extra long to make sure they were brown. In my oven that takes awhile.

You can find the recipe here 

I skipped the oregano spice but made sure to put lots of garlic, lemon juice and oil. 


I didn't feel like making kebabs or souvlaki so cubed the pork, marinated it and put it on my indoor grill. It is so quick to cook but you need a bit of time for the marinade to work.

Frugal Tip: Purchase a full boneless pork loin roast and slice into pork chops as well as pork cubes for stir fry, kebabs and marinated cubes (as in photo below). I was able to get a full side of pork loin roast on sale for only $12.  It was a fabulously frugal way to get some nice dinners.

Here is a recipe. Again I skipped the oregano. I do like oregano but I am out of it at the  moment.


I also made some Greek Tzadziki (Cucumber) Sauce. I didn't have thick yogurt on hand so I strained the whey out of some before I used it. I found it was much runnier (thinner consistency) than last time even though I drained a lot of whey from the yogurt and water from the cucumbers too. You can avoid that problem by buying thicker yogurt or straining yours longer.  I decided to thicken up the sauce by adding a bit of ground up flax seeds.  This not only made it the right consistency but gave me some needed fibre. It didn't affect the taste either.  Here is a recipe for the sauce (minus the flax seeds).

Frugal Tip:  Purchase plain yogurt on sale and strain the whey out using a thin cloth. You can make it to your preferred consistency and save on cost of buying more expensive Greek yogurt.


To round out the meal there was some toasted pita bread and leftover green salad from the previous night's dinner. A few cherries for dessert. I love cherries and eat a lot of them during their brief season.

Frugal Tips:  There can be a tremendous gap in pricing at local food markets for fruits in season. Shop around. Prices in my neighbourhood range anywhere from $2.49 per pound to $9.99 per pound for cherries. One week a local grocer might have them on at the highest cost but the next week their cost is lowest. You can save a lot of money just by being willing to go a few blocks more for your treats.  Another tip is to purchase flax seeds whole and grind them yourself as needed. Store both the bag of whole seeds and the ground up seeds in the fridge to keep it from going rancid so quickly due to the oil in the seeds.

As you know I've been mentioning the excessive heat for long but in anticipation of some small rain we are having, it cooled off on Friday and Saturday. 
The predicted rain arrived on Saturday but there wasn't a lot of it.
Thunder and lightening storms are predicted for the rest of the province and the fear is the lightening will cause more wild fires.
We already have over 200 fires burning and the cost to the treasury is now in excess of 100 Million Dollars (Canadian).

Sunday (June 11th) called for a bit more rain. It did come down a bit but not a whole lot.

Here is a photo I took on Saturday morning.

The sky is very dark with a combination of smoke and rain clouds.
Today is Monday and we have a lot of blue in the skies for the first time in a week. The sun is also out in full force and there are a few clouds in the sky.
I may add today's pic later but right now am preparing to green my niece who will arrive within the hour.



Thank you for sharing my world with me.
Joining in with Our World Tuesday
I hope you visit again soon.
xx

18 comments:

Joanne Noragon said...

A delicious meal. I am very fond of cucumbers in a sauce. Thickening with flax seeds is ingenious.

Nancy Chan said...

Looks like a great yummy dinner!

Red said...

Your Greek dinner sounds great no matter whether hot or cold.

Ela said...

It looks great! I love potatoes in every dish !
Greetings

Ela said...

It looks great! I love potatoes in every dish !
Greetings

eileeninmd said...

Hello, your Greek dinner looks delicious! Thanks for sharing. Enjoy your day and the new week ahead!

Powell River Books said...

Great frugal tips. When I'm home at the cabin cooking is easier because we BBQ outdoors. When we go to town, cooking in a condo with no air conditioning is no fun. Then it is cold salads or microwave meals. Not so exciting, but easier and way cooler. - Margy

Penelope Notes said...

Oh boy, that first picture of potatoes looks mouth-watering and a little like pineapple. The seasoning makes all the difference in an otherwise bland vegetable. It looks like you did it just right!

carol l mckenna said...

Meal sounds delicious ~ thanks for sharing and great sky shot!

Happy Week to you,
artmusedog and carol

jabbott said...

That meal looks so good, im a big fan of pork too!!

Chris said...

Your dinner looks delicious, Greek food is so good. Just a few light showers of rain here, so disappointing. At least it's not so hot for a few days.Stay cool!

Indrani said...

I want to eat this post. :)
Lovely mouthwatering presentation.

Rajesh said...

Wonderful food preparation.

Small Kucing said...

Myside very hot too but this morning it rained a bit.

Annie Jeffries said...

So many good tips. I especially like the yogury one. I'm going to try that.

Cynthia said...

That meal looks and sounds wonderful! I do the same thing with yogurt, buy the cheaper regular yogurt and strain it to make it "Greek". Works great!

John's Island said...

Hi Joyful, I sure agree that it is difficult to decide what to cook in this unusually warm weather. Your Greek food looks good. Today I'm making potato salad ... cooked the potatoes early this morning when it was cool in the kitchen. They are resting in the frig now and I'll finish up the salad later this afternoon. Thanks for sharing your recipes.

Indah Nuria Savitri said...

the dipping sauce is amazing...we live in Astoria and we have so many authentic and great Greek restaurants here..lucky us :)

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