Olive bread (ψωμί με ελιές)

You may have noticed that I already posted a recipe for olive bread and now I shall describe another, equally as delicious. This is a great bread for making on Sundays and enjoying with family. You can keep it and enjoy it in the week, I take it to work and enjoy it for my lunch. 


Olives are so wonderful and vital to our Greek-Cypriot diet; the flesh is eaten, the oil is spread, slurped or sizzled. Bread is also an important part of our culture, our food is all about sharing and this is the ultimate symbol of togetherness. 


Ingredients: 
Handful of chopped Kalamata olives
300g flour
7 grams yeast
4 tablespoons olive oil (olive oil) 
175ml warm water
1 and a half teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon raw cane sugar
A little more olive oil (good quality)


In a bowl, mix together the yeast, warm water, olive oil and sugar and leave for around 15-20 minutes. 


Add the salt and flour, slowly blending and then take out of the bowl and knead the dough for around ten minutes. Then roll into a medium ball and brush with a little olive oil. Place in a bowl and cover with a tea towel, then put in a warm place to rise for around 2 hours. 


After two hours take the dough and hit it a couple of times with your fist on a work-top. Preheat the oven to 220°C.


Now gradually fold in the olives until they are all within the dough. Mould it into a ball shape, brush with a little more olive oil and place on a greased baking sheet. Cover again with a tea-towel and leave it for another 30 minutes. 


Then uncover and mark some circles on the top with a sharp knife. Place the bread in the oven and bake for around 25 minutes. When it is done, leave it to cool and enjoy it dipped in some olive oil and balsamic vinegar. 

Olive bread (ελιόπιτα)

If there is one thing I am grateful for, being Greek, it is the olives... kalamata, stuffed, yiayia's own pressed olive oil from Cyprus, olive bread, olive pastries...



My favourite is this olive bread, it's not really a typical bread but a bit like a cake loaf. The aroma from the mint really gives it something special and it is so unlike the olive bread you can buy in a store. The texture is soft in the middle and the smell takes you to small village streets, ladies sitting outside their houses dressed all in black. 


Ingredients: 
1 onion chopped finely
2 handfuls of fresh chopped coriander
1 tablespoon dried mint
2 cups black olives, chopped
200ml olive oil
5 eggs
200ml milk
350g self raising flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt


Grease a cake tin and preheat the oven to 220°C


Beat together the eggs and the oil and then stir in the milk. Then slowly add the flour, salt and baking powder, beating all the time. 


Stir in the coriander, olives, onion and mint and mix it all together well. Now pour the mixture into the cake tin and pop it in the oven for about 45 minutes. When it is done, it should be golden brown and cooked in the middle. 

Leave it to cool and then serve in cake-like slices along with tzatziki or tahini and a big fat Greek salad.

Raviolia (Ραβιόλια)

This is a typical cypriot dish, perfect for an evening where time is short as these can be frozen and eaten at a later date. My yiayia makes these for my pappou at lunchtime and just the smell of the aromatic mint and halloumi takes me to the heart of Nicosia in the summer. Recently, I had one of those uneventful Sundays. There was some halloumi that my yiayia had bought me from Cyprus leftover and so decided to make some raviolia. In the cupboard I also have a stash of the most wonderful dried mint (also from my yiayia) and you really can smell the difference between that and the one from the supermarket...there is no comparison.

Ingredients: 

225g plan flour

2 tablespoons of olive oil

2 eggs

150g grated halloumi cheese

50ml warm water

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon ground cinammon

1 tablespoon dried mint

dash of pepper

You will also need a ravioli cutter or shaper.

In a bowl, mix together the flour, salt, oil and egg. Then add the water slowly and work the dough for around 5-10 minutes. The dough should be soft and not too sticky or too dry, if you need more water or flour then add it. Set it aside, covered with clingfilm and leave it for about half an hour.

For the filling, mix together the other egg, the halloumi and the spices and herbs.

Roll half of the the pastry out thinly and lay either on a floured surface or on to a ravioli shaper. If you doo not have a shaper then mark out regular squares of about 2x2cm. Place a spoon of the filling in the middle of each ravioli and then cover with a second thin layer of the pastry. Cut out the ravioli shapes and set them onto a plate.

When you have used up all of the pastry and filling, leave the raviolia for about half an hour. Afterwards, you can either cook them, boiling for about 10-15 minutes or freeze them. If you decide to freeze them then arrange them in layers with clingfilm in-between each layer so that they do not stick.

I like to eat them plain, with a drizzle of olive oil or in some vegetable stock. I also like to make a thick spicy tomato sauce and spoon it over the top.

This is what we eat when we are in Cyprus and are too tired to go out to eat. There is always a supply of them in the freezer and they are so quick to just throw in the pan. But more importantly...they are delicious ;)