Divine Diet
Greek Monastic Food Gets Cookbook Treatment
Last updated Friday, August 15, 2008 6:05 PM CDT in Religion
By Derek Gatopoulos
The Associated Press
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MOUNT ATHOS, Greece - In a secluded Orthodox Christian sanctuary, the phone is ringing again for Father Epifanios Milopotaminos.
Ever since he wrote a cookbook sharing his secrets for feeding his fellow monks, Milopotaminos' cell phone rings constantly with requests to speak at seminars, appear on television and do cooking demonstrations.
He's an unlikely candidate for sudden celebrity; in the nearly four decades since he took charge of cooking on the secluded Mount Athos sanctuary, little about what he does has changed.
"It's the same way meals were prepared 100 years ago, or 50 years ago," Epifanios says of the meat- and dairy-free diet, much of it cooked over a log fire. "It's a clean diet that people once ate across the eastern Mediterranean."
This year he shared that diet, collecting 126 of his recipes in a book that provides a rare glimpse into life in this community of some 1,500 monks in 20 monasteries that strictly limits outside access, including barring women.
And people appear to like what they see.
"People are curious because we use different ingredients and different methods," he says.
Epifanios already has appeared on a popular Greek cooking show and his publisher, Synchronoi Ozizontes, says the leather-bound cookbook has sold 12,000 copies, a healthy figure for the local market.
Athens nutrition scientist Paraskevas Papachristou says books such as Father Epifanios' get a great deal of attention because Greeks generally want to eat healthier.
Whether people actually make the recipes is another matter. Papachristou says the interest is at odds with an overall trend away from Mediterranean diets because people cook less and eat more convenience foods.
Published in April, "Cooking on Mount Athos" (so far available only in Greek) offers unpretentious, tasty recipes. Don't expect arugula with balsamic vinegar. Rather, lots of chickpeas and bitter wild greens.
"Monks at Mount Athos don't eat meat," says Epifanios. "The word butter is never mentioned in the book, and we don't add flour to thicken sauces. We just let the ingredients boil down."
Epifanios' catalog of recipes is divided into seafood - with and without backbones, according to different fasting categories - or vegetables. No desserts at the Holy Mountain.
Slow cooking suits the heavily bearded monks, who rise well before dawn and spend much of their day in prayer.
"We have a lot of time, without families, wives and children to tend to," Epifanios says.
"Everyone has a secondary job. One monk may be a librarian, another may write books, or make wooden carvings, or weave prayer knots, or be an icon painter, an incense maker, a winemaker, or a cook," he says.
Unlike the typical Greek priest, Mount Athos monks have a ruffled appearance, many with hands hardened from manual labor. They often can been spotted on the mountainous peninsula driving a tractor or a worn-out van.
Dinner, and its unhurried preparation, is where the talking takes place. Monks, migrant workers and guests sit around Epifanios' table peeling potatoes, slicing vegetables and topping up glasses with monastery made-wine or the potent grape-residue spirit, tsipouro.
On special occasions, it's the same food made on a much larger scale. The monks use two hefty wooden poles to place pots more than a yard wide onto outdoor fires.
Epifanios - who calls himself a cook, not a chef - says his meals are rooted as much in centuries old church practices as in common sense. Unfashionable ingredients such as broad beans, artichokes and okra, which many older Greeks still associate with poverty and often are ignored by the young, remain staples here.
"People are less in touch with their natural surroundings nowadays," Epifanios says. "They used to eat what they found around them and what they could gather.
"Now they try Chinese, Indian food, and dishes from - I don't know - Finland before they realize that what they really liked all along was the meals their grandmother made them."
Traditional versions of this dish call for salt cod, which is cod that has been salted and dried. Though delicious, salt cod can be tedious to prepare, as it must be soaked in water for hours to remove excess salt.
This version has been adapted for fresh cod, a substitution that also reduces cooking time.
Braised Cod With Plums
3 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 large yellow onion, diced
1 pound plums, halved and pitted
1 1/2 pounds cod
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
Juice of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
Ground black pepper, to taste
In a large, deep skillet over medium-high, combine the olive oil, garlic and onion. Saute until the onion just begins to soften, about 3 to 4 minutes.
Add the plums and saute another 2 minutes. Arrange the cod over the onions and plums, then add enough water to come halfway up the cod. Sprinkle the cod with salt, then bring the water to a simmer, cover and cook 15 minutes, or until the cod flakes easily.
Sprinkle the lemon juice and parsley over the cod, then season with pepper.
Servings: 4 to 6.
- Recipe inspired by Father Epifanios Milopotaminos' "Cooking on Mount Athos," (Synchronoi Ozizontes, 2008)
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