Author: Oana
#CookTogether with Riverford
I love cooking. It all started when I was a little girl, with me watching my mum cook all our meals from scratch. My first memory of getting involved (and my mum was great at that, she always had the patience and the enthusiasm to have both my brother and myself “help” her out) was making dough balls on a winter’s day in my mum’s cosy, steamed up kitchen. My love affair with food grew as the years flew by and I got to travel and see the world. There is nothing I love more than a hot fondue after a day out and about in the snow, when in Switzerland. Or a fresh salad, full of earthly goodness and some Feta cheese, as a bonus, when dining out in Greece! I had hoped, once I had children, that they will inherit my love for travelling and adventure. My wish came true! Emma is becoming a passionate and astute traveller who can charm the socks off a Turkish palace guard for a smile(and a picture!), …
A second day in Istanbul
Last night, we aimed to eat out at a local restaurant not far away from here, but it was closed. It was the Eid, after all and we didn’t expect small, local restaurants to be open on the equivalent of our Christmas Day! Our lovely hotel guide thankfully had a back up plan and took us to one of the touristy parts of the town, to Kalamar, a fish restaurant. We were told all day yesterday that the Turks would be celebrating and knowing how family-oriented the Muslim culture is, I did expect the place to be full of foreigners. It wasn’t! Young and restless local Turks were out with their girlfriends and close friends, having their bayram with loud drum music, singing and dancing (on tables, Emma would add!) and plenty of food and drink! On the second day of Eid, the atmosphere in Istanbul reminds one of European countries on Boxing Day. Tranquility. Contentment. Peace. We had a day planned in the Bazaar, which is only two tram stops away from the hotel …
Visiting Istanbul…by mistake!
As you know from my last post, we have been travelling within Greece in the last weeks and were meant to be back to Thessaloniki, where we have our summer base, yesterday. But as life has it, I am writing this post from a sunny hotel lounge in…Istanbul! Let me tell you how we got here. Yesterday, on our way back to the airport, we had a very near car crash. A crash which would most likely have been fatal for all of us, had it had happened. We then proceeded to return our rental car to Goldcar Rental in Koropi. We had experienced issues with them when we had picked up the car and we allowed half an hour to return the car this time. Foolish miscalculation! Their ATM wasn’t working and after FOUR(!!!) unsuccessful attempts to return our deposit, we knew we were very close to missing our flight back to Thessaloniki. Which we did… We sat there, shell-shocked after the near-crash, furious following the car rental mishaps (which, from the sound of …
Stunning Andros Island
We have been in Greece for over two weeks now and have done some serious travelling so far. We are based in Perea, near Thessaloniki, where we rent a small apartment all year round. I am planning on writing a blog post on how this is possible, to have a holiday home in a warm, Mediterranean climate, without necessarily paying top pound for your holidays. But today, I will introduce you to the island of Andros, one of the beautiful Cycladic islands but less known than Mykonos, the over-touristy and loud one! Andros, with a rich history and known in the olden days as Micra Anglia(Little England), due to its cosmopolitan and cultured atmosphere, can easily be reached by ferry boat from the port of Rafina, in Athens. We had a pleasant, less than two hours ride and arrived here mid-morning. We had rented a car in Athens as we wanted to have flexibility of transportation in the capital so our ferry boat journey in, with the car and three passengers, was 82 euro. The …
Mama's Haven 