Zagori

Epirus, a poor region, cruel, with wild beauty, gave birth to the great national benefactors, taught ethos and dignity, and gave gastronomy its wonderful pies.
The impressive mountains of the Pindos, the inaccessible pastures, the wild rivers and the tranquil lakes have shaped the manners and customs of its inhabitants for centuries. Place isolated, sparsely populated, poor, with agricultural land covering only 10% of the land, Epirus pushed most of its population into livestock breeding and cheese making. Despite all the poverty and desolation, the place radiates a melancholy beauty, unique in Greece. A beauty born of pain and deprivation, as expressed by the polyphonic songs of the place.

Epirus cooking is a bridge between South and north, east and west. It marries the olive oil with the sheep butter, it uses meats and vegetables, but mainly makes pies. Corn is the typical cereal of Epirus agriculture cultivated in the mountainous fields, and corn flour, much cheaper than wheat, is the basis for breads and pies. The memorable scholar of Epirus gastronomy Alexandros Giotis, having recorded 178 pie recipes in the Epirus menu, writes: “Pita on Epirus is both bread and food and eat and prosfagi, because it was the basic, main part of the diet of the nomads breeders, the skinites, the Vlachoi and Sarakatanaioi “. The most famous pies of Epirus are the kasopita, the batsina, the blatsara, the meat pie, the chicken pie, the cabbage pie (cabbage is grass of the mountain), the milk pie.

In Epirus, with its rocky, rough mountainous areas, meat was always consumed in large quantities, with goat, lamb and veal being honoured. Cooked goat with plenty of sauce, whole lamb of milk baked in oven with potatoes, spleen from sheep and goat intestines wrapped with intestines and roasted on the spit, fraggelia of marinated pieces of lamb liver Wrapped in a canopy (slips) and passed on grilled skewers, and we must not forget the abundance of mushrooms, chestnuts and other fruits of the forest that accompanied the meats in the cooked foods.