Rethymno | Why Crete has The Best food in Greece

Rethymno | Why Crete has The Best food in Greece

As good as food is all over Greece, if you ask Greeks where to go for the best food in the   country they will likely tell you to go to Crete.  There’s even a say go to Santorini to fall in love  

Mykonos to party and go to Crete to eat. I’m in heaven. We  just stopped at our favorite coffee shop in Rethymno   and we’re on our way to Hasika, our favorite restaurant.  This is a really cool opportunity, we’re guest  

Of Michalis Hasikos. Also joining us for lunch today  will be our favorite producers from the Rethymno   region. So your tattoo says Kefi? Do you manage to  translate that to your American friends? So there’s   no real translation. yeah but it’s I think it’s an  interesting.. like the feeling the spirit something  

That my yia yia always would say is if you’re going  to do something, you must do it with Kefi. Kefi is a word that does not translate well to English.  Kefi can be used to describe many good things: Joy,  

Spirit, passion, happiness, Triumph, Mojo, feeling good,  having fun and loving life. People here don’t need   to drink to relax the body, they need to drink to  express their Joy they express their feeling and   share it with others. You lift your spirit a little  bit above and enjoy the moment this is Kefi.

means white bottom which means drink it all in one shot. okay. Time out. Let’s talk about how we got here. All  over Greece, the people say Cretans are different.   They’re known for their hospitality, their love of raki, olive oil, produce, trade history, and most  

Importantly their pride in their strong traditions.  What makes Crete different? It’s more than just   being able to find whatever you’re looking for on  this island. Here, on Rethymno, these traditions feel   even more preserved. In Crete’s third largest city, the  middle of Heraklion and Chania, the smaller population  

And less Big Industry helps keep Traditions strong.  The Gastronomy in Rethymno perfectly reflects what is at   the core of this region, traditional while also  being modern. On my first trip to Rethymno I was   alone at Hasika and had the most delicious meal I  had on Crete. They also have the best greek salad  

I’ve ever eaten and I’ve had a lot. I love that  their food is not only traditional but creative   and different so I was eager to bring Katina  here after coming back to Crete and sharing this   experience with her. Katina’s first observation  here was how incredible this olive oil was. [Greek]

A few weeks before our gathering we were invited  out to harvest olives at Efkrato by cousins Manolis   and Andreas, the family behind this delicious  oil. Katina this is my Aunt, Katina. All these trees are   tsounati trees. I believe it’s the most ancient  variety in the Cretan space and the second oldest  

In the Greek space. What we’re doing right now  is early cultivation? It’s quite early, yes, but   things are changing. I mean 10 years ago you  would have really difficulties finding a mill   owner running his Mill by October. We call this  tsounati tree the diva because they need special  

Care. I can tell you put love into the trees,  the oil you make. What is special about Efkrato, we are   not only collecting the olives but also sorting  out damaged olives, rotten olives, we want them   to be in flawless condition when they arrive  at the mill. It’s a very important factor that  

We have a big percentage of organic matter in  the soil or contributing to the well-being of   the Olive Grove in the long run. In Crete olive  trees have been cultivated ever since humans   were on the island this means that there is a  lot of knowledge but very often people just do  

Things as their parents have done it without  reflecting. I was pushed from others to put   fertilizer, do this, do that and they were all  measures that should have an effect in a short   run.. and this sounds strange to me because  these are trees that have maybe now 70, 80,  

90 years, some of the trees we have are hundreds  of year old. Why should I change the rhythm of a   plant that lives in terms of hundreds of years?  This tree must be older than 500 years I guess.  

Wow. It teaches you to be patient, you can’t  push. You have to adapt at the rhythm of the tree. [Greek] [Greek] Efkrato olive oil was only the first exceptional local  product that we had discovered at Hasika when we  

Had come here before. Next, we ordered a bottle  of wine, which our new friend Mary recommended   because I wanted to drink a Red and Katina a Rosé. We  quickly fell in love with this wine as Katina   explained to the producer, IIiana Malihin. It became  our favorite amongst our first taste. I made these  

Rosè because I wanted to pair with the Cretan Cuisine.  it’s a Mediterranean style of Rosé, not a pale one   like provant so it’s the perfect pairing with the  Cretan and dishes with tomato sauce, and with the meat,  

With the traditional gemista, with (?) you can pair it with  everything.. and it’s also 100% Rethymian wine. Love   that. Yeah you do. We found that this particular  wine is popularly served all over the old town  

Of Rethymno. Iliana is well known throughout Crete for  creating wines at such a young age. Her first wine   was produced when she was only 24. My dream is to  place Rethyno on the wine map and also to give   

Motivation to the locals to stay in the village,  to cultivate and to have a very good income   from this. The big dream is this, to make villages  alive again. In 2022 there was a big wildfire in  

Rethymno, which caused major losses in the region. This  also created a big loss for Iliana’s Vineyards and   Olive Groves. While unfortunately the olive trees  won’t recover, with the help of the community of   Rethymno they were able to revive The vineyards.  You can imagine how important it is to have  

Good friends, to be a warm community with locals  that help each other they love each other and   they love also their land. The Rethymno land. So for me  it’s very important the love for each other and  

The love for our place. For Rethymno. IIiana is proud  that she only uses grapes from Rethymno villages to   make wine. I feel like we have discovered some  new favorite wines. In Crete, they grow basically   everything, they make basically everything. They  even use handmade phyllo which this shop in Rethymno 

Is one of the last in the world to do. Everything  is from here and has its own flavor and it’s incredible. [Greek] And now that the region has such  great products holding on to tradition   while also using the newest information  to cultivate, Hasikos wanted to be able to  

Showcase the good local products at  his restaurant.. which is really what   brought us to this table. Many cultures have  passed through Crete, from the Venetians, the   Ottomans and many people came to Crete  from Asia Minor. Hasika is able to take these  

Traditions and bring them into today while still  maintaining the flavors and memories of the old Times.. and absolutely everything here is delicious.   That is so good. So they have  the lamb of Cretan cuisine and he used the bulgur from [Greek] With better products and exceptional knowhow   it’s no wonder this restaurant has some  of the best food we have ever

Eaten. We discovered our favorite wine at Hasika.. and  our favorite olive oil. Iliana and Manolis are truly   trying to pioneer the way as they have exceptional  attention to detail to produce the most quality   products possible. Michalis says the best we can  do is get the right products to pass on to the  

Next Generations. In Rethymno they are proud of their  history and hold on to their traditions.. but they   also pour their new knowledge creativity and  soul into what they’re doing. I think this is   the real ingredient that makes the food, the oil,  the wine so good here. I think the most important  

Is “the marriage” of the past techniques and the  new ones. You have to have the knowledge of for   example for wineology but to bring it together  with the old techniques I think this is the best. [Greek] The people of Rethymno work with passion, live  with pride, love, companionship, and joy.

If we didn’t have the word that we were mentioning today,  kefi, the obvious choice would be to just uh   you know focus on the other variety. If you want to  understand what the word Kefi means, look no farther  

Than the people of Rethymno. Because the people  here truly embody the word, the spirit, the feeling, Kefi. Don’t forget to like  And subscribe to follow along

Rett and Katina travel to Rethymno Crete to discover why Crete has the best food in Greece. The Crete culture is centered around food and there is so much great produce in Crete. We dine with renowned chef Michalis Hasikos at his resteraunt, Hasika, and guests from our favorite producers in Crete. Hasika is known as one of the best restaurants in Crete as they serve modern Greek food while also holding true to traditional greek food. We also visit the Tsounati olive grove of Efkrato to harvest olives for their high phenolic olive oil as well as visit Iliana Milihin at her winery.

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