19/05/2026
“In the beginning, there was soutzoukakia”
There are dishes you simply eat.
And there are dishes that carry family, voices, Sundays, sweat, and stories.
Our soutzoukakia came with our family from Halkidiki.
They passed through the hands of great grandparents, grandparents, mothers, and now arrive in ours, not as a “dish,” but as a responsibility not to let memory disappear.
Cumin, garlic, pepper, soaked bread the old way, and strong fire to char them properly.
Not fine dining made for photographs.
Real food made for wine, loud conversations, and fingers that cannot stop reaching for one more piece.
And next to them?
A Barolo Cannubi 2016 from Damilano.
Cannubi.
The vineyard many in Piemonte whisper about as the Grand Cru of Barolo.
Rose petals, leather, tar, cherry, dried herbs, old wood, autumn soil.
And somewhere between the first and second glass, Nebbiolo starts reminding us of Xinomavro.
Like two cousins that grew up in different countries, one dressed in Italian tailoring, the other smelling of northern Greek earth, both stubborn, nervous, elegant and impossible to forget.
Some people would say it’s excessive to drink a Barolo like this with soutzoukakia.
I believe great wines do not need pretentious food.
They need honesty.
Carnivale
