"Fakes" or lentil soup....and High School!!

Let's go back to my high school days in Montreal. Those were the days. Noone could pronounce my name..Pa..na...giota..that sounds  Greek to me right! I took the jokes with a grain of salt and actually I also made fun of myself , I loved making people laugh. Needless to say my friends called me Penny, a little more anglosaxon, but I didn't care I wanted to fit in.

One thing though that was impossible to laugh at, was when people asked me about the food we ate at home. Most of the kids squirmed at the thought of......for example...Fakes (lentil soup)..they usually asked " what the f...k are Fakes". How about Octopus with rice, anyone for squid, or how about eating bitter greens (radikia)..you know the kind our moms used to go to the fields and collect in big garbage bags. Do you guys eat lamb, okra, green beans, fish brain....and all in one week!!!! Yes it sounds strange but that it is how we ate in Canada because our sweet,  controlling, traditional Greek moms  always insisted that THIS was the right way to eat.

Then their was the olive oil. Everywhere olive oil!! My dad would pour olive oil on his toast, cook his eggs in olive oil and finally pick up the salad bowl and drink the last drop of oil on the plate so as not to waste any precious bit. I was taught that olive oil is a very special gift from nature and must be treated with respect and never..but absolutely never wasted!!

Guess what, looking back..they were right!!!

If only we had realized sooner that the Mediterranean diet would be so popular to western health fanatics, we could have walked the halls of Dunton High School with our heads held high...and maybe WE could have sold all this knowledge and made a fortune..it was all there..right in our kitchens...

Recipe for Lentil Soup  (Fakes)

500 gr lentils
1 large onion
2 medium size carrots
1 cup crushed tomatoes
2 bay leaves
3 cloves of garlic
2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon chilli pepper flakes
coarse sea salt and peper to taste

Place the lentils, garlic and bay leaves  in a pot of water (about 2-3 inches over the lentils) and let boil on medium heat until the lentils are half cooked ( about 15minutes).
In the meantime puree in a blender  the onion, carrot and crushed tomatoe. Add this mixture to the boiling lentils, as well as the remaining ingredients and simmer until the water reduces and the lentils are cooked into a creamy soup. (Be careful not to evaporate all the liquid)

* serve with kalamata olives, fresh bread, and marinated anchovies.