“Have I ever told you the Meze story?” This shall be the
opening line for many years to come, as I will most definitely retell this hilarious
story till I am old and gray.
Driving back to
Lemesos after a fun visit to
Aphrodite’s beach,
Verse and I stopped in the old town. We wandered about a bit, checking out
stores and an art gallery. Verse at this point was very hungry and really
wanted to get a very small snack before going home. This small snack was meant
to hold us until we went out to dinner later. Hurriedly (and hungrily), he
chose a place to eat and ordered two vegetarian Mezes from the chalkboard menu at
the entrance. The owner of the restaurant looked very confused and asked in
broken English, “You want two vegetarian Mezes?” Verse replied yes as we sat
down in the empty restaurant. At this point I had the urge to ask the man what
exactly the Meze was as I vaguely remember reading about it in my lonely planet
guidebook but because of his limited English and Verse’s growing hunger I didn’t
want to keep back the ordering process and kept quiet. We sat waiting for our
two small vegetarian pies to arrive, which in Verse’s mind was what we were
waiting to receive.
A few minuets later the owner brought out some olives and Tahini
and we were thankful for the appetizer to get us started. Chomping on those
dishes, we soon realized more plates were coming out filled with different
kinds of food. It suddenly hit us that what we were expecting was not at all
what we were receiving. Before the end of the meal 20 different dishes were
brought out…enough food to feed 6 people comfortably. We were shocked! Meant to
be a social meal shared among a group, the
Meze features a variety of local
dishes brought out in batches from appetizers to vegetables to different types
of meat. We sat laughing hysterically at the mistake and tried to eat all the
dishes the owner proudly brought out to us. Beet root, potato salad, green
salad, steamed veggies, grilled cheese, eggplant, zucchini, baked potatoes,
steamed potatoes, caviar, grilled fish, dolmathakia (stuffed grape leaves with
rice and herbs), toast, calamari, muscles, fried crab meat with the gundys, cous
cous and macaroni were among some of the things to come out from the kitchen to
feed us. The food was very tasty but because I am nearly a vegan most of the
eating was done by Verse so as not to insult the owner. Needless to say we were
stuffed after the meal and our small snack became my birthday dinner. Surprise
for me! We rolled ourselves home and sat in the hotel in a semi comatose state
laughing for the rest of the evening. (That didn’t stop us from having some
more champagne and my birthday ice cream cake though.) Great company,
adventure, beach trip, good food, new experiences and laughter are all the makings
of an amazing birthday! What a blessed day!
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| Walking around the Old Town in Lemesos |
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| Old Town, Lemesos |
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| An art exhibition, Old Town, Lemesos |
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| Megaro Restaurant |
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| Plates kept coming with flavourful items |
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| Stuffed and happy |
Even though I had heard the story before - it was still funny and gave me a laugh to brighten up my long night of working! - Thanks for that! M
ReplyDeleteSure looks good, and what an interesting experience!
ReplyDelete