Greek Dinner at the Haigh’s

Last Saturday, Erin invited a group of us over for dinner. As a tribute to Athi’s Greek roots (not to mention Rachel Ray), our gracious host decided to cook chicken souvlaki sticks with tzatziki and orzo pasta with grape tomatoes and feta – yum! Needless to say, dinner was a big hit. The meal took less than half an hour to prepare and ranked highly on the taste vs. cooking ability scale.

Inspired by the Haigh’s success, I decided to rehash the meal last night, as a surprise for the boyfriend (who often ends up doing a lot of our cooking). Here are the results:

I’ve never cooked orzo before, but discovered that its surprising easy (and deliciously good) tossed with a handful of crumbled feta and a half pint of grape tomatoes halved and left to juice with fresh young basil leaves.

The chicken souvlaki is best prepared with tender chicken breast marinated for ten minutes in a mix of olive oil, garlic, herbs and spices and then threaded and grilled (either George Foreman style or out on the BBQ).

The tzatziki is surprisingly similar to raita – an Indian yoghurt concoction, especially desirable when trying to cut the intense spices of a curried meat – only based on thicker greek yoghurt rather than the more watery Indian kind. I whipped it up with some grated cucumber and spices before serving it as a dipping sauce for the chicken skewers.