Set out on an exhilarating journey of gastronomic imagination to Chania or Haniá, one of the most desired Cretan destinations!
A bouyátsa with cream, a delicious cream pie dusted with powdered sugar based on an old Asia Minor recipe, is the sweetest way to start your day! Continue your culinary quest with a visit to the “temple of gastronomy”, the Chania Municipal Market.
Here, in a deep mystic atmosphere, wander around various food stores, and taste the divine gifts of Cretan Nature!
Search for all the ingredients of the world renowned Cretan diet: aromatic herbs and fresh edible weeds, virgin olive oil, pulses and vegetables, cereals, fish, meat, dairy products, honey and fennel.
Taste culinary delights like fresh handmade wedding cookies, dry bread wreaths, yraviéra cheese (full fat sheep’s cheese with appellation of controlled origin), sweet smelling anthótyros from Sfakiá (fresh, soft, white cheese made of either sheep’s or goat’s milk), fresh stàka butter (the cream of the butter) for the Cretan wedding rice (rice cooked in meat broth), roasted goat or sea food delights – special ingredients blended in delicious sea-urchin salads or divine fish soups!
Our journey has not yet come to an end! Stroll down the Old Town and the Venetian Fortress and relish a delicious meal in exquisite restaurants.
Indulge your palate with traditional Cretan specialties: eggs with stàka, cretan kalitsoùnia (sweet mini cheese pies), lamb served with spiny chicory, dácos (the traditional hard Cretan bread accompanied with tomato, mizithra cheese and plenty of virgin Cretan oil), snails boubouristì (popping fried snails), haniótiko bouréki (patty from Chania, a vegetable specialty) and kserotigana (honey dipped spiral pastries). Gourmet specialists will be delighted by the wide range of choices that can easily satisfy all tastes and desires!
Accompany your dinner with a glass of deep-red Cretan wine, the divine marouvás or drink after your meal an ice-cold tsikoudiá (or raki), traditional Cretan spirits distilled from pomace, with a delicate aroma of ripe grapes. The treat is always on the house, a sign of traditional Cretan hospitality!
The non-alcohol lovers can have a hot soothing drink instead, the herb dittany, widely known in Crete as “diktamo”. The Cretans prefer to call it “eróntas” (meaning “love”). They definitely feel true love for it.
Otherwise, we couldn’t explain the reason why they climb up the steep slopes of Mt. Psiloreitis, searching for it!
