I wear a lot of different hats as a de facto Greek food ambassador and “guru” of the cuisine. I am the consulting chef at three popular Greek restaurants: Pylos (NYC), Axia (NJ), and Avli (Chicago), and am working on a fourth, Boukies, a meze concept in downtown Manhattan. In that capacity, I create and organize the menus, new dishes, events, and other related activities to the successful operation of each restaurant.
I’ve written 18 books on Greek cuisine, including the IACP-awarded Glorious Foods of Greece and the forthcoming Country Cooking of Greece (Chronicle, 2012).
I appear regularly on American television, including “Throwdown with Bobby Flay,” “Bizarre Foods,” “Foodography,” the “PBS News Hour,” and “360° w/Anderson Cooper”” and write regularly for major international media, including: the Washington Post, Dow Jones wire, Food & Wine, Gourmet Live, zesterdaily.com and more.
You can see my cooking videos of traditional, healthy Greek fare at www.youtube.com/greekfoodtv, the first Greek web TV venture. I also consult for retail operations, including the Hellenic Gourmet shop at the Athens airport.
Together with my husband, Vassilis Stenos, we own and operate Glorious Greek Food, a recreational cooking school on the Blue Zone island of Ikaria. In addition to regular weeklong classes, we organize culinary tours around Greece for interested travelers, foodies, and food and beverage professionals.
I divide my time between New York, Ikaria, and Athens, where I am the restaurant critic and food columnist for Greece’s largest daily paper, Ta Nea.