Beyond any doubt, the concept of the Mediterranean diet has been the most forceful intellectual influence on our food in the past decade. The idea that less meat, and more pulses and grains, vegetables and olive oil, garlic and red wine is not just the basis for good eating, but is in fact the very way to keep ourselves alive and in good health, stole the limelight during the 1990s, when the Mediterranean diet received the imprimatur of both national governments and the medical profession.
But the idea goes back farther than that. Back in 1960, Robert Standish wrote: "Olives, olive oil, wine, figs, almonds, saffron, garlic, honey and goats' cheeses are the basis of the Mediterranean diet. This, in all probability, was the diet of Christ and the Apostles; of Socrates and Pythagoras, Plato and Homer; of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo. It was on such a diet that the Romans spread the Pax Romana to the ends of the earth and beyond, and on which Hannibal took his army across the Alps - that and a little meat."
What a staggering thought that is - that the staples of a continent's diet can remain unchanged through millennia, and indeed that those very staples can still be seen and eaten today in many parts of the Mediterranean. What a rebuke such an idea is to our affluent diet, with its burdensome fats and meats, its fundamentally unhealthy aspect.
The Mediterranean diet has endured, and has emerged as the diet of necessity, because it is healthy. But it has also endured because it is so delicious. To try to enumerate its riches is almost impossible, for the countries of the Mediterranean have each taken their raw ingredients and created such a panoply of extraordinary dishes with them that the glories of this huge melting pot can scarcely be counted.
In her book, The Mediterranean Diet, published in 1985, Robin Howe writes: "It is olive oil that unites the cooking of the region. From Gibraltar to the Bosphorus, it has shaped the cuisine of the Mediterranean, making a sharp contrast with the blander, butter-based cooking of the north. But oil alone would not be enough to give the food its character. There is also garlic, whose fragrance permeates everything: few Mediterranean dishes of a savoury kind are made without it." And then, in the 1990s, along came the news that, with the oil and garlic, we should take red wine also - for the good of our hearts. Glory be!
So, if you find yourself already wavering from the resolve to stick to that New Year diet, go ahead and scrap it. Don't deny yourself, but instead switch to the lighter, more natural flavours of the Mediterranean: the oil and garlic; the vegetables and fish, the grains and pulses; the bread and pasta; the nuts and cheeses. And start with these ideas.
If you want to eat more fish, then keep things simple by buying fillets of fish and grilling them, then pair them with this terrific sauce - a staple of the Greek diet. This version, which uses yogurt to lighten the sauce, comes from The Mediterranean Diet Cookbook, by Nancy Harmon-Jenkins. You need a mortar and pestle for this - a food processor would turn your potato to glue.
Skordalia
1 large potato
About 1/2lb of one-inch-thick slice of firm, Good white bread, crusts trimmed,
(about 2/3 cup)
3 large garlic cloves Chopped
salt to taste
1/2p extra-virgin olive oil
3/4 cup Greek-style yogurt
Juice of 1/2 lemon or more to taste
Pre-heat the oven to maximum and bake the potato for at least an hour or until it is very soft. Discard the potato skin and mash the flesh with a fork. You should have about two thirds of a cup.
Tear the bread into chunks, place in a bowl, and cover with cool water. Leave for just a minute or so, for the bread to absorb the water, then drain and squeeze the bread as dry as you can.
With a mortar and pestle, pound the garlic with about a teaspoon of salt until it is very smooth. Add the bread and continue pounding until the mixture is creamy, then pound in the potato flesh. Add the olive oil as if for a mayonnaise, a little at a time and stirring constantly. When about half the oil has been added, stir in the yogurt. When all the oil has been added, you should have a thick, homogeneous, rather creamy mass. Stir in the lemon juice. Taste the sauce and adjust the seasoning, adding more salt, pepper and lemon juice if desired.
Mediterranean cookery techniques and ingredients adapt beautifully to vegetables which we think of as staples of our winter diet, such as leeks.
This lovely, simple idea is from Arabella Boxer's Mediterranean Cookbook.
Leeks Nicoise
2 1/2 lb (1.15kg) thin leeks
1 large onion
4 tablespoons olive oil
1lb (450g) tomatoes
sea salt and black pepper
1/2 teaspoon sugar
2 cloves garlic, crushed 2 tablespoons parsley
1/2 tablespoon lemon juice
Trim the leeks, leaving them whole. Clean them well, then drain and pat dry. Slice the onion and cook gently in the oil in a broad, heavy pan until it starts to colour. Add the leeks, turning them over and over in the oil.
Add the skinned and chopped tomatoes, sea salt and black pepper, sugar and crushed garlic, and cover the pan. Cook slowly for 10 to 15 minutes, until the leeks are tender, moving them round from time to time so they cook evenly. When tender, lift them out with a slotted spoon and lay on a flat dish. Boil up the sauce till reduced and tasty. Turn off the heat, add parsley and lemon juice, and spoon over the leeks. Leave to cool somewhat before serving, but do not chill. Serves four as a first course, or six with two other dishes.
And Mediterranean cookery doesn't stand still. This modern adaptation of sauted squid and soulful mashed potatoes is a funky idea from Food Of The Sun - a fresh look at Mediterranean Cooking, by Alastair Little and Richard Whittington, which uses a Chinese technique of scoring the squid, and marries the noble spud with good fruity olive oil.
Seared Squid Steaks with Olive Oil Mashed Potatoes
1 red onion
4 tablespoons olive oil
hot red chillies
2 garlic cloves
4 squid steaks (see below)
salt and pepper
small handful coriander leaves to finish,
extra-virgin olive oil, to serve
For the Olive Oil Mashed Potato:
900 grams (2 lb) potatoes
5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
Buy large squid - two 450 grams (1lb) tubes would be perfect to give four rectangular steaks, 115 grams (4 oz) in weight, with the flesh at least 5mm (1/4 inch) thick. Cut down one side and open up. Trim at the pointed (tail) end: each will make two steaks. Once trimmed carefully, cut a diamond cross-hatch into each side, taking care not to cut all the way through.
Peel the potatoes and cut them into chunks. Cook them in a large pan of boiling salted water for 20 minutes, or until just tender.
While they are cooking, peel and dice the onion and fry until browned in a little of the olive oil.
De-seed the chillies, cut the flesh into thin strips and add to the onion. Peel, smash and chop the garlic, adding to the pan only as the onions are cooked. Stir to cook briefly and remove from the heat and reserve.
Prepare the squid steaks as described, brush with the remaining oil, season with salt and pepper.
When the potatoes are cooked, drain well and mash them with the extra-virgin olive oil and season with salt, pepper and grated nutmeg. Keep warm.
De-stalk and chop the coriander.
Heat two dry frying pans until very hot. Lay two steaks in each; ready to turn with tongs after 30 seconds. Turn and, as they roll up, take the pans off the heat and scatter the onion mixture over them.
Transfer to warmed, individual serving plates and serve at once, with a big spoonful of the mashed potatoes and with the fried onion, garlic and chilli mixture scattered over. Finish with chopped coriander leaves. A little more extra-virgin olive oil may be poured over, if desired.