Our next stop in Tinos was at Marathia restaurant which is located on the beach of Marathia. There, we were welcomed by two lovely dogs, Marathia and Svoura. These two must be living their dream lives, you could easily see that in their peaceful eyes and the way they were moving around. No stress at all even though they had strangers in their house.

At the entrance of the restaurant we met Evripidis whom I remember from when I was very little, at See You restaurant in Sani, Chalkidiki, treating my grandfather with rare kindness. Since then, I’ve been keeping up with his remarkable career in the restaurant industry, a career that includes many achievements and places; from Athens, where he worked as restaurant manager at a Michelin starred restaurant, to Marathia, Tinos, a place that offers an abundance of wonderful ingredients and a unique location.. I completely understand why he came here.

I feel extremely lucky that a familiar face was there to welcome us and that he gave us the opportunity to cook along with the great team of Marathia’s cooks for the blog. It’s important to mention that there is a head chef in Marathia who is also quite known –and very patient, I might add- but he prefers to be presented as part of his team instead of talking about him specifically.. So, from now on, it’s team Marathia!

Lastly, let me to introduce you to Mr. Marinos Souranis, owner of Marathia restaurant as well as Marathia apartments, whom we’d like to thank for the hospitality. We left with a wish for many endless conversations with him in the future! Another thing that really impressed me (and I’ll stop blabbering, I promise) was the fact that all the waiters were familiar faces from last year, which is amazing and not an easy thing to achieve in island restaurants. So, congratulations on that too, Mr. Marinos!

Now, let the cooking commence! “What are we cooking?” we asked Evripidis… “Wild artichoke”, he said!

The chef comes out of the kitchen with his assistant, a table is set and they start cleaning the wild artichokes. They also have a bowl with water and lemon juice next to them so that they can soak the artichokes in and maintain their colour. Wild artichoke can be quite thorny and requires attention but it’s one of the most beautiful flowers I've ever seen. This must have been the idea behind the styling of this wonderful dish. I love how something so wild and thorny can be transformed into such a tender and delicate flower, and it was one of those flowers that a cook opened religiously with a kitchen tweezer and then placed it into a black plate to showcase its colours, glorifying the ingredient and respecting all the hard work.

Inside the restaurant, a fish dry aging refrigerator caught my eye.. I started walking towards it excitedly and Evripidis quickly informed me that this is the first one in Greece and that they are now testing it on some oily fish which are left for about 20 days to age and develop a deeper flavour. I didn’t get the chance to try this dish as it’s still going through a more experimental stage but I’m positive I will on my next visit to the island.

After our cookery was finished and we snapped some pictures of our stunning dish, it was finally time for us to sit and enjoy our dinner by the beach. It was during the most wonderful time of the day and the scenery was unique. I didn’t want to take any more pictures, I just wanted to enjoy the moment. I had the most tasteful scorpionfish soup amongst many other delicious dishes and tried 2016’s Τ-ΟΙΝΟΣ Mavrotragano wine (in expectation of 2017’s which I tried during an event in Mykonos about a month ago and I loved it). Our dinner was exceptional both in flavour and appearance and was concluded with a strawberry Pavlova and my favourite tsoureki flavoured ice-cream, which comes as a surprise as it has the taste of something that is usually consumed while it’s warm and airy. I suppose that’s why it gives me such a warm feeling despite the fact that it’s, well, ice-cream.