It's all Greek to Me: LA GreekFest 2006

After work on Friday, J and I headed down Normandie Ave to St. Sophia's Cathedral for the annual Los Angeles GreekFest. The Fest takes place at the center of the Byzantine-Latino Quarter of Los Angeles, one of those interesting neighborhood mash-ups you find in this city where layers of immigrant groups and history have merged into an curious mix.


Our first stop was the wine tasting booth, manned by some guys who had perhaps sampled a significant portion of the goods already. We opted for two random Greek red wines at $5/each, then noticed the sign hawking a 3 glasses for $10 deal. When we asked about a third glass, however, the server shook his head, waved his hand and said, "Oh that's too complicated," and went on to serve the next guest. We were in no mood for arguing and as our first sips of the wine were settling in our brains, we realized we weren't really missing much.


Dinner consisteed of a shared moussaka, a baked, layered dish with ground beef, eggplant and a creamy, cheesy (eggy?) topping. New to us was the tiropita, a cheesy, lemony, nutmegy mixture encased in flaky filo dough, often served as a breakfast dish.

For dessert we shared a heaping plate of loukomathes--fried dough balls drizzled with honey and sprinkled with cinnamon.

We capped our night not with ouzo but by watching the Zorba the Greek dance contest. It was the first (and probably the last time) I will ever see someone do the robot--and a really freaking good robot--to Zorba the Greek. Good times.

The festival continues through Sunday, and costs $3 to attend (there's a $1 off coupon on the website). Since this is LA, there's $10 valet parking, but we found a spot on the street just a few blocks away.