Haris Nikolouzos. Chef
Φωτό: Τάσος Τσέκουρας
BYO Athens meets one of the most up-and-coming chefs of Greek cuisine in his kitchen.
"Long, long ago and very by chance, I found myself in a tavern." The previous year, he was in a pastry shop without thought or vision of becoming a cook or pastry chef. He was still attending technical high school when this happened and was doing it for a living. At least, he thought so. "I was very young. I must have been 14." However, the days in the tavern passed, and he grew with an additional joy that he could not explain. "I was starting to like cooking." All this develops in Corfu, of which he is a native.
After that first tavern, continue to the next one. "This transition helped me greatly because they taught me to cook traditionally and distinguish the taste. Also, he needs to understand the correct fillings" to change them later. "Two years ago at the "Seleni" restaurant, I was more "teased".
His enrollment in a Culinary School was inevitable. "That's when I decided I wanted to do something better than taverns." That's when the desire to move into the "restaurant" track entered his mind. And just like that, Hector Botrini's "Etruscan" came to write his biography in golden letters. "I lived there for some years. It's the best restaurant in Greece, and I was happy because I didn't have to leave Corfu by working there." He continued his journey to Halkidiki. "I went for a season at "Danai" whose kitchen was headed by Herve Prontsato with chef Vassilis Mouratidi". Learn. Constantly.
"Suddenly, in 2013-2014, I was offered to take over the restaurant "Dionysos" in Acropolis with the help and support of Michalis Duneta". From then until today, he has been in charge of the kitchens. "I'm like a chef." As if by agreement, the kitchen bell rang. Some preparation had been completed. In our discussion, we decided: "I don't like the term chef; I prefer the term cook." We are all cooks. Chefs are the ones you are ashamed to look into their eyes. Let's say Hector's father was a chef. He was a chef in every sense of the word."
Φωτό: Τάσος Τσέκουρας
What is missing from the staff of the Greek restaurant
"The honourable one." And stability. "England and London are the oases of gastronomy. All the big guys there open a restaurant, and it's no accident. Not only because that's where the money circulates, but also because that's where the correct logistics take place." For Grace, there is America in the world, and in Europe, there is England. "In England, you go and eat, and they know who you are, what you do, what you eat. Is the hospitality top there and the most important thing? The consistency. A thousand times to always bring out the same mediocre food than once to give it good, once bad, once mediocre, once perfect, once crap. Here in Greece, few restaurants have this." He explains that he and his team at Jerar are trying to achieve this.
The raw material
"In Greece, we have a huge problem with the raw material. We have excellent materials, but we don't use them. We are not looking for them. We are interested in the dove from France, the flower from Holland." A shopkeeper appeared before us. She briefly took Harry away and handed him a package. "It was seaweed from Rhodes."
The term "Greek cuisine"
"We cannot say on a menu "Greek cuisine" and the pork is from the Netherlands or the lamb from New Zealand. I avoid the phrase because in most of the restaurants I worked at, we used it all the time. Now in Jerar despite the fact that all the products I use are Greek, I don't include her somewhere because here, I do what I want. Whatever comes to me." Now, she goes public twice a week. “Now, it has lemons, we don't have lemons all the time. We've made them puree, we've made them sweet, we've made them zesty." Inspired by seasonality. "Suppliers don't make it easy for us."
The recipes
"I really wanted to make a pigeon but I was frustrated that while we have many pigeons in Greece, the supplier is France. When I found the raw material, I started looking for pigeon recipes." It goes together somewhat. "At some point, I wanted to make my own pork, not Dutch. To find a cut of my own. We have some of the best pork in the world, I wanted to find a good supplier." No one had. "I wanted a specific piece, but I couldn't find it." He ended up getting the whole thing from an estate in Crete. "I said I'm not going to make it look pretty, I'm going to make it different." One will make it fricassee, and one with beetroot sauce.
Perfecting the dish
"When I work on a dish, I'll take it to 50-60%. He must spend at least two months in the kitchen to catch a good percentage. The more you work on a dish in the kitchen and not in your head, the more likely you are to perfect it." In Jerar, they are open from April 2022. "Dishes from the first day until today go a click higher".
Φωτό: Τάσος Τσέκουρας
The new trend in shops
It avoids looking at the "Menu". Still, he agrees that this much-hyped dining outing is slowly on the wane. "The trend now is what we propose. We opened, and ten other shops opened with the same philosophy."
Five materials for an exile on the planet Mars
"The wheat." In the restaurant, they bake fantastic bread. "We make a sourdough called Kapodistrias since I am from Corfu and have been carrying it since 2018. We make our bread, yogurt, ice cream, cold meats." And here, a parenthesis opens to say that Jerar's sausages are their signature plate. Second material: "the olive". Third material: "Legume". Fourth: "My sausages." Fifth: "Greens".
"Are we supposed to go to Mars?" Because we talk about it a lot."
Five years from now, its evolution will be:
"I have thought a lot. My dream is to return to Corfu with my family and have a restaurant with my lemon trees, my orange trees, my well, the cold meats I will make at home, and the wines I will collect as I do now".
