Name: 7 Day From Athens to Tinos Island: A Greek Culinary Odyssey in Greece
Brand: Culinary Backstreets LLC
Price: 4000 USD
Availability: InStock

Greece Culinary Tour

Join Culinary Backstreets LLC for a movable feast that begins in the modern metropolis of Athens with its ancient backdrop and then sails on to Tinos, where you'll explore this idyllic island and its unique cuisine. You'll visit historic and religious monuments, join village celebrations, meet local artisans, and take part in the preparation of seasonal specialties. You'll get out for short scenic hikes to experience the enchanting landscape and track down secrets that only can be discovered on foot. With your time in Athens providing a perspective on contemporary Greek life, the sojourn in Tinos will serve as a deep dive into the traditional culture and cuisine of Greek island life.

Highlights

Hands-on demonstrations and preparing local delicacies with traditional masters
Sit at some of the best tables to enjoy all that the Greek pantry has to offer
Short scenic hikes and agricultural and market visits and historic site visits
Experience the distinct landscape of Tinos on scenic walks along ancient paths
Meet the producers and the vendors who keep their country’s kitchens stocked
Six breakfasts, four lunches, and five dinners
6 nights accommodation

7 days with instruction

Group size: 6-12 participants

Program

The thriving urban foodways of cosmopolitan Athens and the deeply traditional culinary life on the island of Tinos provide for a striking and delicious contrast, one that’s even better experienced during certain seasonal moments, when everything is amplified in celebration of the Eastern Mediterranean’s culinary bounty.

Day 1: Athens arrival and welcome

This afternoon, arrive in Athens and settle into the group’s hotel. In the early evening, you'll meet for a welcome drink and introductions at a bespoke cocktail bar and then take a stroll to your first dinner together. Over several courses of traditional Athenian cuisine accompanied by local wines, you'll start getting to know each other and discuss what the coming week holds in store.

Day 2: Exploring the diversity of the Greek kitchen

To put the week and its cuisine in proper perspective, you'll spend a day in downtown Athens, the Greek melting pot. Here you’ll discover an array of regional cuisines, hailing from the Greek islands to Asia Minor and even the Eastern Black Sea.

You'll visit Athens’s Central Market, where you';; taste olive oils and all that is good in Greece, and have the chance to meet small, local producers, including a cheesemaker and a producer of wild honey. You'll eat lunch over the course of a series of stops at charismatic yet lesser-known backstreet restaurants. You'll finish the day with a tasting of Greek wines with one of the city’s top sommelier.

After much eating and strolling, this evening is yours to rest and relax, or continue exploring more on our own. Visit the Central Market, where you’ll taste olive oils and all that is good in Greece, and have the chance to meet small, local producers, including a cheesemaker and a producer of wild honey. Eat lunch over the course of a series of stops at charismatic yet lesser-known backstreet restaurants. After much eating and strolling, this evening is yours to rest and relax, or continue exploring more on your own.

Day 3: Off to Tinos!

In the morning, you will visit some of Greece’s most famous historic sites, including the Acropolis as well as some of its lesser-known treasures on a walking tour with a local historian. You'll then check out of our hotel, hop into a private van, and head to the port.

From there, it’s off by fast ferry to the island of Tinos! (About a two-hour ride). You'll check into your hotel and enjoy some rest before our first feast on the island. At a lively taverna, which happens to be run by one of the island’s best cooks, you'll be treated to a bountiful feast of Tino's specialties, including local artichokes and roasted doves.

Day 4: Farm to feast

This morning, head out to the village of Ktikadi. Along the way, stop by an artichoke farm and head out to the fields to learn about one of the island's greatest crops. Upon reaching Ktikadi, you'll be welcomed into the workshop of two local women who specialize in the island’s food products - they dry, preserve, and jar just about anything that springs from the land, including, of course, artichokes.

You'll roll up your sleeves and join them for a hands-on demonstration and tasting of their products followed by a feast with the hosts. In the late afternoon, you'll have a well-deserved glass (or two) of wine with a local winemaker, committed to preserving the indigenous grape varieties found on his stunning property.

Day 5: Honey Trail to hidden beach

After a lazy morning, you will brunch in a charming spot in the village of Agapi, fueling up on cheese pies, home-made yogurt, seasonal fruit, and Greek coffee before a short hike through the forest to Volax, a village known for its hand-painted doors bearing messages of love.

A stroll through the village will bring us to a picnic with a local beekeeper who will introduce to you his work and treat the group to his freshly harvested honey. You'll enjoy the late afternoon light snack at one of the island’s hidden beaches where you may swim in the crystal blue sea and relax before a casual beachfront dinner.

Day 6: Farewell feast, return to Athens

Before you say goodbye to Tinos, you'll make a morning visit to the island’s cathedral, a pilgrimage site, and one of the most important churches in Greek Orthodoxy. Your final meal together will be at a special restaurant on the Island where inventive chef Antonis Ghion takes traditional Tinos cuisine into the contemporary realm. After a restful ferry ride back to Athens and check into your hotel for the night, perhaps a farewell nightcap toasting an unforgettable week is all that’s left to do. Until next year!

Day 7: Farewell and departure

Your trip is done, group members will either head home or continue on their onward journeys.

Notes on the itinerary

Itineraries and daily schedules are subject to change. Culinary Backstreets expects to do everything listed in the itinerary, though the order may be rearranged based on weather or other local conditions.

Activity level

Travelers should feel comfortable walking three to five miles each day and remaining on their feet for long periods of time. Be prepared to roll up your sleeves and get hands-on during a couple of cooking workshops.

Included excursions

Six nights of accommodation in a boutique hotel.
Two talented local guides to accompany you throughout the trip.
Six breakfasts, four lunches, and five dinners.
All activities and events as mentioned in the itinerary.
A hungry group of Culinary Backstreets travelers, excited to explore all that Greece has to offer!

Location

Athens

While for the last decade, Athens has been struggling with the impact of the ongoing economic crisis, which has also brought up some big questions regarding Greece’s self-identity and the country’s place within Europe, the hard times have also helped spark a process of rediscovery, with Greeks taking a new look at their own identity, their own resources, and, most importantly, from perspective, their own culinary traditions and heritage.

Tinos

The island of Tinos is known for its rugged landscape, sprinkled with sugar-cube houses and palatial birdhouses. A quiet retreat from its crowded and glitzy island neighbors, it’s a place where local village life thrives. Neighbors still cook for each other, preserving unique culinary traditions and adhering to the strict Greek Orthodox calendar of feasting and fasting.

Tinos is also home to one of the most important religious pilgrimage sites in Greece, which, once a year, is awash in the pageantry and ritual celebration of Easter. Come Easter, the Tinos feast table, creaking under the weight of spring lamb, artichoke pies, sheep and goat’s milk cheeses, sizzling kokoretsi, minerally and fresh white wines, salads laced with foraged herbs, almond cakes, and much, much more, might make you want to get up and dance, as the locals often do.

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Food

You are encouraged to have an adventurous palate! Culinary Backstreets will try their best to accommodate dietary restrictions. Though pork, seafood, and lamb are common, the Greek diet is filled with other options. Culinary Backstreets LLC can accommodate a vegetarian and pescatarian diet. Please contact them about any specific restrictions or food allergies.

The following meals are included:

Breakfast
Snacks
Drinks

The following drinks are included:

Water
Soda
Alcoholic beverages

The following dietary requirement(s) are served and/or catered for:

Vegetarian
Regular (typically includes meat and fish)
Pescatarian
Other dietary requirements on request

If you have special dietary requirements it's a good idea to communicate it to the organiser when making a reservation

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