Informationen zum Autor Diane Kochilas, photography by Vassillis Stenos Klappentext Part cookbook, part travelogue, Ikaria is an introduction to the food-as-life philosophy of the Greek island "blue zone" and a culinary journey through luscious recipes, gorgeous photography, and captivating stories from locals. The remote and lush island of Ikaria in the northeastern Aegean is home to one of the longest-living populations on the planet, making it a "blue zone." Much of this has been attributed to Ikaria's stress-free lifestyle and Mediterranean diet: daily naps, frequent sex, a little fish and meat, free-flowing wine, mindful exercise like walking and gardening, hyper-local food, strong friendships, and a deep-rooted disregard for the clock. No one knows the Ikarian lifestyle better than Chef Diane Kochilas, who has spent much of her life there. Capturing the true spirit of the island, Kochilas explains the importance of shared food, the health benefits of raw and cooked salads, the bean dishes that are passed down through generations, the greens and herbal teas that are used in the kitchen and in the teapot as "medicine," and the nutritional wisdom inherent in the ingredients and recipes that have kept Ikarians healthy for so long. Ikaria is more than a cookbook. It's a portrait of the people who have achieved what so many of us yearn for: a fuller, more meaningful and joyful life, lived simply and nourished on real, delicious, seasonal foods that you can access anywhere. Introduction Ikaria Feeds the Soul I first touched foot on the island in 1972 as a 12-year-old New York City kid inured tosticky urban summers, insipid American food, and strict curfews. My Greek was nonexistent, but somehow it didn't matter. I felt at home, as though Ikaria was in my bones. It was, I guess. I grew up with it all around, the child of Ikarian immigrants. My father left his village, Raches, in 1937 and never was able to make it back, settling instead, right after the war, in New York City. Despite our physical distance from it, Ikaria was woven into the texture of our lives. We lived in an Ikarian enclave in Jackson Heights, Queens, and all my parents' friends were from the island; by default and design, we kids were also friends. Now, so are our own children. Bonds among islanders from Ikaria cross oceans and generations. We never thought these ties and our roots to the island to be anything but the norm, even in a society as mobile as America. Historically, Ikaria has always been isolated and poor, a speck of rock 99 miles long in the middle and roughest part of the Aegean, where political undesirables were exiled from the Byzantine era to the 1960s. But in remoteness and want, islanders learned to be self-reliant, independent of thought, and close-knit, to disdain the pursuit of material acquisition and live simply and essentially, to pay little heed to the zeitgeist of the times, indeed, to pay no heed to time at all. Ikaria is known as the island where people do not live by the clock, where punctuality is not necessarily a virtue, where the time of day is always late thirty, a kind of running joke. Yet, they outlive most clocks, for the island is home to some of the longest-living people on earth, a demographic and statistical anomaly that has catapulted Ikaria and its people to unexpected fame in the last few years. Ikaria is one of the Blue Zones,® a term coined by the Belgian demographer Dr. Michel Poulain, who together with Dr. Gianni Pes of the University of Sassari in Italy and Dan Buettner, author of the book The Blue Zones , have been studying the planet's pockets of longevity since 2003, under the aegis of the National Geographic Foundation and, in the case of Ikaria, the AARP as well as a series of other corporate funders. Poulain, blue pen in hand, literally drew circles (in blue) on the map one day around places such...

Autorentext

Diane Kochilas, photography by Vassillis Stenos

Klappentext

Part cookbook, part travelogue, Ikaria is an introduction to the food-as-life philosophy of the Greek island "blue zone" and a culinary journey through luscious recipes, gorgeous photography, and captivating stories from locals. 

The remote and lush island of Ikaria in the northeastern Aegean is home to one of the longest-living populations on the planet, making it a "blue zone." Much of this has been attributed to Ikaria's stress-free lifestyle and Mediterranean diet: daily naps, frequent sex, a little fish and meat, free-flowing wine, mindful exercise like walking and gardening, hyper-local food, strong friendships, and a deep-rooted disregard for the clock.

No one knows the Ikarian lifestyle better than Chef Diane Kochilas, who has spent much of her life there. Capturing the true spirit of the island, Kochilas explains the importance of shared food, the health benefits of raw and cooked salads, the bean dishes that are passed down through generations, the greens and herbal teas that are used in the kitchen and in the teapot as "medicine," and the nutritional wisdom inherent in the ingredients and recipes that have kept Ikarians healthy for so long.

Ikaria is more than a cookbook. It's a portrait of the people who have achieved what so many of us yearn for: a fuller, more meaningful and joyful life, lived simply and nourished on real, delicious, seasonal foods that you can access anywhere.

Leseprobe
Introduction
Ikaria Feeds the Soul

I first touched foot on the island in 1972 as a 12-year-old New York City kid inured tosticky urban summers, insipid American food, and strict curfews. My Greek was nonexistent, but somehow it didn’t matter. I felt at home, as though Ikaria was in my bones. It was, I guess. I grew up with it all around, the child of Ikarian immigrants. My father left his village, Raches, in 1937 and never was able to make it back, settling instead, right after the war, in New York City. Despite our physical distance from it, Ikaria was woven into the texture of our lives. We lived in an Ikarian enclave in Jackson Heights, Queens, and all my parents’ friends were from the island; by default and design, we kids were also friends. Now, so are our own children. Bonds among islanders from Ikaria cross oceans and generations. We never thought these ties and our roots to the island to be anything but the norm, even in a society as mobile as America.

Historically, Ikaria has always been isolated and poor, a speck of rock 99 miles long in the middle and roughest part of the Aegean, where political undesirables were exiled from the Byzantine era to the 1960s. But in remoteness and want, islanders learned to be self-reliant, independent of thought, and close-knit, to disdain the pursuit of material acquisition and live simply and essentially, to pay little heed to the zeitgeist of the times, indeed, to pay no heed to time at all. Ikaria is known as the island where people do not live by the clock, where punctuality is not necessarily a virtue, where the time of day is always “late thirty,” a kind of running joke. Yet, they outlive most clocks, for the island is home to some of the longest-living people on earth, a demographic and statistical anomaly that has catapulted Ikaria and its people to unexpected fame in the last few years.

Ikaria is one of the Blue Zones,® a term coined by the Belgian demographer Dr. Michel Poulain, who together with Dr. Gianni Pes of the University of Sassari in Italy and Dan Buettner, author of the book The Blue Zones, have been studying the planet’s pockets of longevity since 2003, under the aegis of the National Geographic Foundation and, in the case of Ikaria, the AARP as well as a series of other corporate funders. Poulain, blue pen in hand, literally drew circles (in blue) on the map one day around places such as Ikaria, Okinawa, Sardinia, Costa Rica, and a community of Seventh Day Advent…