12 squid, cleaned
3 ounces feta cheese
1/4 cup olive oil
2 teaspoons marjoram, chopped
salt and pepper

1. Combine olive oil, marjoram, salt and pepper and marinade squid for at least an hour.
2. Preheat a well oiled grill.
3. Remove squid from marinade. Stuff tubes with feta cheese and place tentacles on a skewer, if using.
4. Grill squid for about 5 minutes on one side and 2 minutes on the other.
5. Serve with lemon wedges.

Makes 4 servings

1 pound potatoes, peeled and boiled
5 cloves garlic, crushed
2 tablespoons white vinegar
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt

1. Mash cold potatoes until very fine, almost a puree.
2. Grind together garlic with salt and a small portion of the olive oil in a mortar and pestle to form a creamy texture.
3. Combine garlic oil and vinegar with potatoes, then gradually stir in remaining oil to form a smooth, thick sauce.
4. Serve hot or cold with grilled or fried fish or vegetables.

Makes 6 servings

3 tablespoons fresh dill, chopped
3 cups romaine lettuce, finely chopped
3 scallions, chopped
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon white vinegar

1. Combine lettuce, scallions and dill.
2. Combine oil and vinegar and toss into lettuce mixture. Serve immediately.

Makes 4 servings

I'm not sure why tonight's dinner was so filling, because looking back on it, it's little more than a bit of greens and a couple rings of squid. Perhaps it's because I'm still eating oversized lamb pitas for lunch and wasn't very hungry to begin with. You'd think I would've worked up an appetite cleaning all those squids. The whole process took me about 45 minutes; ripping off their heads, pulling out their spines, tearing off their skin, squeezing out their guts and last dinners and giving them a good rinse. Over, and over, and over again. All because I'm too cheap to buy already cleaned squid tubes. I made Grilled Squid with Feta out of a few of them and saved the rest and the tentacles for tomorrow.

I'd never grilled squid before, so I was a little apprehensive about the whole thing. Since I don't get very many opportunities to make or eat seafood I'm pretty unfamiliar with it and always think that it's threatening and potentially laden with bacteria that will kill me if I don't completely overcook it. Like most people to chicken, I am to seafood, and end up with a rubbery mess. I tried very hard to cook it as little as possible this time and threw it on the grill for a total of maybe 6 minutes. It almost instantly shrank to half its size the second it hit the heat. They tasted pretty good though, the feta melted nice and creamy and it had a nice garlicky flavor.

I made Skordalia, which is a Greek garlic sauce, and put it on top of steamed green beans. Skordalia seems like the Greek's version of Hummus, a garlicky starchy dip. Instead of chick peas it uses potatoes and instead of lemon it uses vinegar. Frankly, I prefer hummus, but it was still pretty good. Whereas hummus has the bonus of having cumin as well as garlic, this is basically just garlic. It's supposed to go great with fried fish, which I could see. The other side dish was Salata Marouli, which is just a simple romaine lettuce salad. Pretty impossible to screw up and a nice way to fill up a large portion of a plate.