Written at a hill village table on Ikaria The Ikarian Way · First Edition
The Ikarian Way Get the Book · $37
Eleni Stamati · First Edition
From Eleni’s Greek Kitchen

They come to my island for the secret. There is a hillside, and there is work.

I am Eleni Stamati. I was born in a hill village on Ikaria, up above the coast where the tourists never went. I will not promise you years, because nobody can. What I have is one hundred and eighty entries on the beans, the bread, the wild greens, the terraces and the village, written down as they were actually done, with what you might do with each one at home.

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“We did not eat beans because we were poor. We were poor, and so we learned to cook beans very well.”

No page in this book claims to add a single day to your life.

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The Ikarian Way
— Food, Family, and the Everyday Rhythm of a Greek Hill Village
The Ikarian Way, cover photograph
Eleni’s Greek Kitchen
PDF + EPUB Any device · print at home
200 pages · 180 entries · 12 chapters
01 · What this book is not

Everyone who has heard of my island expects the same four things. This book gives none of them.

Below is exactly what people usually come looking for, and what they get instead. I would rather lose the sale than promise you the column on the left.

The note in the margin is which chapters you get instead, and how many entries are in them. Nothing on this page is a promise about your health, your weight or how long you will live. I am not able to make that promise, and I am not going to pretend otherwise.

$37. Once. The hillside grows the same greens it always did.

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What you get
instead ↓
What people usually come looking for
— and what this book gives instead —
A food or two that add years to your lifeThe claim behind most books like thisNo such food existsThe real meals an Ikarian hill family actually lived onChapters 1–4 · 60 entries
A strict diet or eating plan to followUsually sold alongside the claimNo plan was ever followedA whole year of growing and gathering it yourselfChapters 5–6 · 30 entries
One secret ingredient nobody else knowsThe usual hookThere was never just oneFamily, village and the daily rhythm, in fullChapters 7–9 · 45 entries
A doctor explaining the scienceHow these claims get their authorityEleni is not a doctorHer own belief, always named plainly as beliefEvery chapter, marked as opinion
The words “Blue Zone” on the coverA trademark, not a factSomeone else’s brand nameThe real place, and what actually happened thereChapters 10–12 · 45 entries

Twelve chapters, and not one of them makes the promise on the left.

This book makes no claim about your health, your weight or how long you will live. It describes one household’s way of life in one place. What you take from it is yours to decide.

02 · What’s inside

12 chapters, 180 entries, 200 pages.

Every entry is one page. The old way, in her own words. Then how you might bring a little of it into your own home today. Then one line worth remembering, and a photograph, because a description of an old pantry is worth far less than a picture of one.

You do not need to read it start to finish. Most people open it wherever their own life needs it that week.

01

The Everyday Pot

15 entries
  1. Fasolada, the Pot of Most Days
  2. Black-Eyed Peas with Wild Fennel
  3. Chickpeas Left in a Slow Oven
  4. Fava, the Yellow Purée
  5. Lentils, and the Vinegar at the End
  6. Soufiko, the Summer Pan
  7. Ladera, Cooked in Oil and Left to Cool
  8. The Oil Poured In Raw at the End
  9. Lemon Instead of the Meat
  10. Gigantes, the Big Beans for a Sunday
  11. Chickpea Patties from Yesterday’s Pot
  12. The Pot That Fed Twice
  13. Wild Fennel, in Almost Everything
  14. Salt, and the Sea Below Us
  15. The Table Without Meat On It
02

Bread, and the Two Days It Took

15 entries
  1. The Starter Kept Alive on the Shelf
  2. The Two Days a Loaf Wanted
  3. The Village Oven and Baking Day
  4. Barley, the Grain of a Dry Island
  5. Paximadi, the Rusk That Kept Forever
  6. Wetting the Rusk Under the Tap
  7. One Baking for the Whole Week
  8. The Watermill in the Ravine
  9. The Crust Nobody Threw Away
  10. Pitarakia, the Little Greens Pies
  11. The Pumpkin Pie That Was Not Sweet
  12. Rolling the Sheets by Hand
  13. Trahana, Made in Summer for February
  14. The Loaf Made Only for the Feast
  15. Bread and Oil, the Child’s Afternoon
03

The Goat, the Milk and the Little Cheese

15 entries
  1. The Goats Out on the Rock
  2. Milking, Morning and Evening
  3. Kathoura, the Fresh White Cheese
  4. The Whey That Came After
  5. Cheese Kept in Brine for Winter
  6. Yogurt Set in a Clay Bowl
  7. The Rennet and the Cloth
  8. Cheese Under Oil in a Jar
  9. Meat Only When the Feast Came
  10. The Goat Stuffed with Rice and Herbs
  11. The Bones Went Into the Pot
  12. The Kid, and the Hard Decision
  13. Milk in the Cup, Not the Glass
  14. The Cheese Pie Made from Scraps
  15. What One Goat Gave in a Year
04

Small Joys: The Sweet, the Wine and the Long Sit

15 entries
  1. Honey from the Hillside Hives
  2. The Fig, Dried on a Reed Tray
  3. The Spoon Sweet for the Visitor
  4. The Wine in the Cellar
  5. Treading the Grapes with Bare Feet
  6. The Small Glass, Never the Bottle
  7. What Was Made from the Last of the Grapes
  8. Coffee in the Little Copper Pot
  9. The Kafeneio and the Long Sit
  10. The Tea We Drank in the Evening
  11. Gathering and Drying the Herbs
  12. Almonds and Walnuts at the End of a Meal
  13. Rice Pudding on a Feast Day
  14. Honey Fritters at the Panigiri
  15. The Sweet That Was Kept for Others
05

The Terraces Through the Year

15 entries
  1. The Pezoules, Steps Cut Into a Hill
  2. The Dry Stone Wall and Who Built It
  3. Broad Beans Sown in Autumn
  4. The Water Problem on a Dry Island
  5. The Spring Bed of Greens
  6. Onions, Garlic and the Braid on the Wall
  7. The Tomatoes That All Came at Once
  8. The Aubergine and Courgette Bed
  9. The Autumn Row for Winter
  10. Ash, Manure and What Fed the Soil
  11. The Vine Along the Terrace Edge
  12. The Fig Tree Nobody Watered
  13. Seed Saved in a Twist of Paper
  14. The Garden You Walked Past Every Day
  15. What the Terrace Gave, Month by Month
06

Horta, and the Free Half of the Plate

15 entries
  1. What Horta Actually Means
  2. Vlita, the Summer Amaranth
  3. Radikia, the Bitter Chicory
  4. Wild Fennel Along the Path
  5. Nettles, and How to Handle Them
  6. Wild Asparagus in the First Warm Weeks
  7. Myroni, the One That Made the Pie
  8. Sorrel, Mustard and the Sharp Ones
  9. Mallow, the Soft One for Hard Times
  10. Cutting So It Comes Again
  11. Boiling, and the Water After
  12. Oil and Lemon, and Nothing Else
  13. Greens Stirred Through the Beans
  14. The Greens That Went Into a Pie
  15. Where You Never Gathered
07

The House and the People In It

15 entries
  1. Three Generations Under One Roof
  2. The One Room That Was Warm
  3. The Table in the Middle of Everything
  4. What the Grandmother Did
  5. Children Underfoot and Useful
  6. Marriage and the Neighbouring Field
  7. The Ones Who Went to America
  8. What Came Back in the Parcel
  9. The Women in Black
  10. Nobody Ate Alone
  11. The Argument, and the Making Up
  12. Sunday, and Who Came
  13. The Old Ones Never Moved Out
  14. Where Everybody Slept
  15. The Door That Stood Open
08

The Village, the Square and Belonging

15 entries
  1. Houses Scattered, Not Gathered
  2. The Houses Hidden in the Rocks
  3. The Church and the Chapels on the Hill
  4. Your Name Day, Not Your Birthday
  5. The Priest Who Farmed His Own Field
  6. The Kafeneio as the Village Office
  7. The Shops That Opened After Dark
  8. Borrowing Without Counting
  9. The Work Everybody Turned Out For
  10. Gossip, and What It Was Actually For
  11. Helping at the Harvest of Somebody Else
  12. The Newcomer and the Long Test
  13. The Funeral the Whole Village Came To
  14. The Walk to Somebody Else’s House
  15. Nobody Went Missing Unnoticed
09

The Ikarian Clock

15 entries
  1. Waking Without an Alarm
  2. The Late and Serious Breakfast
  3. The Cool Hours Were the Working Hours
  4. The Big Meal at Midday
  5. The Afternoon When the Village Stopped
  6. The Evening That Started at Nine
  7. What Six O’Clock Meant
  8. Walking, Because There Was No Other Way
  9. The Errand That Took Two Hours
  10. Dark That Was Actually Dark
  11. The Long Night’s Talking
  12. No Word for Being Behind
  13. The Week Without a Weekend
  14. What Was Not in the Kitchen
  15. Hurry Came With the Visitors
10

The Turning Year and the Panigiri

15 entries
  1. The Panigiri, the Village Saint’s Day
  2. Cooking for Four Hundred
  3. Everybody Pays and Nobody Profits
  4. The Dance That Goes Round
  5. Children Still Up at Two in the Morning
  6. The Long Fasts of the Church Year
  7. Clean Monday and the Table That Went With It
  8. Easter, the Fire and the Whole Animal
  9. The August Feast in the Heat
  10. The Grape Harvest
  11. The Olive Harvest in the Cold
  12. Carnival Before the Fast
  13. Christmas and the Bread with a Cross
  14. New Year and the Coin in the Cake
  15. The Reason for the Whole Calendar
11

Work, Craft and the Hands

15 entries
  1. Building the Wall That Holds the Hill
  2. The Charcoal Burner on the Hillside
  3. The Barrel and the Cooper
  4. The Loom in the Corner
  5. Spinning, Always Spinning
  6. Baskets from What Grew by the Water
  7. The Word for Throwing Away
  8. Whitewashing Every Spring
  9. Carrying the Water
  10. The Mule That Did the Heavy Work
  11. The Hives Behind the House
  12. Soap from the Last of the Oil
  13. Keeping the Tools
  14. The Hands That Told You a Life
  15. Nothing Was Made to Be Admired
12

Growing Old Without Stopping

15 entries
  1. There Was No Retirement
  2. The Old Man Still on the Terrace
  3. The Grandmother Who Ran the Kitchen
  4. Less of the Heavy, More of the Wise
  5. Wanted at the Feast
  6. Teaching the Grandchild
  7. Walking Because There Was No Other Way
  8. The Same Chair, Every Afternoon
  9. Nobody Was Sent Away
  10. The Ones Who Came Home
  11. Death Talked About Plainly
  12. The Long Remembering
  13. Useful to the Last Week
  14. What the Old Ones Complained About
  15. A Reason to Get Up
03 · The honest part

The deal this book makes with you.

✕A promise that this food adds years to your lifeNo page in this book claims that, and none ever will. What is here is how the food was made, and why, nothing more.
✕A doctor, a scientist, or a clinical claimEleni is not a doctor. Where she believes something works, the book says so plainly, as her own opinion, never as a fact.
✕The words “Blue Zone” anywhere in this bookThat name belongs to someone else’s brand. This book tells you about the real place and the real household instead.
✕A diet plan, a meal schedule, or a rule to followThere is no plan here. Only a description of how one household actually ate, in its own words, across a whole year.
Eleni Stamati — Eleni
Eleni Stamati
Eleni Stamati
04 · Who is telling you this
“I will not sell you a cure. I will tell you what grew on my hill.”

I was born in a village in the interior of Ikaria, up where the road gives out and the hillside starts. What the tavernas down at the water serve is not what we ate.

People come now and ask what the trick was. There was no trick. There was a poor, dry island, a great deal of walking, beans that had to carry a winter, and a hillside that gave up half our plate for free if you knew where to look.

So that is what is in here. The two-day bread, the bean pot, the goat, the terraces, and the greens I have been cutting off that hill since I was six years old. I have my own opinions about why we did well on it, and I say so plainly as opinions.

Read it in any order. The hillside chapters are where I would start.

05 · Order the book

Read it for a week. If it is not for you, I do not want your money.

Read it for seven days. If it has not given you something worth keeping, write to me and I will refund every cent, no questions. Pay once and it is yours to keep, on your phone, your tablet, or printed at your own kitchen table.

It is a book to dip into, not to finish in one sitting. 12 chapters, each one a different part of the same life.

$59$37
180Entries
200Pages
7Day refund
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06 · Questions

Questions people ask

Is this a diet book?

No. It is a description of a way of living, food included. It makes no promise about your own health, your weight or how long you will live.

Is there medical or financial advice in it?

None, deliberately. Eleni is not a doctor, a nutritionist or a financial adviser. Where she shares her own belief about why something worked, the book marks it plainly as her opinion, never as guidance.

Is the famous Ikarian herb tea in the book?

It is, described exactly as what people gathered, dried and drank, and nothing more. This book will not tell you that a herb does anything to your body, because I am not able to tell you that and I will not pretend otherwise. In these pages a herb is a plant and a flavour.

Is any of this historically accurate?

The food and customs described are real, checked against the historical and cultural record. Eleni tells it in her own voice, the way a grandmother would tell it at her own table.

Why doesn’t the book use the words “Blue Zone”?

Because that name belongs to someone else’s brand. This book describes the actual place and the actual household instead of borrowing someone else’s label.

What do I get, and is it a subscription?

Two files, emailed the moment you buy: a 200-page PDF for reading or printing at home, and an EPUB for Kindle and e-readers so you can set your own type size. You pay once. Nothing renews.

Can I get it on paper?

Not as a printed book. It is a digital book you can print yourself, which is what keeps it at $37 instead of what a 200-page illustrated hardback would cost.

There was never a secret on this hill. Only what grew wild on it, and who you ate it with.

12 chapters on the beans, the bread, the goat, the terraces, the wild greens and the turning year of an Ikarian hill village. 200 pages, 180 entries, a photograph on nearly every one. $37, once.

Get the Book · $37

7-day refund · emailed instantly · PDF and EPUB

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