Pelagoes, Crete

I've been rather absent recently sunning myself in Crete. But have no fear, I was keeping my eye out for some tasty treats throughout the two weeks that I was away. Amongst the site seeing and snoozing on the beach, I did my fair bit of eating!

Our holiday rep let us into a few sneaky treats when she climbed up into the hills to visit us (luckily we had a car and I only had to walk up that hill once, an experience I will be forever scarred from!)
Her recommended restaurant was one that the owner of our villa owned, and she was certainly right to recommend it to us!

Pelagoes, was a small restaurant hide in the back roads of the town. With it’s over grown garden with hanging lanterns and mis-matched furniture, it was the best spot for one our first nights out. Not only , but the free wine and little bread basket was the perfect welcoming! Our very friendly waiter showed us to our table asking us about our holiday and where we'd been.

We started with a little bit of everything, Fava, Zucchini and Dill fritters, Kefta, Cheese Souvaliki, all freshly made and was so delicious I failed to take a picture! (Very bad blogger I know!) Zucchini did become my staple diet for an evening meal! Our mains where equally as good!

I had grilled octopus, with grilled aubergines and peppers, it was the best octopus that I have ever had! The parental ones both had the fish grill with sword fish, mussels, octopus cuttlefish and rice and grilled vegetables. I had this on our second visit and the fish was perfectly cooked!

The owner of our villa came to see us and gave us free fruit with melon and grapes! Later found out that this was the general thing in Greek restaurants.

Overall the food and staff were friendly and helpful, the atmosphere was equally as lovely with a little guitar man in the corner it was the perfect setting for a family meal or dinner for two.

It was so good we went back again! I would definitely recommend it to anyone staying in or around Agios Nikolaos.

What Came First? The Chicken Or The Egg?

Spending your bank holiday Monday hungover is a pretty standard thing, regardless of age. So as per this is how I spent mine. But as I thought my brain was going to fall out of my nose, I descended down the stairs of the Chicken Shop and all hope was restored.

With no signage and in the tiniest of places it is very easy to miss, in fact we drove past it 4 times. I had it in my head that this place was going to be huge, which seems to be the fashion at the moment. Vast restaurants with deli's and florists and card shops and shops that sell staplers and EVERYTHING. It all becomes a bit confusing after a while. But this was the opposite.

Down the stairs, you found yourself in a little den, seated right by the kitchen we got all the action. There aren't any menus - how exciting! To be honest I wasn't very excited (as I've explained my brain was about to fall out of my head and through my nose). Instead they are on the wall, and like all these restaurant/bar/deli/shop things that also have huge menus, it was actually nice to have an easy decision to make instead of spending 20 minutes umming about what to eat.

The very happy waiter did his best to bring us back to life, telling us that we can have a whole chicken, half a chicken or a quarter chicken. With a number of sides including corn, slaw, chips and salad. Being the three little pigs we had it ALL.

A whole chicken with all the sides... it was amazing. Who thought something so simple could bring my little taste buds back to life and do a little dance of happiness! The chips were made out of proper potatoes as opposed to.. I'm not sure what, rubber? And the avocado and baby gem lettuce salad was so yummy and very refreshing.

I always have a fear of chicken, I rarely eat a chicken sandwich simply because its often dry and quite sad. But this chicken has been cooked on a spit roast and it was probably one of the best chickens I've eaten. You can add a little heat to your chicken, with the Hot Sauce or the Smokey sauce which is bottled and on your table. I found the Smokey Sauce had more of a kick to it than the Hot Sauce still they were both the best.

Dessert is served at the table - my tummy was far too full of chicken - but pops went ahead with the apple pie, and you could smell the cinnamon on it. It comes with either cream or ice cream very yummy indeed!

Apple Pie

All in all I think I have found my new hangover cure, sadly it is really hard to get to and almost impossible to find, they've literally made it work through word of mouth and their website is: http://www.chickenshop.com. But it really is worth the hunt and I will certainly be returning; maybe not so hungover this time round.

Mr Chicken Chopper