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The Drizzle: Volume 3

September 20264 min readBy Demosthenes Hickling
The Drizzle: Volume 3

One of the best parts of the Greek lifestyle is enjoying meals together. Sharing food with family and friends is about more than eating—it's a chance to catch up, relax, and enjoy each other's company. This tradition celebrates hospitality, community, and connection. Whether it's a simple family dinner, a gathering with neighbours, or a festive celebration, meals bring people of all ages and backgrounds together, creating lasting memories and stronger relationships.relationships. This is the kind of dish that was made for exactly that. In our family, it's the meal that appears on tables without ceremony - usually outdoors, usually with too many people gathered round and not quite enough chairs. It doesn't ask much of you. A good fish, a handful of herbs, a squeeze of lemon, and a generous pour of DIMOS to bring it all together. Ready in 10–15 minutes over the coals, it takes you straight to the coast of Kalamata without ever leaving your garden.Light the coals early and let them settle into a steady, white-grey heat while you get everything else ready. If you're cooking indoors, line a baking tray with foil, lightly grease it with a neutral oil, and preheat your grill to 220°C. Score 3–4 slits through the skin on both sides of each fish, deep enough to let the oil in, but not so deep that you hit the bone. Whisk together your DIMOS olive oil and lemon juice, season well with salt, then stir in the parsley. Using a pastry brush, coat the fish generously on both sides, working a little of the oil into each slit so the flavour gets right to the centre. Grill for 3–5 minutes each side, depending on the size of your fish. You're looking for lightly charred skin and flesh that pulls cleanly from the bone. Serve alongside a nice Greek salad, some slices of lemon, and a final drizzle of DIMOS straight from the bottle before it hits the table.Food like this is a reminder of why we do what we do. There's something quietly powerful about a dish this simple done this well - good fish, fresh herbs, and quality olive oil that brings it all together, shared in the open air with the people who matter. It's the way we grew up eating on our summer holidays in Kalamata: outdoors, unhurried, the table full, and the afternoon stretching on. We hope this one earns a spot in your summer rotation and that somewhere along the way it takes you, even just for a moment, to one of those afternoons. A common question we get asked is, "Isn't it bad to heat olive oil?" It's one of those myths that's somehow stuck around, and we're happy to put it to bed. You can absolutely cook with olive oil - over low and high heat. The fear usually comes down to smoke point, but that turns out to be the wrong thing to worry about. What actually matters is how well an oil holds itself together under heat, and on that score, a good extra virgin olive oil is one of the most stable you can reach for. It's rich in monounsaturated fats and natural antioxidants, which support cardiovascular health by lowering "bad" LDL cholesterol, reducing systemic inflammation, and protecting cells from oxidative stress. Together, they also keep the oil steady when the heat is on. A high smoke point sounds like it should make an oil better for cooking, but it's a poor guide to what's actually going on in the pan. Corn oil is the perfect example: it smokes at a much higher temperature than olive oil, yet in one study it produced twice as many harmful compounds when heated. Olive oil simply doesn't break down the way people fear.Even when olive oil is heated to high temperatures for a long time, the research finds it keeps the lion's share of its beneficial compounds, and its nutritional value stays intact. So cook with it freely - sear, roast, fry, whatever the day calls for. Then pour a little more over the top before you serve, and you get the best of both: the warmth of the cooking and the full, living character of the oil straight from the bottle.
D

Demosthenes Hickling

From Kalamata with Love

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