Looking for healthy Greek recipes

My hubby and I love greek food and I'm hoping to find some way to make it at home so that I can have a little control over the calories/fat/etc.  We love our local greek diner but when I've asked for nutritional info, they only give me a sort of vague idea or tell me to eat a salad lol.

I especially love dolmades, gyros, hummus, pasta bakes, and I more than willing to try new stuff!  Anyone have a good resource or some ideas?

The very healthy Mediterannean Diet is based on Greek style foods.  The problem is, the Greek food we get in restaurants is not this healthy, everyday fare, but dishes that are usually served as special treats for holidays and celebrations.  Chinese food is the same way.

I did find a good article

Improve Your Heart Health With Greek Food  There are tabs at the top of the article that will lead you to some recipes.  Select - Quick & Easy Greek Meals with Step by Step instructions to learn how to make some favorite dishes.  There are videos!

I hope it helps you.

Thanks that's awesome!  I had a feeling that the stuff at Greek restaurants was pretty calorie rich, but I love some of the unique ingredients and spices in greek food so I figured that there were probably some healthier ways to prepare these dishes.  Those links should help a lot!

My tied for second favorite food region(with India - Thai food is 1st)!!!

ok this chick, is awesome check her out!

I always keep hummus in the fridge, 2T is a good amount to add to a meal and its only like 50 calories. Anything goes with it too! If you have a Mediterranean /middle eastern store buy the Tahini there - way cheaper. I use 1 can chickpeas/garbonzos 1/4c lemon juice, 1/3c or less tahini and 1-2T minced garlic. Throw it all in the food processor and viola! Sometimes I add a bit of water (or garlic water from the jar of minced I keep) to thin it out more, without adding as much tahini.

I am diabetic so I greatly watch what carbs I do eat and it is basically only 2 types of bread. Pita is one of them. I buy mine fresh, handmade from a local resturant and freeze them.They keep for a while and I don't want to be driving across town just for the bread - which is sometimes $1 cheaper than that gross stiff dry name brand most grocery stores sell.

I make a type of gyro/meatloaf and i'm not completely sure of the caloric content but you can always get lean cuts of lamb ground up. If you have a whole foods, they are happy to do this for you. I have used this recipe and was pretty good. I used 1 part lamb and 1 part ground beef. I wish I had used like 3 part lamb and 1 part very lean beef. I also did not use bread crumbs. It sounds like it couldn't possibly be like gyro meat, making a loaf and baking it - but the consitency was not like a meatloaf. I used electric knife and shaved the meat off - perfect.

I haven't made this for about a month and a half now, but when my garden was producing lots of tomatoes and cucumbers I made a simple medditeranian type salad with onions, tomatoes, and cucumber. I added a dash of pepper, some lemon juice and some nonfat greek yogurt until it made a constistancy I liked. Sometimes if i had left over teeny tiny feta cheese crumbles (or rather it was like powder) I would add that in also - so yum. Just a bit, maybe like, .125 oz worth but you could definitely taste it.

Lastly, sometimes I would make greek pizza (that even my kids loved). I buy pizza dough from any local grocery store - ask them for raw italian bread dough, they might look at you weird, but so what :)

I cook up some ground lamb, put some low fat riccotta (now that I think about it, you could probably use low fat cottage cheese instead)  on the rolled out dough, some VERY well drained and shredded frozen spinach, the lamb, sprinkle some feta cheese on top and then drizzle some tzatziki sauce(again with fat free greek yogurt) and bake - probably like 375 for 20 minutes - but dont quote me on that!

Now i'm hungry :)

Wow thank you so much!!  That pizza sounds reeeeeeeally good!  There is a Mediterranean store just down the street from my house and I've just never thought to stop there lol. Sounds like we're going to be making a field trip!  I've made hummus in the blender before and it was a bit gritty...I think I may need to convince my hubby that we NEED a food processor lol. 

I love fresh pita bread and I was just thinking the other day "Geez, why does this store-bought pita taste nothing like the stuff from the restaurant?"  I will see if there is not a good local bakery to buy it from.  Freezing it is a great idea...I always forget that you can freeze bread because its always gone so fast in my house.

Ya, I'm pretty hungry now too :-D

It thaws out really fast too, in like 15 minutes, pita bread does. I do leave hummus to process a while too, several minutes. I have a feeling I will be making that pizza very soon - like... Wednesday :D I havent thought about it in months.