Recipe corner
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Dhoughts of catering for the numerous parties the Hawk throws every Christmas has had these venerable feathers fair twitching of late. Until, that is, I took flight to Cyprus on a late package job.
Over there when it comes to celebrating a wedding or a festival with 400 guests, the southern locals simply call in the Kleftico specialist. This involves carrying mobile clay ovens by truck to the venue and cooking a sheep or two slowly on regulo three.
The term Klefti put the Hawk in mind of Klefti-wallah, a bit of old army slang translating loosely as sticky fingered git.
Sure enough there is a sort of connection as, according to one old sage, the Kleftico was originally designed to hide (and gently simmer) the results of a night's rustling. Well, one lamb stew looks pretty much like another.
The old Dodge chassis with its catering bodywork cut out of a tipper is one of many to be seen in the Paralmini region of Cyprus. The traditional Greek Cypriot dishes cooked in this way are delicious but the owner declined to say how many rear tyres he gets through or what happens to the driver if he inadvertantly operates the tipping gear.