Kefi- Spirit of Joy

Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church.

The Dayton Greek Festival is a celebration of all things Greek. Music, dancing, culture, Faith, community and of course food and all are wonderful and enthusiastic parts of the whole.

I  was struck by the love and welcoming of the people of this community as well as their dedication.

 

The Festival has been going on for 55 years. It is a three day event from Sept.6-8. The church itself is quite lovely. We enjoyed the church tour which shared both the history of the Greek Orthodox church as well as its architectural highlights and art within.

 

Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church tour. Looking at the Dome area.

Beautiful relief, paintings, alter pieces, chandeliers and stained glass. The current church building was started back in 1945. The location is next to the Dayton Art Institute and across from the Masonic Temple on Belmonte Park North.

 

Dedication- the sheer quantity of food that this community prepares to serve during the festival is colossal. A local article in the Dayton City Paper reported that they use 1,600 pounds of tomatoes, 700 pounds of feta cheese and start cooking in June. They make over 15,000 spinach and cheese pies, Spanakopita and Tiropita (to die for); 10,000 domaldes-meat and rice stuffed grape leaves. They also make over 10,000 Baklava pastries. Add a multitude of other pastries, moussaka-  an eggplant and meat dish; Pastitsio- a meat and macaroni dish; gyro's, lamb shanks and hummus and Greek salad well you have nothing less than a huge feast and feat of cooking and everything we had was wonderful! You can tell when food is cooked with love. It doesn't get any better than this.

 

Out of this world pastries!

 

Baklava- filo dough layers filled with walnuts and cinnamon syrup; Kadaifi-a shredded wheat-like buttered pastry with walnuts and almonds and syrup; Rosettes- strudel pinwheels of nuts and syrup; I could go on and on but it's rather cruel and you get the picture! Everything is very reasonable too. We tend to get one of something and share so that we can try more items. We had to go back for more Tiropita (cheese pie in filo dough) though as they were delicious and for $2.00 each OMG!

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Browse the Boutique for Greek groceries, jewelry, and Spiritual items. Pick up some raffle tickets. Learn how to prepare Greek food at the cooking demonstrations. Dance and celebrate and look for your own Spirit of Joy.

Thank you to all the members, volunteers and cook's at Annunciation Church for a wonderful day and experience. Opa!