Happy Friday beautiful friends! I hope you are enjoying your Friday and almost the weekend.

On today’s post, my wonderful friends from Thess Del Food featured me on their blog! I wanted to share the love of course! Please have a look below and click on both links to take you to their site! Plus if you have a love for Thessaloniki, well you will LOVE their blog.

**This article is available in English and Greek. Please scroll below to view both!

Greek:

https://thessdelfood.blogspot.com/2020/04/krystina-kalapothakos-chef-california.html?m=1

English:

https://thessdelfood.blogspot.com/2020/04/krystina-kalpothakos-authentic-greek.html?m=1

KRYSTINA KALPOTHAKOS: AN AUTHENTIC GREEK SOUL CHEF

By: Thess Del Food

We had the opportunity to meet the warm-hearted, talented chef and beautiful soul, Krystina Kalapothakos. Krystina is a Greek-American chef and cookbook author, who lives in California, but visits Greece almost every year. She recently had her second cookbook published and it was a great honor for us to write an article for the gastronomy of Thessaloniki at this second cookbook, titled “a Drop of Ladi & MY GREEK SOUL”. We are extremely excited that Krystina accepted to give us an interview for our blog and tell us many interesting details about her life and her career!

We are very happy to introduce Krystina to our friends and followers!

1. Krystina, why have you chosen a career in the field of culinary arts, particularly as a chef?

My love for food started at a very young age. Both my parents are wonderful cooks, and we have many cooks on my dad’s side of the family in Greece. Growing up in a crazy Greek family who appreciates food was a good start toward my love for cooking. At the age of seven, I was officially making my own Greek recipes including spanakopita, keftedes, baklava, and much more.

In 2008, I acknowledged the passion I had for culinary art and enrolled in the pastry chef program at Le Cordon Bleu in Sacramento, California.  In 2009 I graduated with my pastry degree. I later became a sous chef on the island of Skiathos working at a Tapas restaurant. In 2011, I tested my skills in a Japanese restaurant and became a sushi chef.

Kouzounas Kitchen is dedicated to my yiayia, Stavroula Kouzouna Kalapothakou. Yiayia was from Mani, Greece and was a fantastic home cook. I learned many of her traditional Greek recipes and now I share them through my blog. (I hope yiayia is looking down upon me smiling as I share many of her delicious recipes with my very own twist).

I fulfilled a long-awaited dream of mine recently. Back To My Roots cookbook was published on February 28, 2016. Back To My Roots is not only packed full of mouth-watering recipes, but I also share my personal story, kitchen tips and tricks, bits and pieces of the history of olive oil and its benefits, and much, much more!

2. What inspires you when you are in the kitchen?

This is such a great question and my answers are probably endless! What inspires me daily in the kitchen? It is my LOVE for cooking! It is an endless love that I have. I feel the kitchen is what brings happiness to my soul, and I want to share that happiness with all.

**For the full interview click below! Many thanks to my friends Evi & Thanos for the beautiful post. I hope you enjoy and don’t forget to subscribe to their blog Thess Del Food for all things Thessaloniki and foodie related.

Read the entire interview HERE!

Featured photo credit: Thess Del Food