Baked snapper pie
"The baked snapper pie on the menu at Alpha is a riff on a bean pie that I had up in the mountains in Greece many years ago. I was at a tavern and there was a woman serving a filo triangle filled with white and green beans. It was one of those dishes that evolves through necessity. I was eating this pie overlooking the Mediterranean and thought, 'How can I take this dish to another level?' That's when the fish idea came to me and I put notes together and my snapper pie was born. The pie is built on green beans, onions and fennel, which are slow-braised for eight hours, then topped with snapper, smoked tomato and saffron butter and baked in filo. All the flavours are very fresh and you have this unctuous flavour and richness coming from the very slow-braised beans."
Source: SBS Food
Pickled green chilli loukoumades
"I like to play with people's minds by starting with a traditional dish and reinterpreting it to suit my style of cooking. This dish is inspired by loukoumades, the honey doughnuts traditionally done with honey syrup and a wonderful yeast batter. We all know as a dessert and I wanted to transform it. My new approach is to take my pickled chillies and stuff them with feta, dip them in batter and fry them. I then drizzle a mix of preserved lemon and honey over them. It looks like a dessert plate, but it is definitely not a dessert. It's a wonderful mezze and a great start to the meal. This dish is about me taking those ingredients from a time-worn dish and transforming them."
Bacon and egg pita roll
"This is my homage to the Aussie bacon and egg roll. I sell it at Alpha's Foodstore. Greeks aren't known for having much more than a for breakfast. I wanted something that would define Greek food but honour the way we eat here in Australia. I couldn't think of anything more apt where we wrapped bacon and egg in a house-made pita bread and served it with a roast tomato smoked jam instead of ketchup. They are so popular. A bacon and egg roll has been part of my life since a very young age. When Dad first came to Australia, he went to a pub with his workmates and they ordered . From then on, every Sunday, Dad would take the helm in the kitchen so this dish was an homage to Dad after he passed away. I took the Aussie food that he introduced me to and honoured him with a bit of a Greek twist."
Alpha's fusion of cuisines brings a Greek twist to your morning feed Source: SBS Food
Eggplant moussaka
"My eggplant moussaka came together by chance. I remember before I opened Cosmos more than two decades ago I was in the kitchen making taramasalata. The one thing I have never done is use pink taramasalata. I had also fried up some eggplant and my seafood supplier had brought me these amazing scallops from Hervey Bay. So I put it all together. I seared the scallops, added some eggplant and taramasalata on top and a fresh note of tomato and fennel salsa with roasted fennel seed on top. This flavour combination for my eggplant moussaka was a happy accident and 25 years on that dish is still a best-seller on the vintage part of my menu."
A happy kitchen accident: Conistis' eggplant moussaka Source: SBS Food
Baklava muffin
"The food I serve at Alpha is still Greek in its essence. I started selling baklava muffins at Alpha's Food Store, but they have made their way into the restaurant. I wanted something light, that carried the flavour and textures of baklava. The honey-based sweet muffin is flavoured with lots of spices and nuts and citrus peel wrapped in filo pastry with a wedge of chocolate hazelnut baklava on top. After we bake it we dip it in a spiced honey syrup. It's baklava on baklava on baklava and it was a take on my mum's classic baklava with a honey syrup and nuts. I incorporate cocoa and cinnamon into the filo and then the filling is a combo of roasted hazelnuts, almonds, walnuts, spices and dark chocolate. It's on the menu at Alpha where we serve it with a chocolate and brandy sorbet."
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Conistis' baklava muffins add a Greek flare to an everyday food Source: SBS Food
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