Mr. Dimas, as a Michelin star chef whose menu is farm-to-table, what did you pick at the farm this morning?
Well, one example would be the herbs and greens that we pick for our Bouquet from the Garden salad that’s on our current menu. In the early summer, we pick the herbs, greens, and flowers for this bouquet, we cut them fresh and present them to our guests just a couple hours later. It’s difficult to have such a fresh salad on the table but for me, it’s the highlight of my menu. The dish is something very, very personal to me. That freshness is something that is in the DNA of Mediterranean cuisine, we are not a culture that uses pickled vegetables, spices, preserves, things like that. We have fresh produce all year round, and that freshness is really what represents Greek cuisine.
Is that why your farm in Corinth supplies all the produce for your restaurant, Makris?
Yeah, in this industry, it can be difficult to find really nice, quality produce, ones grown without chemicals, in the volume that we need. Our current farm is run by my parents, and together we work to supply Makris. Farming is in our family history, I was raised on a farm with my grandparents and parents living in the same house, so since my birth, we’ve been growing vegetables, we had chickens, small animals in the farm… So this is always something I’ve loved doing. Now the volume is a bit higher, the day-to-day operation is a bit more difficult to grow as much as we need, cultivate it in the right way, treat it in the right way…
“You can’t really plan your menu even one week in advance. Of course this effects you, you have to be ready to adapt, to change your mind into something else.”
There must also be something satisfying about picking the flowers and herbs, pulling vegetables out of the ground with your own hands…
I think it takes away a lot of stress, especially for me, having seen my parents doing this all my life. It’s very important to touch the actual produce, you have to feel it. My father is even talking to the plants! (Laughs) He speaks to them, I also like to touch the leaves, touch the flowers, not just to check on them but to give them a bit of affectional, to say thank you. It’s a very personal thing.
And can you taste the difference in the dishes you’re making?
Of course! The aroma, the fragrance, the taste profile, the flavour… All of it is just that much deeper in organic products. The taste is totally different, especially for guests who come from a big city and haven’t had the chance to such locally grown organic produce before… It can be a surprise just how much better these vegetables and fruits can taste. For the ingredients we use at Makris that we can’t grow ourselves — meat, honey, olive oil — we get from suppliers all around the country; Milos, Crete, Corfu, we even get our Iberico pork from ancient Olympia, where the Olympic Games started. We now have a map on our menu that shows where all our ingredients come from in Greece, as a way to not only show where these things come from, but also to honor our suppliers. I want to show my gratitude to these guys who work so hard all over the Greek islands, especially because I know how much work it is, since I’m a supplier myself.
Is it ever frustrating or tiring to work seasonally and locally in this way? Farm-to-table innovator Dan Barber says that sometimes he wishes he could just call up a supplier and pick what he wants from a big list. But that’s the nature of the game.
It is, exactly. I went to the farm last week and it was full of flowers, we loved using them in our menu. But this week, it’s been very hot and it’s empty. Everything was dead from the sun and the high temperature! So this means you can’t really plan your menu even one week in advance. Of course this effects you, you have to be ready to adapt, to change your mind into something else. It’s frustrating sometimes, sure, but you have to comply with that, you can’t do anything to change it, so you have to be ready with a new idea that will be able to excite your guests.
It seems like hospitality is also a big part of Greek culture, no?
Greek people in general are very used to having guests in their home! In Greece, our main goal is to serve a big table of friends. Our culture is really built around the table, relationships are built around the table. It’s deep in our blood to have guests over for dinner, everyone gathered around a table of home cooked food. But as well, Greece is a very touristic country, we’ve had tourists coming here since the 1950s, 1960s, so this idea of hosting is also really part of our lifestyle here.
Was becoming a chef always part of the plan for you then?
Since I was around 17! My dad and my mom actually didn’t like that I wanted to become a chef. Their reaction was not good at all! I ended up moving to Brighton in the UK at some point because my uncle had a restaurant there. I went to culinary college and I was working at the same time to pay my tuition, so I was already training at the restaurant. After some years working at different restaurants, I was offered the position of executive chef at Makris, which is owned by Domes Resort. Initially it was my dream to open my own restaurant, and it still is, but with this kind of partnership, it’s a bigger job. There’s more opportunities when you’re working with a hotel, you do things differently, you have a bigger team, the volume is higher, the marketing is different, there’s a lot more work for me in the management side of things. But it’s also made me wiser, it’s made me a better manager, and I’m learning skills beyond just cooking.
And now Makris has been awarded its first Michelin star.
Yes! We have one star and we look forward to working hard for more. My team and I respect sustainability and we will be looking towards a green star as well. The dreams never stop so, we’ll always be aiming higher and awards will follow. I want to be on the World’s 50 Best, I want to have two or three stars, I want to open more restaurants somewhere in Europe or Asia…
That would be the ultimate success for you?
Well, no, the ultimate success for me is in the very, very small things, actually. Success to me means not losing yourself. It means staying humble and loving what you do, keeping your true self and staying authentic. When my team is happy and thriving, that’s also success for me.
Is running your farm and staying grounded in that way also a form of success?
Absolutely. It helps me a lot to stay grounded and stay humble as well, because I’m putting a lot of effort every day. It’s tiring to go to the farm, pick everything, and then come back and manage the restaurant and the hotel, the guests, the kitchen staff, the service staff, the journalists! The day starts very early in the morning, so by the time it’s show time, I am tired. Sometimes I’ve lost my energy hours before the service. So for me, knowing all this and still feeling the vibe of the restaurant, smiling while I’m cooking, giving everything I’ve got to my guests so they have the best experience, making this food with my heart… That is success as well.