February 11, 2021
THE WASHINGTON POST – Nektaria Anastasiadou’s debut,
A Recipe for Daphne, is perhaps the first contemporary novel in English set among Istanbul’s dwindling population of Rum – Greek Orthodox Christians, some of whom trace their roots back to the Byzantine Empire. It’s also a novel to be thoroughly savoured, from its enticing culinary elements to its charming love stories.
The story revolves around Daphne, a young American woman who has come to the city of her parents’ birth to explore her heritage. There, she meets two men who vie for her affections: Fanis, a feisty 76-year-old, has a long history of womanising, to try to exorcise a dark chapter from his past. Kosmas, an award-winning pastry chef who’s still living with his mother at 41, tries to track down a lost Ottoman recipe to win Daphne’s heart. A colourful group of friends, opinionated aunties and neighbourhood regulars, almost all from Istanbul’s diverse non-Muslim communities, round ou