Tsouchti Manis Recipe: Peloponnesian pasta with Myzithra

One of the simplest and tastiest Greek pasta dishes.

This is one of the simplest yet most satisfying pasta dishes ever. A pasta dish that resembles Greek cuisine as the cuisine of the poor who knew how to make their food taste so delicious, that it’s now become the envy of the entire developed world.

People tend to forget how common pasta and pasta dishes are to Greek cuisine, and many are surprised when I mention this recipe to them. Tsouchti comes from Mani in the southern Peloponnese. It’s pasta with fried ksiri (dry) myzithra cheese and topped with fried egg. ‘Tsouchti’ roughly translates to charred/toasted, which is what you will do to the myzithra. Hence ‘Tsouchti Manis’ essentially means the ‘charred/toasted’ pasta dish of Mani.

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Tsoucthi Manis Recipe: How to make Greek tsouchti pasta

Ingredients:

Serves 4 portions

• Extra virgin olive oil

• 50g butter

• 175g dry myzithra + more to garnish (aka ksiri myzithra – NOT ksinomyzithra or galomyzithra)

• 1 500g pack of spaghetti, Greek macaroni no. 5 or bucatini

• 1-2 eggs per portion

Method: How to make Tsouchti Manis

1. Bring a large saucepan of fresh water to the boil and grate 200g of the dry myzithra into a bowl.

2. Place a large frying pan on a medium heat. Add the extra virgin olive oil and butter and heat until it all melts and begins to bubble.

3. Now add in the myzithra and fully combine with the olive oil and butter. Toast it until lightly golden, stirring it every minute to avoid it from catching and burning while you prepare your pasta.

4. While you’re toasting the myzithra, salt the boiling water and cook your pasta for approximately 9 minutes or to your liking.

5. Once the myzithra is golden throughout, turn off the heat and mix well with the pasta. Do not season – the myzithra is salty enough.

6. Return the frying pan to a low-medium heat and gently fry the eggs to serve until the white is cooked but the yolk is still wobbly and runny.

7. Plate your pasta, add 1-2 fried eggs on top and finish with some freshly grated myzithra and plenty of freshly ground black pepper. No salt needed.