You can learn a lot about Greece from the place mats at Desfina. Crowded onto each sheet of crinkly paper are a drawing of the Parthenon, a map of Greece, and a history lesson. "Western Civilization and Democracy were developed by the Ancient Greeks," it says. "Aristotle argued that the earth is round 1800 years before Columbus. Hippocrates was the father of Modern Medicine."
You can learn a lot about Greek food from this book I found in the library: The Foods of Greece, by an Athenian journalist. It's a wonderful coffee-table affair that paints a glowing picture of a cuisine of mint and feta and parsley, of roast lamb and eggs and seafood, of fresh cheese and hand-cracked green olives.
You can forget all that stuff, though, when you sit down to dinner at Desfina, a cozy little taverna offering authentic Greek cuisine, tucked behind the Cambridge courthouse. There are only two things you need to know here: one, Greek restaurant food bears only a slight resemblance to country cuisine. And two, at Desfina a man will come to your table and light a piece of cheese on fire.
