Dakos or otherwise known, in my hometown, as Koukouvagia (Owl), is a Cretan meze made of dried bread or barley rusk, grated tomatoes, feta cheese and oregano. It's one of my favourite summer dishes as it's light (especially when trying to cope with the heat), healthy, simple to put together and very yummy. It is a perfect alternative to a salad. In this version of a Dakos I decided to add a few slices of avocado for a bit more texture and some basil leaves for that extra kick of freshness.
Ingredients:
-dried bread/barley rusk
-salad tomatoes
-greek feta cheese
-avocado
-oregano
-salt/pepper
-olive oil
-basil
-olives
For this recipe I have only listed the ingredients and skipped the quantities as it is completely up to you to decide how much of each ingredient you would like to use. More avocado and less tomato or less avocado and more tomato, it's up to you!
If you are using barley rusk then you can skip this step but if you are using normal bread it is important you dry it out completely otherwise the juices from the tomatoes will make the bread all soggy and that's something you definitely want to avoid. So, pop a few slices of bread (bread buns or rolls will work better than toast bread) in the oven at 130° for about 20-30mins or until you think they are ready. I used multi-seed deli rolls and they worked perfectly.
For the toppings just grate your tomatoes and season them with salt and pepper, slice up your avocado and crumble up some feta cheese. After your dried bread has properly cooled down, drizzle some olive oil on it and then add the avocado, tomato and feta. To top it off, sprinkle some oregano and a basil leaf. In Greece, this is a dish always served with loads of olives but of course they are optional if you're not a big fan of them.
