Greek food guide: feta, Kalamata, Chios mastic and what PDO and PGI mean

The short answer

Greek food is regional, and a good part of that is written into EU law. The European Commission's register of geographical indications lists 82 Greek food names as PDOs and 39 as PGIs, plus 15 protected names for Greek spirits. By XTOUR's count of the register's product classes, 25 of those food names are cheeses and 33 are oils and fats.[2]

The labels are the useful part for a traveller reading a menu or a shop shelf. They tell you which names are tied to a place, and the register's own documents say what each name has to be. They do not tell you what to order, and this guide does not rank dishes or producers. What to eat in a particular place belongs on that destination's page.

PDO, PGI and GI: what each label requires

The European Commission sets out the three schemes on one page. A PDO, which the Commission describes as having the strongest link to its place, requires every part of production, processing and preparation to take place in the defined area, and the Commission's own example is a Greek one, Kalamata olive oil, which it says is entirely produced in the region of Kalamata from olive varieties from that area. A PGI needs, for most products, at least one of those stages in the area. A GI is the spirit-drink scheme, and for most spirits it needs at least one stage of distillation or preparation in the area, not the raw materials. The PDO and PGI labels are mandatory on food that carries the name.[1]

The register is still growing. A new EU regulation covering food, wine and spirits came into force on 13 May 2024, according to the Commission.[1] One more Greek food name, Afrina, is published as a PGI and two more, for prawns and sardines from the Amvrakikos, are at the application stage. Fifty-seven of the registered Greek food names carry an EU protection date in 1996, the earliest year among them. The register gives most food names both in Greek and in Latin letters, and the names keep their Greek grammar: "Chiou" is "of Chios" and "Santorinis" "of Santorini".[2]

Feta

Feta is a Greek PDO, file PDO-GR-0427, registered by an act published in October 2002.[2] That date is later than most Greek cheese names, and XTOUR has not read the act itself, so it does not explain the difference.

The register holds the summary of Greece's original application, which rests on a Greek ministerial decision of January 1994. It describes Feta as "a white table cheese which is stored in brine", made by traditional methods either from sheep's milk alone or from sheep's milk mixed with goat's milk, with goat's milk not exceeding 30% of the milk. It gives the area as Macedonia, Thrace, Thessaly, Central Mainland Greece, the Peloponnese and the prefecture of Lesbos, and a total ripening period of at least two months.[3] That summary is the version XTOUR could read; it has not read the current specification, so it does not say whether the area has changed since.

Kalamata: two names, two areas

"Kalamata" appears in two separate food PDOs, and a third time in a spirit name, Ouzo of Kalamata.[2]

• Elia Kalamatas, the table olive. Greece's application describes olives of the Kalamata variety, picked by hand when fully ripe and black, scored, washed and ripened in brine, from an area set as the administrative boundaries of the prefecture of Messinia.[4]
• Kalamata, the olive oil. Its application gives a narrower area, the municipality of Kalamata in Messinia, and two varieties, Koroneiki and Mastoidis.[5] The register lists later publications for this name, in 2012 and 2015, which XTOUR has not read.[2]

So the same word protects an olive from a whole prefecture and an oil from one municipality. The European Commission's example sentence, "the region of Kalamata", is looser than either application.[5][1] XTOUR's reading is that the PDO label and the full registered name, not the word "Kalamata" on its own, are what tie a product to Messinia.

Chios mastic: four protected names from one set of villages

Mastic is a resin from the mastic tree, and the register protects it four times over.[2]

• Masticha Chiou, the resin itself, a PDO since 1997.[2]
• Mastichelaio Chiou, mastic oil, a PDO distilled from the resin.[6][2]
• Tsikla Chiou, Chios chewing gum, a PDO.[14][2]
• Masticha of Chios, a liqueur, protected as a spirit GI.[7][2]

Greece's application for the mastic oil names the area: 24 villages in the south of Chios known as the Mastikhokhoria, "the mastic villages", from Armolia, Mesta and Pirgi to Kalamoti and Vessa.[6] It names the tree as Pistacia lentiscus var. Chia, and says producing Khios mastic outside those municipalities is forbidden.[6] The liqueur's technical file adds its own rules: at least 20% alcohol and 150 grams of sugar per litre, no added flavourings or colours, and every stage from flavouring to bottling on Chios.[7]

The people behind the name are organised. The Chios Mastiha Growers Association says it was founded in 1938 as a compulsory cooperative, and represents 20 primary cooperatives in the 24 mastic villages, with about 4,500 members.[8] UNESCO inscribed the know-how of cultivating mastic on Chios on its intangible heritage list in 2014. Its description follows the year: pruning in winter, clearing the ground around each trunk from mid-June, cutting the bark from July, and gathering and sorting the hardened "tears".[9]

Santorini and the Cyclades

Two Santorini names are PDOs. Fava Santorinis, which the register classes as a dried leguminous vegetable, was registered in 2010; Tomataki Santorinis, a fresh tomato, in 2013. "Fava" on its own is not protected: the register also holds To Fava tis Amorgou and Fava Feneou, both PGIs.[2] XTOUR's Santorini page covers the island.

The Greek National Tourism Organisation lists fava, kopanisti cheese and louza as traditional dishes of the Cyclades.[15] Kopanisti is also a PDO, and Greece's application describes it as a soft, salty cheese with a creamy texture and tangy flavour, made from cow's, sheep's or goat's milk, with "the Cyclades prefecture" as its area.[12] Naxos has its own cheese PDOs, Graviera Naxou and Arseniko Naxou, and a spirit GI, Kitro of Naxos. For Mykonos, the Cyclades-wide names are the ones that apply: XTOUR has found no register name for Mykonos itself.[2]

Crete

Crete's names cover cheese, oil, bread and spirits. Graviera Kritis is a PDO cheese, and Greece's application, made by the association of cheese-makers of Rethymno prefecture, describes a hard table cheese from sheep's milk or sheep's and goat's milk, from the prefectures of Chania, Rethymno, Heraklion and Lasithi, ripened for at least three months.[11] Xynomyzithra Kritis and Pichtogalo Chanion are two more Cretan cheese PDOs.[2]

Ten names in the register's oils-and-fats class include the word "Kritis" or "Kriti", from Sitia Lasithiou Kritis to Peza Irakliou Kritis and Kolymvari Chanion Kritis. Eight of the ten are PDOs; the other two are PGIs, Chania Kritis and Kriti, an olive oil whose registering act dates from 2025. Kritiko paximadi, the Cretan rusk, is a PGI, and Tsikoudia of Crete a spirit GI.[2] The tourism board names dakos, gamopilafo and kalitsounia as traditional Cretan dishes.[16] See Heraklion and Chania.

Ouzo, tsipouro and the regional spirits

Ouzo is a spirit GI held jointly by Greece and Cyprus.[2] Its technical file says it is produced exclusively in the two countries, that flavouring, blending, sweetening, dilution and bottling all have to happen there, and that the process cannot be split between them. It names the flavourings as aniseed, fennel seed, Chios mastic and other aromatic plants, with aniseed always dominant.[13] Five further ouzo names carry a place: Thrace, Kalamata, Macedonia, Mitilene and Plomari.[2]

Tsipouro and Tsikoudia share one GI, with separate names for the tsipouro of Thessaly, of Tyrnavos and of Macedonia and for Tsikoudia of Crete. Corfu's kumquat is protected twice, as a fruit PGI, Koum kouat Kerkyras, and as a spirit GI, Koum Kouat of Corfu.[2] The tourism board's Ionian page also mentions kumquat liqueur in Corfu.[17] XTOUR's Corfu destination is Corfu Town.

Dishes the tourism board lists by island group

The Greek National Tourism Organisation gives a short "traditional dishes" panel on each island-group page.[21][19][17][16] Some of the foods it names also appear in the register: kopanisti in the Cyclades, ladotyri in the North Aegean (as Ladotyri Mytilinis), Aegina's pistachios (as Fystiki Aeginas) and figs on Evia, where Xera syka Kymis, dried figs of Kymi, is a PDO.[2][22][20][18][15]

The groups themselves are explained in Greek island groups explained. The register holds no name for dishes such as dakos or pastitsada, and XTOUR does not give recipes for them.

The Mediterranean diet

UNESCO inscribed the Mediterranean diet on its intangible heritage list in 2013, jointly for Cyprus, Croatia, Spain, Greece, Italy, Morocco and Portugal. Its description is of a way of living rather than a menu: the skills, rituals and traditions around crops, fishing, cooking and above all sharing food, with eating together at its centre.[10]

What XTOUR does not tell you

XTOUR does not list restaurants, markets, producers, tastings or prices in Greece, and it does not know whether a dish in a given restaurant uses PDO or PGI ingredients. It does not publish allergen, vegetarian, halal or kosher information; those need checking for the exact dish. The summaries quoted above are the register's copies of Greece's original applications from the 1990s; XTOUR has not read the current specifications, which can be amended. Wine has its own guide: the Greek wine guide.