Monday, September 14, 2015

Katsamatado wedding

Vasili's Wedding- Another Cretan Wedding- I am still uploading more pix and videos.

Reception line- lasted at least an hour! This is where people who did not go to the church wedding will give best wishes and drop off the gift of cash in a white envelope. They will also receive a round roll of bread ( have to find the name out from paul) , xerotigiana, maybe a shot of sikoudia as was done in Melissa but not in Katsmatado, and salted peanuts again done in Melissa but not Katsamatado. It was a trip to see our 88 year old cousin Theodoros at the discoteck where Paul use to go dancing. The wedding an awesome combo of Old tradition and New . 
This one started days ago with Progammos ( Prewedding) which is a traditional style smaller wedding. During this time, friends/family   drop off butchered animals ready for cooking for the wedding and the groom has dinner for them. Plenty of food, wine to go around.

We visited the village before the wedding and had plenty of village wine, goat and boiled chicken. (We also stopped and visited Petro and Evangelici and I'll upload the pix when I find them)
homemade wine, boiled goat, xerotigana on the table before the wedding. 




To learn more a Cretan wedding see here: This site does a fabulous job at describing it and it was exactly like this- same food etc. Click here to read more about Crete weddings:  Organically Greek: Wedding (Γάμος)


The ceremony. 

The church

The beautiful bride!

 Sweets greeted us as we walked into the reception- these were white chocolate with dried fruit. 

Jordan Almond or Cofreta. 

Mano's favorite food....boiled goat meat!

appetizers. The traditional appetizer on the plate is Kalitsounia. Greens ( horta) and cheese wrapped in filo. The other ones were not traditional but still really good. 

Wine and tsikoudia

 Anticipation! See the cheese- that is gravieda, a local cheese, most likely made by the family, and honey is on the table to serve over the cheese. 

       Thankfully we brought the kindle, it was  a great ice breaker for all the boys since they spoke different languages but all knew the language o minecraft!























See all the men? One thing that I haven't uploaded was an amazing song that the Cretan men sing. The men of the wedding party, mostly the 30-50 sector dressed in Cretan black, arms linked around each other sing a song- Rizitika- a wedding song. Stay tuned for the upload. Here's a link for more info about Rizitika http://www.kretakultur.dk/english/folklore/music/rizitika.htm



Here's Hadiklia with her father  Adoni in front and her hubby in back.
the never ending line- this is a photo of the line in which everyone who didn't attend the ceremony now says, "Zisete" to the bride and groom and family, drop off the gift of money in a white envelope and are given bread called Kouloura and xeratigano. 
Special Lady- Georgia  with Paul . Cretan wine is in his hand. 

xerotigani - this is a delicious friend dough with syrup. This was the first thing on the table and most ladies ate this first. We also took some home.



at the village- awesome to see decorations in all types of trees. 








4 comments:

  1. Greats pics, Michelle. Did the kids dance? What time did the wedding get over? I would like to see more pics of you, PUl and kids and the house. Are you enjoying you air conditioner?

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  2. glad to see you found the blog useful Michelle - i hope you have a fab time here

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  3. Hi Mom,
    The kids didn't dance, It appears there is a lot of waiting around at a Cretan wedding, I'm talking hours waiting while the bride and groom arrive and form a reception line. With almost a thousand guests, the reception lines is REALLY long

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  4. Quite an inspirational post! We have booked one of the most famous royal themed Seattle Wedding venues for our wedding reception party. The venue is beautiful but we want to add some custom touch of wedding décor to it so I was just wondering if you have some unique decoration ideas for our royal themed receptions!

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