The Lemon Roast Chicken Recipe That A Greek Grandmother Swears By

Her main love language was preparing food for her family. She was from the Peloponnese, but love brought her to the island of Andros in her late 20s. I spent my first summer with her when I was only a month old. I remember her using her retro cooking utensils from the 1970s, which she would insist were irreplaceable on account of their quality. 

During the summers I never had an alarm; it was the smell of what she was cooking in the mornings that would always wake me up and bring me straight to the small, traditional kitchen she had. She taught me how to forage, harvest, and prepare my own capers; how to cultivate vegetables; and how to make sure every year we have enough chickens for our own eggs. She was obsessed with her lemon tree, which she planted when I was born. I knew that one of my daily tasks would be to collect the eggs in the morning and cut a few lemons for her that she would then use for our meals, like this kotopoulo lemonato. After her passing, I've probably never eaten or will ever eat food that has been prepared with so much love.

Serves 4

This is an edited extract from Yiayia by Anastasia Miari, published by Hardie Grant Books. Available in stores nationally, RRP $55. Photography by Marco Arguello.