Dining out: Greek Market

My friend Kiely put me onto Greek Market, even though she doesn't eat there very often.

Instead, she goes to this State Street gem and buys bags of pitas and big containers of gyro meat and other fixings, then takes it all home for a Greek feast in her own kitchen.

"You can have a great dinner for 10 people in 15 minutes," the manager told me on the day my husband, son and I had lunch at Greek Market.

That's a great way to exploit Greek Market's mastery of Aegean food, but I also like eating in the small but large-windowed dining space, if only to bask in the friendly service and enthusiastic conversation you're likely to encounter when you go.

The manager and I spent five minutes just talking about feta cheese. I asked him about it because Greek Market's feta is extraordinary, not only salty but creamy, tangy and meltingly smooth.

Turns out it's nearly all imported. That particular batch was from Greece, he said, but he urged me to return for a chance at the French feta they serve, which he said is sweeter and lighter.

I love feta, out of all proportion. I believe a mezedaki platter, a mingling of various Greek treats on one plate, is close to perfection, but especially so if it's crowned with lots of feta and olives.

The mezedaki at Greek Market is a glorious thing, a bed of herbed tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuce topped with pork and chicken souvlaki, two dolmathes, loads of feta and a liberal sprinkling of olives. The plate also came with a quartered "puffy pita," a much plumper and more tender version, crisped on the outside and cut into quarters, with a cup of tzatziki (yogurt) sauce for dipping.

I also love olives, again out of all proportion, and these were wonderful; juicy and firm, sweet and musky, bitter and salty — little nuggets of heaven. My husband doesn't like olives, so I had them all to myself.

We also shared a gyro plate, a pita wrapped around lots of beautifully seasoned lamb gyro meat, with tomatoes and yogurt sauce. On the side was a fresh iceberg-based salad with tangy house dressing and a mound of creamy lemon rice, cooked to a perfect consistency.

For dessert there was much more than baklava on the menu. We enjoyed galataboureko, an intensely sweet pastry sort of like baklava with custard instead of nuts, and kourambiedes, the round little Greek "wedding cookies" with lots of almonds inside and a dusting of powdered sugar outside.

Thrown in with the cookies was a shiny pretzel-like stick of koulouria, crisp and lightly sweet butter cookies sprinkled with sesame seeds, which turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the meal.

Greek plates $4.95-$18.95, gyro sandwiches $4.55-$4.75, salads $1.95-$7.25, sides 99 cents-$3.95, dessert 89 cents-$2.50.

Greek Market

Rating: ★★★
Where: 3205 S. State, South Salt Lake
Hours: Monday-Friday, 10 a.m.-6 p.m.
Saturday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
Closed Sunday
Payment: Major credit cards accepted
Phone: 485-9365
Also: Banquet room available

Stacey Kratz is a freelance writer who reviews restaurants for the Deseret News. e-mail: skratz@desnews.com