Editor’s note: We’re sorry to report that Kelly’s Cookbookstore has closed.
Thinking we’d find something like New York City’s Kitchen Arts and Letters or London’s Books for Cooks, we paid a visit to Kelly’s Cookbookstore near Omonia Square. Like them, the shop is warm and inviting, its owners encyclopedic sources on all matters culinary. Unlike them, it also doubles as an emporium for select kitchen accessories, chefs’ outfits and especially knives. In fact, displayed on the wall opposite the bookshelves, the knives seemed to outnumber the books, most of which are in Greek.
You’d find more cookbooks in English in a mainstream store like Eleftheroudakis or Evripidis, but if you have a passion for kitchen gadgets, gorgeous aprons or colorful toques, you’ll enjoy browsing here. And you’ll be in good company. Kelly’s caters to almost all the chefs and cooks in Greece. They are the sole representatives for top-quality Wüsthof knives, Triangle products and Microplane graters, but also stock less glamorous items like clogs and vegetable peelers, meat thermometers and bulb basters.
Kelly, short, brunette, wearing tight jeans and a loose gray T-shirt emblazoned with the words “FOLLOW YOUR [heart],” told us that after 15 years in the business, she’s well known in professional cooking circles.
“We have customers from all over the country, not just Athens. They don’t necessarily come here to shop; they can order by phone and soon from our website. If I’d stuck to books, we would have closed years ago. My partners, Thanos and Dionysis Rafailidis, keep track of the knives and supplies.”
Kelly Triandafyllidou gives a broad grin when we ask about her name. “No, it’s not Greek. My real name is Kyriaki, but when I was little my mother thought I looked like one of Charlie’s Angels – the short, dark one – and since then I’ve never been called anything else.”
And when we ask if she likes cooking herself, her whole face beams with enthusiasm. “Like cooking? How could I not? I was born in a restaurant.”
For years her parents, both of them cooks, had a taverna – casseroles, baked dishes and fish – called Ellinikon, opposite the old airport near Glyfada. “I started working there when I was eight. They stood me on a beer crate so I could reach the counter, where I sliced vegetables.”
Although Kelly’s has been in existence in its present location since 2008, it first opened in 1999 in a basement a few blocks away on Pheidiou. Then it was called Chef in Love, the chef being a South African Greek, Tony Kavalieros, who has since moved to the U.S.
“I came to the business not as a cook but as a designer. I studied graphic arts and web design and Tony hired me for those skills. But I was a designer in love with cooking myself. In those days we held seminars with well-known experts, so I learned a lot. The practical aspect from Tony, the theoretical from Alexander Giotis. I was on his team of cooks.”
Mentioning the name of this revered gastronome, food critic/journalist, teacher and restaurant consultant brings a shadow of sadness to Kelly’s mobile face for a moment. He died three years ago before reaching 60.
She also confesses that she too worked in a restaurant as an adult, but that a serious accident forced her to quit. “I can’t stand for long periods; I can’t lift heavy pots and pans. But,” she says philosophically, “if you love something enough, you always find a way to get close to it.”
We talk in short snatches because of continual interruptions by customers looking for a specific item. While we wait, we examine different corners of the shop. Who knew there were so many types of peelers, graters, ceramic knives, tongs and chef’s hats! Gone are the days of the white toque or even the black cap. Kelly’s stocks scarves and hats in colors that would make tropical birds seem drab. Some of them even resemble something the Seven Dwarfs would wear, with a tassel.
Kelly tells me what has changed. “Chefs nowadays, especially young ones, are fed up with the darkness in the kitchen. They spend so many of the hours of the day cooped up inside. They crave light, color and fun.”
We talk about chefs, the difference between the celebrities who change with fame and the lesser-known, but perhaps more conscientious, serious cooks, who keep reading, studying and experimenting but use the finest local products and remain true to their traditions. She knows them all.
For an idea of what Greek professional chefs are interested in, these are the perennial bestsellers at Kelly’s Cookbookstore:
Le Cordon Bleu’s Complete Cooking Techniques (in translation from the French)
Vangelis Driskas, Aromatiki Kouzina (The Aromatic Kitchen), a guide to using herbs and spices
Nikolaos Psilakis, Paradosiaki Kritiki Kouzina (Traditional Cretan Cooking) and Psomi & Glykismata (Bread and Sweets)
Soula Giralea, Ι Techni tis Pitas (The Art of the Pie)
Jamie Oliver, 15 Minute Meals and 30 Minute Meals
Alexandros Haralambopoulos (co-author), Senses Cookbook, an illustrated volume on molecular gastronomy
Paul Freedman, The History of Taste (in Greek translation)
Giorgos Ilioupoulos, Gastronomikon: The Technique of Cooking in Ancient Greece (in Greek)
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