The blackboard hanging outside Dexameni’s cramped kitchen reads, “Kindergarten-Bar-Nursing Home,” the title jokingly bestowed upon the café by the eminent novelist and poet Alexandros Papadiamantis. He was among the literati who made Dexameni their regular hangout shortly after it opened in the early 1900s – so regular that the place ended up serving as a home-away-from-home for all stages of life.

With the banks closed for almost two weeks and Greece’s position in the eurozone the subject of heated debate and endless negotiations for the past several months, we wondered how some of our favorite restaurants were coping. Greeks had voted NO to austerity the previous Sunday (July 5), but did this mean they were spending their spare cash on staples for harder times and going out only to take part in demonstrations or stand in ATM queues?

In terms of greenness, Athens doesn’t even come close to other European capitals, with their verdant parks and blossoming gardens. The truth is, modern urban development has not been particularly gentle with this city. Numerous concrete buildings, along with poor road design, hem in inhabitants and visitors with featureless views.

Whether you’re a native Athenian or just visiting, Kypseli is not likely to be on your list of favorite haunts unless you happen to have roots there. It’s not connected to the Metro, it boasts neither museums nor fancy boutiques, and yet it must be one of the liveliest districts in Athens. T

George Vassalos is a beekeeper, farmer, master distiller. He lives in Lagkada, in the center of Amorgos, at the southern end of the Cyclades, and which was made famous by the movie Le Grand Bleu (1988). We were lucky enough to be at his farm recently when he made pasteli using his own thyme honey and sesame grown in Chalkidiki.

You don’t need the excuse of a ferry departure to head for the port of Rafina, on Attica’s east coast. Its long, open beach is a favorite among windsurfers, its fish stalls carry the catch from most of the central Aegean and, most important, it offers a handful of excellent eateries. But how can you separate the standouts from the run-of-the-mill?

Chalkida, the small peninsula on central Evia (Euboea) just an hour’s drive from Athens, is an ideal day-trip destination for urbanites. It’s famous for an unusual phenomenon, in which the tide in the Strait of Evripos changes direction several times a day, and it’s also known among tourists for its fresh and delicious fish and seafood. When Chalkideans want fresh seafood, however, they head to the less touristed town of Nea Artaki, just north of Evia’s main city. In the tiny port, there’s a classic promenade lined with taverns, and the penultimate, Teskos, is our favorite destination. On a recent visit, the weather was beautiful, sunny and cool enough for us to sit on the sidewalk adjacent to the sea.

Sooner or later almost everyone in Athens, tourist or local, heads for the flea market, the city’s oldest bazaar, below Monastiraki Square. Although it’s busiest on Sundays, all week long you can rummage through the antiques – furniture, bric-a-brac, mirrors, paintings, vintage toys, statuettes, vases, silverware – spread out in colorful disorder in front of the small shops that line all four sides of Avissinia Square.

The lively neighborhood of Metaxourgeio takes its name from a silk factory that was once located there (metaxi is silk in Greek). While small, the trendy area is home to a vibrant mixture of people from all over the world who inhabit Athens’ typical old buildings, surrounded by theaters and a thriving art scene. It’s one of our favorite neighborhoods for strolling. And this time of year sees Metaxourgeio in the spotlight: It’s especially famous for having one of the most impressive freestyle Apokries (Carnival) celebrations!

The Holy Week in Greece is full of scents and flavors. Ovens work overtime baking brioches (tsourekia), Easter biscuits and melitinia, diminutive sweets that originate from Santorini. Traditionally, melitinia are made by women and girls on Holy Tuesday to be eaten on the evening of the Resurrection and the coming days of Easter (Orthodox Easter falls on April 12 this year).

In Athens, apart from traditional or nouvelle Greek, you can find almost any kind of cuisine you crave, but usually not under one roof. Thanks to the influx of immigrants and diaspora Greeks in the past 20 years, the city’s roster of foreign restaurants is no longer confined to Italian, French and a sprinkling of swanky Asian and Indian places with white tablecloths.

here’s a lot of talk about revolution in Greece these days. We have a new left-wing government that promises to shake up the establishment both here and abroad, cutting costs by drastically reducing ministerial perks like private guards and official automobiles, reinstating lost jobs and shorn pensions, upping the minimum wage … and seeking alternative ways of handling Greek debt. Our young PM and some of his closest associates are even flouting officialdom’s time-honored dress code by speaking in parliament, Brussels and Bonn without ties and with flapping shirttails.

If there is one single food family that shows off the breadth and extent of the collective Greek culinary imagination, it has to be the humble legume. Together with wheat, beans of all kinds, along with lentils, chickpeas and split peas, form the very foundation of the Greek diet and have done so since Neolithic times.

It’s Friday, 5:30 p.m., an hour one usually associates with tea and biscuits, or in Greece a frappé, yet Kozi’s, a South African restaurant, is pleasantly abuzz with diners tucking into massive steaks and inch-thick burgers. As we stand by the counter waiting for the owner to appear and watching the meat sizzling on the grill, we can’t help smiling. The young woman near the till asks, “Why are you smiling?”

Editor’s note: The year is coming to an end, which means it’s time for us to look back on all the great eating experiences we had in 2014 and name our favorites among them. Pavlidis This modern-looking patisserie is located in central Athens on busy Katehaki, a street more associated with car mechanics than with any sort of food. The Pavlidis family has been in the pastry business since 1932. Famous for its galaktoboureko, this patisserie actually prides itself on its mandoles, a rock-shaped chocolate concoction with caramelized almonds. But really, it’s the kaimaki ice cream which comes in two different variations that we love most. Good kaimaki ice cream is hard to come by; it tends to be quite heavy. Pavlidis makes its version the classic – and correct – way, using buffalo milk, mastic and salepi, flour made from the root of wild orchids, which produces a milky and chewy treat. The bitter almond version is a fragrant, melt-in-your-mouth masterpiece. This is far and away our favorite ice cream in Athens.