Review: Vivien Horler

Matriarchs, Meze and the Evil Eye – A memoir, by Costa Ayiotis (Melinda Ferguson)

The family in which Costa Ayiotis grew up in Kempton Park was not your average nuclear one. Yes, his mum, dad and little sister were there, but so was his dad’s mum, and his aunt.

His mum, Victoria, always knew her mother-in-law would be part of the marriage. Before they tied the knot in Egypt – the family were Egyptian Greeks, originally from Cyprus – fiance Stelios told her: “Victoria, my love, before we get married, you need to know that I am obliged to take care of my mother. That is my only request and condition. It’s my sacred duty as a son.”

And he added: “If you want to make your life easier, leave the kitchen to her and everything will be fine.”

It didn’t end there. Some time after the family had emigrated to SA, Stelios dropped a different bombshell. His sister Mary’s marriage to an Irish diplomat had ended, and not long after she decided she too would come to SA to be close to her mother, and to little Costa, her godson.

Stelios could never turn anyone in need away, especially his own sister. So she moved in with the family too. This had never been part of the bargain, from Victoria’s point of view. And while she got on reasonably with her mother-in-law, the relationship with Mary was something else.

Just glancing at the pages of this book tell us Mary was “a constant thorn in my mother’s side”, “she had a short temper and a curt, cutting manner”, “she was not one to mince her words or lower her voice”, and she could be haughty, disdainful, contemptuous and imperious.

As a small boy Costa loved all three women dearly, although perhaps his grandmother had the edge. But he writes: “… on a good day they were a triumvirate of benevolent volatility. On a bad day, they were a trinity of chaos”.

Victoria became increasingly frustrated by the set up. She also held grudges, for years if need be. The grandmother, known as yiayia, was a wonderful cook of Greek dishes, although with a limited repertoire. As a result Mary had tended to avoid the kitchen. But when she was married to her diplomat and her mother wasn’t around, she became an adventurous and skilled Greek cook.

When Mary first arrived in Kempton Park, Victoria decided to take her husband’s advice and leave the kitchen to her in-laws. But they cooked Greek food, while Victoria liked French food, learnt from the French nuns at her Catholic boarding school. The Greek women looked down on the bechamel sauces, the bought mince (they minced their own cuts of steak) and Victoria’s other culinary choices.

Further tensions arose, and things got so bad that Stelios built on a second kitchen where Victoria would reign supreme. This did not stop the arguments, though, and poor Stelios was torn between his love for and loyalty to all three women.

Costa, however, thrived on the affection and pampering he got from them. Many years later, after he had studied law at Wits and become a diplomat himself, he realised a long-held ambition and opened a Greek restaurant in Hout Bay, which was the subject of his first delightful memoir, My Big Fat Greek Taverna.

And you can see this in his loving descriptions of the food cooked in Kempton Park by all three women in the household.

Poor Stelios, he preferred to eat alone and in silence. Among his favourite dishes was to slice a tomato into quarters, cut cucumber into long strips and salt them, drizzle olive oil over everything, put olives on his plate with a piece of cheese, cold cuts or anchovies, break some bread or crackers, and wash everything down with a few glasses of Shiraz followed by fresh fruit. Sounds pretty good to me.

Ayiotis accompanies his tale of domestic unbliss with a contemporary history of the South Africa he grew up in, the tensions in the country, the 1976 uprising, the way blacks were treated by the white government, while admitting he, like most whites, took his privilege for granted.

I read Matriarchs with interest, and found the descriptions of food mouth-watering, but I think it doesn’t quite reach the heights and humour of My Big Fat Greek Taverna. However, it’s a tale of growing up white at a particular time in SA, with a domestic drama twist, and you do feel for all four adults and the impossible situation in which they found themselves.

• Matriarchs, Meze and the Evil Eye features in Exclusive Books’s Christmas catalogue for 2024