Why doesn't Greek cuisine use a lot of spices, compared to neighbors?

Question

According to what I know almost all countries in the Mediterranean which surround Greece use a lot of spices in their cuisine. Greece itself has been occupied by such countries for hundreds of years. There has always been trade and travel between Greece and the other countries. So how come spices aren't being used that much at all?

Compared to say, Turkey, or Italy, Greek food is not spicy at all. I am not saying this is a bad thing, or that it is bland - I just find it curious that over the millennia no significant use of spices has developed like it did in Italy, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey, Bulgaria. Out of those countries most use a lot of spices including capsicums, and the few ones that don't, still use a lot of spices (like say Syria).

It's known that even in antiquity spices were known in Greece and used for medical reasons. This makes it even more curious. Are there any historical reasons for that perhaps?

Thanks.

Answer 1

The question of "why not" is difficult to answer definitively, or really at all. We can't ask folks 2000 years ago why they didn't care about cumin. However, there are some historical impacts on Greek cuisine that bear on this, so let's explore them:

1. You mention Turkey, Syria, and Lebanon as Greek neighbors. But consider that Greece is also historically next to Austria, and currently next to Romania and Bulgaria, and is closer to Slovakia than it is to Lebanon. So if you look at Greece as being midway between Syria and Kosovo, the frequency of spice use also puts it midway.

2. Greek cuisine doesn't rely heavily on spices partly because it does rely heavily on herbs and alliums. Because of the climate, onions, garlic, leeks, parsley, dill, oregano, thyme, and others grow readily and plentifully all over the islands and peninsulas. So do citrus, also used for seasoning Greek dishes. Many Greek dishes will have onions, garlic, lemon, and as much as 2 cups of minced herbs in them. Given this, one can see why Greek cooks didn't feel the need to add two teaspoons of cumin and dried peppers as well. Italy, having a similar climate, largely takes a similar approach.

3. One place where Greek spice usage is on a parallel with Syria is in sweets. The palette of spices used for Greek pastries, cookies, and cakes is as great as -- and extremely similar to -- the ones used in the Middle East. This is undoubtedly because most places in the region got their sweet recipes from the Persian and Ottoman empires, so they're really the same recipes.

4. Greece, like other ancient regions, includes multiple cuisines. Some of these use more spices than others, particularly Thrace.

Note that above I'm using the term "spices" to refer to its accepted use, of "aromatic seeds, stems, and bark".

Answer 2

My hearsay answer to this is what I learned growing up in Greece (it might be totally wrong): use of hot spices is way more common in cultures living in hotter climates, and it has to do with something like food preservation, or hiding the loss of good taste in the time period when the food is still safe to eat, which would occur much faster in a climate hotter than ours. So, the short answer I learned from my mom and grandma is "we don't need it", but hots (mostly in form of hot peppers, think of the Mediterranean version of jalapeno) were "contained" to certain foods if someone has the taste for them. And in general, they come with a warning that "too much spice (meaning hot) is bad for your stomach". Sweet spices (e.g. cinnamon, nutmeg) are used in abundance for desserts.
One thing to remember also is availability, especially a few centuries ago. At least for the common folk, it's hard to make a case for expensive things that are grown an ocean away, when you have an abundance of herb bushes growing wild in your backyard - so I would certainly make a distinction between spices are native to the Mediterranean (e.g. saffron, coriander) vs things like allspice. And if you want something to overwhelm the taste, garlic does the trick very easily in (non-Americanized) Greek cuisine.