Maria Iordanidou

"Loxandra" is the story of a Greek family living in Constantinople (Istanbul) from the mid-18th century up to the beginning of the First World War. It is not biographical as such, and many of the characters are fictional. Others, including the main character of Loxandra, are real. Constantinople was the author's home during the first years of her life and in her book she conveys the historical events, the customs, the spirit of those times when life for the Greeks of Constantinople was relatively untroubled. The real Loxandra was brought up in the Anatolian tradition of love of good food; culinary delights flowed from her hands and her kitchen as from the horn of plenty, and her generosity and enthusiasm for life and food was not confined to her family but spilled over to whomsoever she had contact with. The Greek edition of Loxandra , first published in 1963, has been perhaps the most acclaimed and best-selling popular publication in Greece of the 20th century and remains continuously in print.