079Magiritsa

Method

Classic Holy Saturday avgolemono soup. Serve piping hot alongside hard-boiled red Easter eggs and tsoureki sweet bread.

You will need

• Large stockpot
• Slotted spoon and tongs
• Sharp chef's knife and board
• Whisk and mixing bowl
• Ladle

1. Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil, add the whole pluck pieces, and blanch them for 5 to 7 minutes until firm throughout. 7 min Ready when: the offal changes colour and firms up enough to cut neatly
2. Drain the blanched offal, plunge into cool water, drain again, and dice very finely into tiny cubes no larger than 5 mm. 15 min Ready when: finely minced, uniform cubes of liver, lung, and heart
3. Heat the olive oil in a wide heavy-bottomed stockpot over medium heat, add the sliced spring onions, and sweat for 3 minutes until softened but uncoloured. 3 min Ready when: onions turn translucent and fragrant
4. Add the diced offal to the pan and sauté over medium-high heat for 5 minutes, stirring frequently. 5 min Ready when: the offal browns very lightly and releases its aroma
5. Add the shredded romaine lettuce in batches, turning with tongs until wilted down completely. 4 min Ready when: lettuce collapses and yields moisture
6. Pour in the 1500 ml water, add the salt and black pepper, bring to a boil, then reduce heat, cover, and simmer gently for 15 minutes. 15 min Ready when: broth is aromatic and greens are tender
7. Stir in the rinsed rice and half of the chopped dill, cover, and simmer for another 12 minutes until the rice is completely cooked through. 12 min Ready when: rice grains are soft and slightly swollen, thickening the broth slightly
8. Remove the soup from the heat completely and let it stand for 3 minutes so the boiling ceases. 3 min Ready when: no bubbles remain on the surface
9. In a heatproof bowl, whisk the eggs vigorously until frothy, slowly whisk in the lemon juice, then gradually incorporate 3 ladles of the hot soup broth one splash at a time while whisking continuously. 4 min Ready when: egg mixture becomes hot, silky, and pale without curdling
10. Pour the tempered egg-lemon mixture back into the pot in a steady stream, shaking the pot in circular motions to integrate thoroughly. 2 min Ready when: soup turns velvety, creamy, and uniform pale green
11. Scatter the remaining fresh dill over the top, grind fresh black pepper, and ladle directly into deep bowls. 1 min Ready when: fragrant burst of dill aroma rises from the warm soup

Tap a step to tick it off.

Make ahead and storing

The offal can be blanched and finely diced the day before. The soup base can be cooked up to the point of adding avgolemono; reheat gently before tempering in the eggs and lemon.

Keep in the fridge for up to 2 days; reheat very gently over low heat, never boiling, to preserve the avgolemono.

Substitutions

• cultivated mushrooms (oyster, portobello, and cremini) for lamb pluck (heart, liver, lungs). A modern vegan/vegetarian variation widely known as 'magiritsa manitarion'.

Common mistakes

• Adding the egg-lemon mixture while the soup is still bubbling on the flame.. Boiling causes egg proteins to coagulate immediately into white flecks, ruining the glossy emulsion.
• Cutting the pluck into large, coarse chunks.. Magiritsa requires a delicate, minutely diced texture so every spoonful has an even balance of pluck and herbs.

Regional variants

• Thessalian magiritsa: prepared without lettuce, relying almost entirely on abundant spring onions and dill.
• Peloponnesian tomato magiritsa: made without avgolemono, finished with a light tomato broth and cinnamon.

About the dish

Magiritsa is the definitive midnight soup consumed across Greece right after the midnight Holy Saturday church service, breaking the rigorous forty-day Great Lent fast. Composed of finely chopped lamb liver, heart, and lungs simmered with abundant wild greens, romaine lettuce, spring onions, and dill, it is traditionally finished with a rich avgolemono (egg-and-lemon sauce). It was historically designed to use the innards of the lamb slated for spit-roasting on Easter Sunday, gently preparing the digestive system for the heavy meat feast to come.

Found in all of Greece. Cooked for easter.

Cousins elsewhere

• Kemedat (Levantine). Various Middle Eastern offal soups prepare pluck and stomach for celebrations, but lack the signature avgolemono and spring herbs.
• Drob chorba (Balkan). Bulgarian and Romanian offal soups also use lamb pluck boiled with rice and herbs, occasionally thickened with egg and yoghurt.

Nutrition per serving (estimate)

375 kcal · protein 32.5 g · fat 18.4 g (saturated 4.4 g) · carbohydrate 20.5 g (sugars 2.8 g) · fibre 4.5 g · sodium 766 mg

An estimate (summed from ingredient estimates) that varies with the exact ingredients. It is not dietary advice.

Written fresh by Epikouria editors from general culinary tradition. Recipe by the Epikouria editors. Following the classic pan-Hellenic Easter midnight ritual with finely chopped lamb pluck, spring herbs, and delicate avgolemono..