Today’s adventure: Tarpon Springs, FL

It’s a touristy town on Florida’s Gulf Coast, and we try to visit every time we’re in the area. Known as the sponge capital of the world, harvesting sea sponges was once the town’s main industry. Now the town is known for its boating activities and Greek food — those sponges were harvested by Greek immigrants. If you’re not doing any activity on the water, its the kind of place to have lunch and spend a couple of hours shopping.

Honoring the sponge divers

And the town’s Greek heritage — these are Naiads, from Greek mythology.

Of course we had to have lunch at Hellas.

We started our meal with saganaki. This is a semi soft cheese, which is briefly pan fried to develop a "crust". The cheese is then doused with brandy and "flamed' at the table, so it becomes rich and gooey. Opa!

I had a wonderful dish of shrimp and feta over rice.

Drew had dolmadas.

A word about dolmades. Here in New York the Greek restaurants stuff grape leaves with a cold rice mixture and serve them on top of Greek salad. You cannot find grape leaves stuffed with a meat mixture. Drew tells me that his mother (who was of Greek-Jewish heritage) used to make dolmades stuffed with meat, so when he found the dish on Hellas' menu, he was ecstatic. He orders dolmadas every time we go to Hellas.

After lunch we walked along Dodocanese Avenue, exploring the shops.