The High Art of Simplicity

However, he is not simply a chef. He is a poet of matter, of taste, and of silence. A cook who builds emotional landscapes with every dish. Born in Athens and raised between the capital and Messolonghi, he experienced early on the intensity of contrasts: sea and mountain, soil and stone, tradition and freedom. These experiences, along with his love for literature, music, and photography, shaped a creator who cooks with memory and vision.

As a child, he spent his summers alongside his grandfather in the olive grove, learning the meaning of time, silence, and care. These values are reflected today in every dish he creates. “Cooking is not technique,” he says. “It is observation. It is standing in front of a product and giving it space to speak.”

He talks about the olive tree as if it were a person. He loves the deep green of its leaf, the feel of oil on the hands. He calls it the “mother of flavor.” He adores salt, not for the taste it adds, but for its silent strength. And when asked how a recipe begins, he does not refer to techniques or rules; he begins with music, a glass of wine, and a blank page. He makes lists, tests combinations, designs flavors the way others design houses or poems.

He loves Rainer Maria Rilke – especially The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge – and listens to Manos Hadjidakis when writing his menu cards. His kitchen is not a place of imposition but a place of dialogue. He works closely with his producers, gives space to raw materials, cooks with seasonality and humility.

He is inspired by the Greece that does not shout. The landscapes of Central Greece, the sunset lights over the Ionian, the smell of burnt wood. His teachers were not only the chefs he worked alongside, but also his grandmother, who added mint to meatballs with absolute certainty. And when asked which dishes he carries within him, he answers without hesitation: “Bean soup, bread, olives. That is the essence.”

His routine in the kitchen is reverent. He wakes up early, arrives first, listens to music. Before touching the knife, he writes – a list, a thought, a verse. Cooking for him is a way of life, a way of thinking, the lens through which he understands the world. And perhaps that is why, when asked to describe himself in three words, he chooses: “Stubborn. Observant. Introverted.”

One dream? To cook for Sophia Loren. A simple, genuine dish: pasta with olive oil, lemon, and plenty of parmesan. “Because elegance,” he says, “is always a matter of simplicity.”

Speaking with him, while tasting his creations, one thing becomes clear: Petros Dimas cooks to create moments. Like photographs not yet printed, but ones you will remember forever.