ATHENS: Mellilotos.

This family-run, weekday-only restaurant specializing in organic dishes opened last July in the lobby of a commercial building just off Syntagma Square. But you'll forget about the narrow restaurant's meager decor when you take your first bite of the salmon baked in paper and topped with finely chopped fennel, leek, dill and celery root, in a delicate reduction sauce made from spinach and a tree resin called mastika (12 euros, or about $17 at $1.40 to the euro). Konstantinos Siopidis, the 38-year-old chef, created the dish five years ago for his wife, Despina Kouklinou, 33, who now runs the restaurant while her husband, her mother and her younger brother do the cooking. At the time, Mr. Siopidis was running the kitchen of an upscale Athenian restaurant, but he was continually frustrated when the owner insisted that he use canned goods and pre-prepared ingredients and serve food that was no longer at its peak of freshness. So the young couple began planning what would become Mellilotos. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]