Bulgur Wheat Meatballs

Ingredients

• Bulgur (cracked wheat)
• Onion
• Parsley
• Spices
• Egg or gelatin sheets
• Flour or breadcrumbs
• Olive oil for frying

Preparation

Cook the bulgur (cracked wheat) until soft and mix with grated onion, parsley, spices, and egg. If there’s no egg, gelatin sheets can be used as a binder. Coat the wheat mixture in flour or breadcrumbs and fry in olive oil.

Recipe from “Starvation Recipes” by Eleni Nikolaidou

At that time, getting meat was nearly impossible, so Greeks made “meatballs” from cracked wheat. The diet was based on raisins, fresh herbs or wild greens, olives, and cabbage. During the occupation, housewives had to turn these ingredients into filling meals. Wartime newspapers advised chewing food slowly to feel full longer. Nothing was wasted. Vegetable broths were made from potato peels and vegetable scraps.

The Great Famine in Greece (Greek: Μεγάλος Λιμός)

During World War II, Greece faced a severe famine with several key causes. First, the occupying forces—Germans, Italians, and Bulgarians—implemented a brutal policy of pillaging, confiscating food, and controlling its distribution. The Allies’ naval blockade of Greece exacerbated the crisis by preventing food imports.

Another issue was the country’s destroyed infrastructure, which hindered effective transportation and supply. In cities like Athens, hyperinflation drove the prices of basic goods to unattainable levels, and the lack of food access led to mass starvation.

Hermann Göring’s contemptuous remarks about the starving illustrate the occupiers’ brutality: “This continuous concern for foreigners must end once and for all […] I don’t care if you say that people under your administration are starving. Let them die, as long as the Germans don’t starve.” In the winter of 1941/42, mortality rates reached catastrophic levels, and the daily sight of emaciated corpses on the streets of Athens was a horrifying reality. Overall, around 300,000 Greeks died from hunger and malnutrition during the occupation.

Laird Archer, working for an American aid agency, was in Athens when the Germans occupied the city on April 27, 1941. He recorded in his diary:

“April 28. […] The mass looting of Athens has begun.

First, they confiscated remaining food and fuel supplies. […] [A worker] found the entire market sealed with swastika signs. The Germans emptied all public fuel tanks. […] A farmer from Marathon, who came today to report that our nurses are safe in the mountains, said that his flocks of poultry, even pigeons, were shot with a machine gun, and swastika posts were set up at the four corners of the field. He was warned under threat of death not to take anything from the fields.

The invaders have been shipping meat, cattle, and sheep north of the city for days and have now seized dairy cattle around Athens for their own use. […] My friends at the Ministry of Agriculture estimate that national supplies of 200,000 tons could be reduced by one-third due to slaughtering.

Modern transport was seized along with food supplies. Syntagma Square is already filled with confiscated cars. […] They are also taking buses, especially trucks. […] Notices sent and broadcasted over the radio order the delivery of all bicycles to specified locations. Over five thousand were collected.

Wholesale and retail stores are systematically shut down. This is done through the polite method of “buying” with freshly printed occupation currency, worthless outside Greece. Early in the morning, all soldiers in Athens with nothing else to do received 100 such notes each. […] They were sent to shops to buy everything from women’s stockings to electronic equipment. They took their “purchases” to the post office or express train and immediately sent them home to the Reich. […] I saw a group of soldiers looting a small leather goods store, carrying new suitcases to a clothing store and leaving with them filled. The Eastman Kodak store was emptied of cameras. […] Major Greek industries are being seized. This is done through the same polite system of “buying” 60 percent of issued shares and hiring a German director.

Raw materials, metal, leather, and so on are being confiscated. Dozens of small factories, returned to their owners by mocking Germans as insignificant, now have no materials to process. […] Carpenters can’t get nails to continue the few construction works still underway. Even cement […] is no longer available.

Finally, hospital and pharmacy supplies are being taken. […]

The incredible speed and efficiency of this process leaves us stunned. We don’t know where to turn for the most essential items.”

Laird Archer: Balkan Journal. New York: WW Norton, 1944.