Greek cuisine gyro, moussaka, dolmades, yuvarlakia and keftethes with the neighboring countries. To an even greater extent it is influenced by Italian cuisine and cuisines from other neighboring south European countries, and thus, especially in southern regions and the islands it includes several kinds of pasta, like hyllopites, gogkes and tziolia. Greek cuisine has a culinary tradition of some 4,000 years and is a part of the history and the culture of Greece. Its flavors change with the season and its geography. Greek cookery, historically a forerunner of Western cuisine, spread its culinary influence, via ancient Rome, throughout Europe and beyond. It
Greek cuisine local liquors, such as mastika (not to be confused with the homonymous anise-flavored Bulgarian drink), kitron, a citrus flavoured liquor from Naxos and tentura, a cinnamon flavored liquor from Patras. Metaxa is a well-known brand of brandy blended with wine and flavorings. Local dessert and fortified wines include muscats (with the Muscat of Samos being the most well-known), mavrodafni, produced from a black grape indigenous to the Achaea region in Northern Peloponnese, and "Vin Santo" of Santorini, a variation of the Italian "Vin Santo". Greek cuisine Greek cuisine (, "Elliniki kouzina") is a Mediterranean cuisine. Contemporary Greek cookery makes wide