The archaic Greek meal revolves around the sitos — the cereal base, almost always barley maza — accompanied by an opson, the "that-which-goes-with-it": olives, cheese, figs, onion, salted fish. There is no separation into starter, main course and dessert: everything is placed together, the barley fills the stomach, the opson provides the flavor. Then comes the moment for wine, the symposion, where one always drinks it mixed with water, on the island of Paros as in the camp on Thasos.

Two markers of Archilochus' world: barley, the grain of the poor and the soldier, turned into a flatbread or a gruel-drink (kykeon), and the renowned wine from the Thracian colonies, never drunk neat. Fish brine, taricha from the Aegean coasts, defines the umami taste of this island cuisine.