“Opa!” calls were heard and delicacies were served as the International Greek Food Festival made its return to Little Rock Oct. 3-4.

The festival was hosted by Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church after a two-year hiatus, as well as drive-through-only editions during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The event still offered a drive-through option through which participants could order food to take home. 

The 39th installment of the event featured food from Greek, Armenian, Georgian, Romanian, Russian, Indian, Jordanian and Palestinian cuisines on the church’s parking lot. 

Popular dishes included gyros, pastitsio, spanakopita, chicken shawarma, falafel and hummus, as well as desserts such as loukoumathes and baklava, among others. 

“The gyro is the way to go,” volunteer Amanda Alley said. “It’s our hottest item, and it’s the thing that people come to the Greek Food Festival for.”

Organizer Mary Cantrell, who has helped organize the festival since 1993, said that some of the foods, such as the chicken shawarma, were a new addition.

“We have the chicken shawarma, [which] is delightful,” Cantrell said. “It’s in our Middle Eastern booth.”

“We also have an amazing gyro sandwich, along with our pastitsio, which is kind of the Greek mac and cheese,” Cantrell said. “We have some wonderful chicken souvlaki, and then, when you’re ready for dessert, our pastry booth is open with baklava and butter cookies.”

The event was made possible by a group of over 200 volunteers from the church and the central Arkansas community.

Alley said the festival serves as a way to share Greek culture to the greater community.

“We are all about sharing our culture and our religion with the community,” Alley said. “We’re here about good food and community.”

In addition to foods and drinks, the festival featured traditional dance performances from students of the O’Donnovan School of Irish Dance. 

“My favorite part is really the entertainment,” Alley said. “We’ve got our little Greek dancers, and then we’ve got the Irish dancers here, so we really like to show all the different cultures and we love to watch the kids dance.”

After the Irish dancers, groups of youth and adult Greek dancers from the church showcased traditional Greek dances to the crowd. 

Before each dance, a volunteer shared information about the name and history of each dance to the crowd.

One of these dances was the Dance of Gerakina, which is a choreographed formation of the Kalamatianos.

“[The Gerakina] tells the story of a beautiful young woman on her way to get water from a well,” a volunteer speaker said to the crowd. “She accidentally falls in the well, but a young suitor hears the jingling of her bracelet, and follows the sound, and is able to save her.”

Crowd members also got the opportunity to learn about common Greek phrases, such as “Yia sou,” which means both “hello” and “goodbye,” as well as “Opa!,” which is a word used to express enthusiasm, shock, or surprise.

The event was sponsored by several local company and community sponsors, a full list of which can be found on greekfoodfest.com.

“[These sponsors] make a huge difference in what we are able to give to charities and what we are able to do for our food festival and our community here in greater Little Rock,” Cantrell said. 

Funds raised from the festival will be donated to three Arkansas charities: Community Connections, which provides extracurricular activities and support to children with special needs and their families, Youth Home, which is a nonprofit mental health support provider, and Ronald McDonald House Charities of Arkansas, which provides an array of healthcare-related services. 

Since the festival’s inception in 1984, it has contributed over $1.5 million to local nonprofit charities.