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With eight ingredients and five minutes to spare, you can whip up this spicy and delicious Greek Tirokafteri dip, which will take your tastebuds to a gorgeous Greek island.

Roasted red bell peppers and feta cheese are the stars of this delicious dip. Greek Tirokafteri Dip is creamy, salty, and spicy! It has to be spicy. Tirokafteri translates to ‘spicy cheese.’ Use it as a dip, a spread in souvlaki or gyros, or thin it with Greek yogurt or goat milk as a sauce over vegetables, a salad, or grilled chicken or fish. Your family will love it.
How To Choose A Quality Feta
Unless you find a Greek or specialty grocery store in America, you’re eating Greek-style feta. This means that the cheese is made from pasteurized cow’s milk. It’s drier and less creamy but retains salty, tangy, and savory flavors.
Authentic Greek feta is made from unpasteurized goat or sheep’s milk, formed into solid blocks, and stored in barrels of salty brine. The flavor is complex, rich, and buttery. It’s saltier with a slight lemon flavor. Greeks believe their feta is superior because the milk is made from free-range sheep or goats grazing on organic pastures.
So, here’s a checklist for choosing a feta cheese:
- Buy a block of feta instead of crumbles. Crumbled feta has anti-caking agents, which, when melted, cause the cheese to be gritty instead of smooth and silky.
- Look for blocks of feta in brine. If you’re lucky to live somewhere with a Greek market, fresh feta in a barrel is phenomenal! However, buying blocks of feta wrapped in plastic with brine added is a great option. The brine helps keep the cheese fresh, protecting it from air exposure, which dries out the cheese and gives it an odd taste.
- Use the blocks of feta for anything hot where the cheese melts or when whipping the cheese into cold dips. You don’t want a grainy dip.
- Use crumbled feta in salads or cheese platters – anything cold.

Ingredients Needed
- Feta cheese – pick up a block in brine for the best result. I like Mt. Vikos Traditional brand.
- Roasted red peppers—You can roast them yourself or buy fire-roasted in a jar. Mancini’s brand is my favorite.
- Garlic
- Fresh parsley
- Smoked paprika
- Red wine vinegar – any brand will work in this recipe, but if you want to splurge just a bit, this Greek brand is amazing!
- Good quality extra virgin olive oil – I never believed in premium brands of olive oil. I always used whatever I had on hand. And then, my idol, Ina Garten, shared her favorite brand, so I had to see what the difference was about. Wow! The difference is remarkable! My dip using her olive oil was sweeter without a hint of a chemical aftertaste. Now I’m a believer! I only use it for finishing or when you will taste the oil, like dressings, drizzles, dips.
- Pita bread – Buy Greek pita, if possible. I like this brand.
How To Make This Recipe
This is the recipe’s best part (other than the taste)! Throw everything, except the parsley, into a blender. Blend to desired consistency. I like a smoother dip, so I blend until it is smooth but still has tiny bits of cheese throughout.
More Dip Recipes To Try
More Dip Recipes To Try
- Beer Cheese – a Kentucky favorite!
- Garlicky White Bean Dip
- Spicy Seafood Dip
- Benedictine Dip – if it’s good enough for the Kentucky Derby, it’s worth making at home.
- Game Day Reuben Dip
Greek Tirokafteri Dip
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This spicy Greek Tirokafteri Dip Is made with roasted red peppers, feta, and a few spices. It’s great with pita bread, Greek crackers, or crudites.
- Author: Millie Brinkley
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 10 minutes
- Yield: 6 servings 1x
- Category: Appetizer – Dips
- Method: Process
- Cuisine: Greek
Ingredients
For the dip:
- 10-ounce block Greek feta cheese, crumbled and 3 tablespoons reserved for the garnish
- 12-ounce jar roasted red peppers, drained
- 1 large garlic clove
- ½ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes or to taste, more to garnish
- ¼ teaspoon smoked paprika, more to garnish
- 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil, more to garnish
- 2 tablespoons finely minced fresh parsley to garnish
To serve:
For serving:
- Pita bread, ripped into bite-size pieces
- Greek cream crackers
- Crudite such as baby carrots, celery sticks, sliced cucumber, bell pepper strips
Instructions
Add all of the ingredients to the bowl of a food processor.
Pulse to your desired smoothness, but don’t blend thoroughly.
Garnish as desired and serve with crackers, torn pieces of pita, or sliced vegetables
Nutrition
- Serving Size:
- Calories: 173
- Sugar: 5.4 g
- Sodium: 438.4 mg
- Fat: 12.7 g
- Saturated Fat: 7.4 g
- Carbohydrates: 7.3 g
- Fiber: 1.8 g
- Protein: 7.6 g
- Cholesterol: 42.1 mg