Sunday 14 January 2018

My greek Winter



The island is green.  So unlike the dry brown landscape of a greek summer.  Roses are blooming though it is almost time to prune them right back.  I think I saw some snowdrops in the field next door.  



Cleaning a kilo of spinach outside on a cold winters day.  I must have been mad.  The spinach was full of mud and needed lots of rinses.   My hands froze but fortunately my shoes and trews didn't get wet which is usually what happens when I use the hose. 

This way the water gets tipped onto the garden and not into the septic tank.   Not that the garden needs watering.  We finally got rain, pouring rain, and an electrical storm last night which rattled the window panes.  Fortunately we pulled the plugs on anything connected with computers before the donner und blitzen hit us full force.  Neighbours didn't fare so well.



Spinach and rice for lunch and spinach pie tonight, and a few more nights if we don't have someone to share it with.  The pie is a spinach-leek-feta cheese pie with lots of dill, and plenty of pepper,  as I  discovered when I ate that first piece.




Our second load of wood this winter.  From last years olive pruning.  This is not a ton but that is how it usually comes.  A ton is the back of a farm truck piled high, or not, depending on how honest your provider is.  Now this wood needs to be moved around to the back of the house where it will covered and protected from any rain we might possibly have.



Our two lemon trees are laden with fruit.  This will the first decent crop for about three years.



The empty flower pots have a crop of stinging nettles.  I won't pull them out.  Maybe next time I make a spinach pie they'll be tall enough to cut and add to the mix.



Our green green garden, covered in three leafed clover, or maybe it is oxalis.  I like it under the trees and amongst the empty pots.  It makes a welcome carpet of green,  However this year I haven't done much weeding in the vegetable garden and the clover has almost smothered the lettuces.  I am 'uncovering' them one by one.  






13 comments:

  1. My Spinach is much like yours, it needs plenty of washing. Actually mine is Perpetual Spinach; you cut it and it re-grows. V useful.

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    1. Spinach grows well here in the winter. I dont know why I've never tried it. I wonder if the perpetual would survive our summer.

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  2. There are so mamu edible weeds; I make risotto with stinging nettles, bitter spinach from dandelions, maidenstears in frittata, etc. A new entry this summer for me was purslane - the fresh leaves in salad are sour, but very tender when steamed.
    A kilo spinach to wash outside in cold weather, don't think that was fun!
    Greetings Maria x

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    1. The old women collect loads of greens from the fields and use them is pies or just boil them and eat them with olive oil and lemon juice. Once again our cultures are so similar. My husband loves the dandelion leaves but they are too bitter for me. In a frittata theyu would be much nicer but I haven't tried that ... yet. Good idea

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  3. Hmm, spinach anything rates high in my book, especially freshly-picked. Here in the Southern States of the USA any kind of green is popular, turnip greens, spinach, collard greens, polk salad, all delicious.
    The pie looks scrumptious !
    ~Jo

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    1. I see on tv recipes for collard greens and turnip greens and think they look just like the greens we eat here, just in a different way.
      The pie was scrumptious. The leeks and feta cheese with the spinach make it so much tastier.

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  4. And Spinach 'anything' is very low on my list of desirable foodstuffs lol
    Turn off pull out is the first thing we do when thunder along with lightning rolls by - thank goodness for surge protectors as well for those time you think 'you might not need them'. Shame your neighbours didn't have them.
    Take care
    Cathy

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    1. We lost three 'routers' (is that the word) because of lightening and the phone company updated and replaced them but three was the limit. Now we are very careful to unlpug. We had a surge protecter but that has conked out. One day we'll get another. They really are necessary.
      A whole area up here was hit when a transformer got a lightening blast.

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  5. Love spinach pie. I also will use silverbeeet.
    We have had strange weather. It’s hot for a few days or very hot for a day. And then the temp will drop and we will get rain
    Today it’s nice and sunny with a cool wind
    Perfect for drying the sheets

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    1. Really cold here these days and we're going to have another wet and cold weekend.
      Normal winter for us, though we do usually get a little more sunshine

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  6. I wondered why you were washing spinach outside until I read your explanation about the septic tank then I understood, the pie sounds delicious though.

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    1. Our septic tank fills up very quickly. We have granite underneath and things do not drain away

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