Lemons

We have juiced almost all those lemons and given 2 bags away to friends that live in the city.  

Thank goodness I had a juicing assissant.  He started off in the kitchen and then went out to his work bench to get out of my way.  Piles of lemon 'shells' went into the compost.

Bottles of juice have gone into the freezer.  

I'm wondering if I can make limoncelo using tsipouro (raki/grapa) as the alcohol.  I'm certainly going to try it.  This year's visitors are in for a treat.  Fresh lemonade and fire water-limoncelo.

Another Day

Lemon curd, or lemon honey as it was known when I was growing up in New Zealand.  Also known as lemon cheese.  Utterly wicked, not as in evil but as in awesome.  A delicious way to use up some of our lemons.

Lemon curd

I used up 4 lemons making this and one went into the lettuce salad so that is 5 lemons used so far today.  Only another 395 to go, more or less.  Tomorrow we start juicing them

I love lemon honey, sweet and tangy, the perfect accompaniment to any cake or pie, or biscuit or just a sly spoonful gulped down when no-one is looking.  Mine didn't thicken today.  I can only think that the recipe I used did not give me the right balance of eggs and lemon juice.  I ended up after half an hour of stirring by adding cornflour.  No change in the taste and nice and gluey instead of runny.  

Planting our olive tree

Vangelis has hundreds of olive trees of his own.  He dug the hole and watered the tree.  Now he's going to bring some special fertiliser to help its roots.  All the olive tree needs is a watering every two weeks.  I shall make a note on the calendar.  He says we will have olives on the tree maybe in 3 or 4 years

The boys in the back garden, knee deep in clover

Rabbit and onions for lunch

Sunday Dinner

Warning. Bunny on the menu.

Another warm halcyon day.  We sat out on the balcony and shared 

our Sunday lunch with friends.  There was the shadow of a half moon hanging in the sky above us so it must be almost time for another full moon.  

  We are waiting for another cold blast at the end of this week.  Meantime we are making the most of the sunshine.

Our big clay cooking pot.  

The accompanying dishes were so many we hardly tasted the  rabbit.  There was loads of garlic on the menu.  We had beetroot with bread and garlic sauce, tzatziki (yoghurt and garlic), and garlic bread.  Any prowling vampires will be kept at bay for a few days.

Everyone agreed, except me, that the rabbit was tender and tasty but everyone, except me, ate little of the main dish.  By the time it arrived on the table we were full of garlic bread, tzatziki, some spicy sausage and greek salad.  I was too full to even try the rabbit.  Tomorrow we'll do it all over again with just the rabbit on the table.

Sunday or Monday, it doesn't make much difference when you're retired.  Our friends and neighbours are pruning olive trees and will be happy to stop at 3 for a late lunch on our balcony.  K will be up there fixing their oven and washing machine.  I'll keep the home fires burning, set the table and warm up the stew.  Rabbit with tomatoes and whole onions.  I'll take a better photo tomorrow.

Oranges and Lemons

It's citrus time.  We have a house full of lemons and oranges and mandarines.  

There are bowls of 'em on the tables and bags  waiting to be picked up, and taken away.

Our daughter gave us a huge bag of lemons and now our neighbour brought us this case of lemons.  Ever heard of the law of attraction?  This is it in action.

I took a photo of these, turned out the light and tripped over the damn crate.  I gave it really good kick.  My toes are still smarting.

Lemons here, lemons there, lemons everywhere

The last of the mandarines.  These were huge

I prefer mandarines to eat.  They peel easily and the slices separate easily.  

Another pile on the bench.  These are sanguini oranges, with blood red flesh

Also called blood oranges

They're all separated, different varieties in different places.  Some of the oranges are big and juicy, very good eating,  Others are only for juice.  Some are sweet, some are just a little sour.  

And then there is a tree full of grapefruit just outside the kitchen door.

No nasty flu bugs around here.  We are vitamin-c-ed up to the eyeballs.  

Sunny Day

Another sunny winter's day.  We are enjoying the Alkyonides days, halcyon days to you.   These are days of sunshine and no wind in mid winter.   We usually have a week or two of them at the end of January and here they are, right on time. 

We haven't been down to the waterfront for a 'coffee' for ages so today seemed ideal.  We even found parking so the Gods were definitely in favour of our decision.

It was almost midday, far too late for coffee so I had a glass of red wine.  

The best red wine.  I put in my order and the waitress came along with my glass, but there was the owner of the cafe right behind her with another glass (filled much higher) of red wine.  He gave a nod to the girl and she took hers away.  'This is your red wine' , he said.  The other was from an old bottle with dregs at the bottom, not good enough for a discerning drinker.....of red wine!  

Friends passed by for a chat.  K passed the time with his worry beads.

At the next table were the daily backgammon players.  The same men play every morning, usually with a band of onlookers crowded the table. 

The lottery seller passed through, selling scratch cards mainly.

The people at this table won 5 euros. 

Another day I was need of a siesta. Red wine at lunch-time is not such a good idea

Olive and Vine

Quite a day today.  A morning of memories.   Whilst drinking my morning coffee a photo came in via Whatsap from my sister-in-law in New Zealand.  It looked as though the old family homestead was being sold.  It hasn't been in our family for over 50 years but we grew up there and have so many memories.  

There were messages zapping through the ether  between NZ, Australia, London and Greece.  Seems the kids knew better.  No it wasn't the old family home but the one next door, or was it?  That got us onto google and eventually we worked out which house had been the family home and I found photos of the interior and the gardens as it is today.  Exciting stuff!  

Some neighbours popped in with their coffee cup in hand and we discussed the day's work.  They are pruning their olive trees and this afternoon will be slaughtering little bunnies.  All in a days work if you have any sort of rural holding here.  The rabbits belong to our elderly neighbour Vaso and her children have decided it is too much work for her, so the bunnies must go.  Into the pot.  We'll be eating one of them on Sunday with stewed onions.

The olive tree we bought yesterday.  We are waiting for the same neighbour to come and dig a hole for it.  He can do that on Sunday before he sits down to eat the rabbit.

An olive tree this size  sells for 25 euros at our local garden shop.  Daylight robbery. We bought this for 6 euros

The bottle of red wine.  It wasn't such a bargain after all.  The bottle is only 1 1/2 litres, not 2 as I thought.  It is a nice light, dry red.  Very drinkable.  I had a glass and a half with lunch.  Stir fried vegetables with a few noodles thrown in.  K is still eating the left over bbqed pork from Sunday.  Today it was helped down by a greek salad and some leftover tzatziki.  

The rest will go to the neighbour's dogs.  It really is vital you get on with your neighbours here.  One helps the other.  They kill the rabbit, we cook it.  They provide the wine and the lemons.  We feed their dogs with pork bones.  K fixes their broken heater and gets their power back on when the oven trips the switch.    We get a handful of fresh eggs.  And so on.

I usually get bottles of red wine from them too but they didn't make red wine this year.  He juiced the red grapes and sold the juice.  There are not many around here that appreciate a good red wine.  

He has just popped in again to bring me a long handled cutter so I can gather the lemons at the top of the tree.  I asked him about the red wine and he says he has loads of last years and he'll bring me a few bottles.  Couldn't/wouldn't say 'no' to that!

Away Day

A different sort of day.  One which occurs only when we must make hospital visits or get official papers stamped or like today when we got a new sticker to say our car has passed its fitness test and a new pair of glasses for me.

It always means an early start.  Mornings are dark and damp.  I don't like having to go out early in the winter.  The sun didn't really start warming me up until 11am today.  

We made the 9.10am car ferry across to the mainland.  Takes slightly more than 5 minutes to cross.  No wind and so no waves today.  And the ferry was only half full.  At least I didn't have to back the car onto the ferry but I still 'bite my nails' while K is doing the backing.  I  get into a tizzy when I have to do it myself.  I get my rights and lefts mixed up, blame that on the foreign language, but I'm still not exactly sure how to turn the wheel when the parking guy shouts 'straighten up'.  I'm one of those dithering old women who shouldn't be allowed to have a license, sometimes.  Everytime, which fortunately is not often, I swear and declare I'll leap (crawl) out of the car and demand they park the darn thing themselves.  They will if you insist but that would really be admitting I'm a dithering old tart/fart.

But K drove on today.  First on, zoom right down the back (I would be zig-zagging!) till you almost hit the bollard.  Then watch and smirk at the other drivers.

First stop, coffee and cheese pie for the road.  He's driving so I have to pull off small pieces and feed him.  No, I don't eat greasy cheese pies so early in the morning.  Upsets the stomach and we don't want that on a road trip.  But I'm the one who gets covered in crumbs and greasy, cheesy fingers breaking off small bites for the driver.

On the road again.  We have a routine.  First we listen to the news channel and then switch over to greek music.  Oh more joy.  But it keeps the driver happy.  'We' (not me) cross ourselves at every church along the route and there are quite a few of those.  I could give you a long list of them, their fiesta days, and the monasteries we pass too.  But I won't.  Half an hour later we pass into the Mythical Peloponese, so the sign says.  This is the lower part of the great greek mainland.  As well as churches and monasteries there are endless signs for ancient ruins, 4,000 year old bridges, mythical fortresses, museums, age old walk ways, bla bla bla.  Every step a trip through history.

Passing through acres and acres of citrus orchards. All the trees laden with oranges, lemons and mandarines

Second stop, the coffee shop next to the big supermarket round the corner from the ancient theatre.  Time for a quick wee and a coffee for me.  I know all the loo stops between here and anywhere!  Otherwise it would be 'crouch' over a prehistoric footpath or hide behind an ancient piece of rockery.  

Then on to the city of Nafplio.  Car fitness test, done in half an hour.  Off to order my new glasses.  Got that done in 10 minutes.  The 3rd pair of frames I tried were just perfect and they had these diddly sunshades which slide on and off too.   The have to be sent to Athens and next week will be couriered to Poros.  No hassle. 

It's market day so parking is non-existent.  We didn't go to the market.  Good I say.  It's fruit, vegetables, clothes, plants, fish, knickers.  Too many people.  We'll go to the Poros market on Friday.  Only fruit and vege.  We didn't want knickers anyway.

But just down the road where we could double park was a van selling olive trees.  Hooray.  I've been wanting to plant one in our back garden for ages.  6 euros for a tree about a metre high and guaranteed to give us enough Kalamon (kalamata) olives to fill up a few jars, so they said.

A quick stop to pick up an envelope of test results from a nearby lab for a relative and off to LIDLS.  I piled bags of macaroni and linguini in the trolley for the kids and managed to find another 40 euros of 'stuff' for us including a big bottle of red wine.  No-one around us seems to have red wine this year.  A 2 litre bottle for 2.50 euros was a bargain.  I hope I enjoy it.  All the shopping has been put away now and I can't even remember what else we bought.  I do recall vaccum packed boiled beetroot to the horror of my dear traditional husband who wants only the fresh stuff and the leaves as well.  He found  a couple of screwdrivers which I feel were superfluous.  How many screwdrivers does a man need?

Off again, this time heading for home.  We had a stop at another supermarket to pick up 4 packets of cornflakes for our neighbour.  She only eats this certain brand and it was on our route and I bought a bit more 'stuff' there as well.  We sat and had a more leisurely coffee and a ham and cheese roll (greek mpagket, french baguette )
and made it in time for the 3.30 car ferry back to Poros.  Done and dusted till another trip next week, this time for tests at a hospital, nothing serious.