Roll Out the Barrel

 A month or so ago s-in-law Yiannis arranged for this year's wine delivery.  2 x 20 litre cartons of white wine and 20 litres of red wine from a vineyard in nearby Korinth. 

It was undrinkable. Plonk

Son-in-law Yiannis had given us the wine and brought quite a few litres for himself.  Both he and K agreed it was unacceptable.  A disgrace. 

K  was very happy when Yiannis told him he was returning it all .

The plonk was returned and another variety acquired from a different winery. 

Life is too short to drink bad wine. 

Fine-r wine delivery

Yiannis with his daughters 

Poppi and Nels 

In K's 'cellar' 

That Poppi tasting the wares

Pinky in the air

And what has this promising young wine critic got to say about the new delivery?

'Quite nice. But a bit strong for my liking'.

She's a water drinker.

Greek Gods

 Climbing Mount Olympos

Last October my son-in-law Yiannis and a group of his friends climbed to the top of Olympos, Greece's highest mountain.

 Home of Zeus and the Greek Gods of Mythology

Here's Yianni at the top of Mytikas, the highest peak,  

almost 3,000 metres.

He spent a couple of months training and trying to lose a few kilos in preparation. He ran, and rode a bike up into the Poros hills.

The throne of Zeus

You can see the huge curved back and there's the seat part (level rock) in front .

The throne of a giant

Trekking over barren mountain face 

The boys celebrating their ascent

The last part of the climb before the summit is a rock face. The climbers are roped and ascend hand by hand, careful not to kick rocks onto the climber below. 

The descent is by another route. Not any easier so Yiannis said.  Descending has other hazards. 

Sunrise

From 'The Greek Reporter' -

Many believe that Mount Olympos, like Atlantis, is a myth and does not exist.

However, it is not simply a mountain from Greek mythology. It has inspired stories, movies and television series. It's a mountain with challenging climbs and is scaled by around 10,000 climbers every year.

It is a National Park with a rich array of rare flora and fauna. 

It's lower slopes have steep gorges, caves and waterfalls.

From his home in the misty peaks *Zeus shaped the destiny of the mortals below and hurled his thunderbolts at anyone foolish enough to challenge his power.  Lesser Gods and spirits lived in caves below. 

Nowadays Olympos is known for its extreme sports, trekking, paragliding, rafting, mountain biking and jeep Safari.

*Zeus

Known as Dias

Δίας 

In greek

His name means 

'Sky Father'

Torta di Sant'Antonio

 

An apple red wine tart, flavoured with cinnamon.

Made in the Italian alpine village of Oulx to honour the town's patron Sant' Antonio.

- Recipe for the Pastry

2 cups of flour 

1 tbsp sugar

1 tsp baking powder 

6 tbsps cold butter cut into pieces

1/2 cup milk

2 egg yolks 

Rub butter into the flour till it looks like breadcrumbs. Add1 tbsp sugar and baking powder. 

Whisk eggs and milk. Mix into the flour. 

Knead into a smooth ball. Chill 1 hour. 

- Recipe for the Filling mixture

1 1/4 cups of red wine

1 tsp cinnamon

5 tbsp sugar 

4 apples thinly sliced

Zest 1 orange

In a pot simmer -

Apple slices

Sugar

Orange zest/cinnamon

Wine

For about half an hour till the wine has turned to a syrup.

Leave to cool.

Roll out the pastry and place in the baking dish . Let the dough hang over the sides. Trim. Fill with the apple mixture and fold over sides of dough.

Cover the bottom with baking paper, or grease the dish.

Sprinkle with sugar.

Bake 180oC for about half an hour.

If you're artistic form leaves and flowers with the dough trimmings and decorate the tart before baking.

Good luck and Bon Appetit 

Antoni

 17th January

The feast day of St Antoni.

He's an Italian Saint from Padua, a Franciscan monk, protector of the poor. In Italy and Portugal he's the finder of lost property.  

Somewhere I have a recipe for an apple pie with red wine that is made in an Italian village on this day.

One of our local churches is dedicated to this Saint.

The little church down a narrow dirt road which in one part was flooded from recent rain.

We arrived at the end of the service but lit our candles and picked up a few pieces of scrummy sweet bread and a small bag of funeral wheat.

One of the housewives must have made it in remembrance of one of her menfolk named Antoni. Or it could have been a female family member, Antonia.

When we arrived the Priest had gone off with a candle bearer to a nearby house. Probably to bless someone who was ill or to give communion.

I hope my dear brother Tony had a happy name day. Not that he knew the Greek Orthodox church was celebrating the saint he's named after. 

Winter's Pleasures

 

What to do with the gingerbread house now that christmas is well and truly over?

A tasty pleasure

First break your gingerbread house into pieces

Then eat it.

And eat it we did.  Quite a lot of it.  The rest of it is in the biscuit tin.

It was a bit soft but not enough to put us off.  K decided he loved it and he's the one now finishing it all. I ate my share and thoroughly enjoyed every gingery, peppery bite.

Thanks to the girls in the office who made it for me. The best gingerbread I've ever eaten

A nightly pleasure

A glass of red wine.  The wine is from the area not far from us called Nemea, known for it's vines and wines.  

We used to buy grape juice in bulk and K then fermented it and made it into wine.  Uusually white wine.

This wine is 2 years old, from a variety of grapes called Agioritiko. It's usually mixed with cabernet sauvignon but this is not. I gave Jan a litre and she found it 'unusual'. Herby. It's described in Wikipedia as being spicy with notes of plum. OK. If they say so. 

Whatever it tastes like we will drink it. We have drunk a lot worse.  40 years ago there was only one wine, served in a metal jug, in every cafe and taverna.  That was a white wine called retsina. Every barrel of wine was flavoured with a lump of pine resin, to kill off any germs. The first glass was a bit rough but the more you drank the easier it slipped down. 

It's out of fashion now and hard to find. 

Simple Sunday pleasure 

For K

A Sunday afternoon ouzo with a friend

Just exactly how K loves to spend his Sundays. A glass or 3 of something with a good friend and a meze.  We had spicy sausage and in the photo is a bowl of rocket from my garden and slices of avgotaraho, salted and pressed fish roe. The spicy sausage was fried and he fried bread in the sausage fat. 

Fishy pleasures 

Kalamari or calamari

Or squid

Tis the season I discovered.  They both told fishy tales about giant squid caught in days gone by.  

We eat them in the summer, frozen. Fried  by Sofia and eaten at her taverna by the sea. Fresh are too expensive

Chestnuts on the wood stove.

I don't like them but K snacks on a couple in the evening

Today's Highlight

 Surprise visitor.

She made our day 

Athletic granddaughter Nels running in the hills.

It's 8ks from her house in Neorion to our house. Uphill all the way.

 She popped in to see her Nana and Papou, for a swallow of water and a wee chocolate mint for energy. 

The last 8ks home, doing the round trip, are at least all downhill. 

Bravo Nels Moy

It was a beautiful day, after so many cold rainy ones.

She inspired me to go for a walk too.

Only about 3ks. 1  1/2 each way for me

The sky was blue and the sea was calm when it finally came into view.

From Above

 One sunny day. Which is Not today. My granddaughters walked up to the Old Mill at the top of the hill. Beside the abandoned mill there is a little church too. And a wonderful view of the harbour and across to the mainland mountains.

Poros. On a sunnier winter's day

Today it's pouring 'chair legs',  thunder and lightening rumbling all around.

Great day for ducks 🦆🦆🦆

And olive trees

No gnomes today

My gnomes have gone away

......they shall return 

G'day Maties