Lovely to see the first poppy flowers beginning to appear this week, sprinkled among the large crown daisies and swaying gently in the spring-like warmth. These are the days when all of nature seems bursting with enthusiasm, even on a short walk around town we’ll encounter colours, sounds, scents of flowers, butterflies and migratory birds.
On my weekly drive across to Hania it’s astonishing to see how much changes there are in a few days, at this time the almond trees are beautiful in their pink frilly frocks….I can easily imagine them, when no-one’s looking, dancing around the mountainside across the carpets of chamomile that, from a distance, look like snow. Who’s that saying I mustn’t get poetic??….
spring is in the air, at least on some days in a week… On other days there’s no doubt that winter still has its hold on us – the rain comes down in torrents, the waves may rise and crash, the sea and sky will meld and behind thick black clouds we’ll know that the mountain peaks are having their snow quota topped up, can be pretty bleak.
It was on such a bleak grey November afternoon in Edinburgh many years ago that I was preparing for an impromptu dinner party and was scurrying around my kitchen looking for ideas and ingredients. That was when I first created the leek and ouzo tartlets which were often a feature of our Saturday night dinner experiences at the Water’s Edge Cafe. I know, I know…..it was so BAD of me to stop offering them, and now to go reminding and re-traumatising you!! Would it help make amends if I post the recipe, and perhaps, another time, recipes for some other dishes as well? Let me know and I’ll get on it………………
