The Giving Vine

It gave me shade.
It gave me fruit.
It gave me something to talk about.
And still! My grape vines kept on giving!

In this world there are three types of plants: 1) The Takers—like Palm Trees and Venus Flytraps; 2) The Givers—like Citrus Trees and Fig Trees; and 3) The Super-Givers like Grape Vines and the Tree that Money Grows On. As a kid I read that book The Giving Tree by the talented Shel Silverstein, which tells the story of how an apple tree gave a boy apples to eat, branches to swing on, wood to sell and a stump to sit on. The apple tree did everything for this kid including letting the kid chop down the tree—his only friend!—to hawk the tree’s dead body to give the kid—now a man—money. Note to the kid/man: That tree was much nicer to you than you were to it. Second Note to the kid/man: If you have to cut down your friend for cash, clearly you haven’t managed your life finances well. Third Note to the kid/man: If you love something let it go, don’t chop it down!

Like this giving tree, my grape vines kept on giving. However unlike the kid, I tried to be respectful of my vines. Yes, my grape vines provided a shady spot under their leaves, offered me delicious fruit and gave me serious bragging rights. But in my summer of Greek cooking, they also presented me with stuffed grape leaves.

CORRECTION: It provided so many leaves I harvested some of them to make stuffed grape leaves.

I love stuffed grape leaves—the rice filling with dill and parsley, the rich extra virgin olive oil and the “This is good food!” taste! So I consulted my Greek cookbook of the summer, It's All Greek to Me by Debbie Matenopoulos, and followed her recipe. Other stuffed grape leaf recipes I had seen only explained how to make them with store-bought grape leaves. But Debbie’s recipe explained how to make them with your own vines, just like her family has done. And this recipe was a winner!

First I trimmed some leaves that were far from the main plant’s canes. Them I boiled the leaves for three minutes then let them sit in cold water.

I made the rice filling with dill, parsley and beef, wrapped the grape leaves around the rice filling and snuggled them into a pan. All lined up like that they looked like little pillows of gastronomical delights.

I filled the pan with olive oil and cooked them. Then I ate them! Voilà! They were delicious! Even Mr. Wonderful was a fan. In fact he would like me to make more stuffed grape leaves, which I still can because unlike the kid/man and his giving tree, I still have many, many more leaves to harvest because I didn’t chop down my Giving Grape Vines.

Here’s to homemade Stuffed Grape Leaves! Here's to my Grape Vines! And here's to high hopes that they keep on giving!

Dinner Inspiration

"What do you want for dinner?" I said making two eggs sunny side up.
"Can I decide after breakfast?" Mr. Wonderful said sipping the first espresso of the day.
"That depends."
"On what?"
"On how long it takes you to finish breakfast."

Of all the seasons I love summer the best. Reason? A gajillion of them including: School is out; The sunny days are long; and the only way to cool down is by eating ice cream every night. With perks like these who wouldn't love summer?

I also like to eat. CORRECTION: I love to eat. And drink wine, and water ski, swim, run on the beach, collect seashells, gather sunflower bouquets, read books by the pool, and-- But I digress.

With so many summertime activities happening right now, I find that deciding what to make for dinner gets pushed to the proverbial back burner. Therefore it's become a personal tradition that every summer I treat myself to some outside inspiration for mealtimes.
 
One summer I only made meals from Gourmet magazine. I had been a subscriber to the now defunct paper-copy of the magazine for several years but because of my grueling work schedule never got around to making any of their delicious-looking recipes. So rather than eating, I would just page through the monthly periodical drooling over the food photographs. It was real food porn. But before anyone accuses me of getting Gourmet for the sexy food pictures, I say I subscribed for the articles. I swear.

There was another summer where I was inspired by the raw food movement, which declared that raw food has 16 gazillion times as much nutrition as its cooked-food cousins. Then and there I decided to eat only raw vegetables all summer. By the Fourth of July I couldn't look at another leaf of raw kale. By the way, eating a raw diet helped me lose weight because I just couldn't stomach the thought of eating another raw potato.

One summer I only cooked French food. I prepared toutes les choses: from Salade Nicoise to roasted peppers to "Voulez-vous choucher avec moi ce soir?" That summer Mr. Wonderful and I had a lot of fun.

This summer I'm going Greek or at least I'm cooking Greek with the new cookbook It's All Greek to Me by Debbie Matenopoulos. A Greek-American, Debbie is a TV personality with lots of charm and even more old Greek family recipes. Last night I made Lemonati kai Regenati Kota AKA Lemon and Oregano Chicken Legs. It was delicious!

So Mr. Wonderful better finish his fried eggs so I can plan dinner. Hmmm maybe tonight it will be Spanakopita...