Yesterday evening finished with me cooking a pea risotto. It was a great way to use the fresh peas we bought from the market, even if it did take Sarah quite some time to pod 1kg of peas. This was followed by two episodes of Mad Men which we are devouring at an alarming rate of knots.
I’ll say no more about Mr. Scops Owl at the moment, but when dawn finally did arrive there were a few clouds in the sky – that’s not what we came to Greece for. We have to be a bit careful with the weather forecast, because yesterday Sarah told me it was going to be 29ºC. I said I thought that sounded a bit extreme, even for Greece, for April. When we looked more closely it was a forecast for Koroni in Micronesia – not exactly relevant for Koroni in the Greek Peloponnese!
Sarah put our bedding through the washing machine and after it was all hung up we headed into Koroni. We had still to visit the castle and we decided we had better do that before we move on tomorrow.
Pretty house Koroni
We had been invited to eat lamb at the campsite restaurant, but Sarah doesn’t eat meat and there were no alternatives on offer. As we walked into and through Koroni the invitation became clear. Many households were spit roasting an entire lamb. Mostly over charcoal. Some had a fancy spit which turned the lamb automatically, with others a man was sitting slowly turning the spit by hand. It is clearly a tradition to roast a whole lamb on Easter Sunday here. It also explains something I mistakenly said in my blog four days ago, about finding whole frozen goats in LIDL. I now suspect those were not goats but whole frozen lambs. It all makes sense now.
One of the fancier spits
As the smells of roasting lamb wafted around the town, we slowly climbed up to the castle high above the harbour. When we arrived we found it was free to enter, because it was not so much a castle as a small fortified town, where a few people still live and which contains an active church and cemetery.
Fortress Gates from inside
As I have explained previously Koroni was a Venetian stronghold as it was an important staging post to another one of their possessions, Crete. The fortress was therefore built by them to protect a whole community, not just a garrison of soldiers. It was subsequently possessed by various conquerors, most notably the Ottomans.
Fortress Bastion
It was a very pleasant place to wander. We had the whole huge complex almost to ourselves. We wandered around the overgrown paths which followed the walls with the verges covered in wild flowers. I know I have mentioned the wild flowers both in Italy and in Greece before, but their beauty at this time of year can not be over emphasised. There really is nothing in northern Europe to compare with the variety and abundance of flowers which appear in almost every uncultivated corner.
Wild Flowers in the Fortress
Sarah, of course, had to go to the edge of some of the big walls to have a look over, something which never fails to give me the jitters. There were plenty of places where the wall edges were completely unprotected. One sign left me perplexed. It gave a warning about the danger of fire. I couldn’t help but wonder if it was a mistranslation. There didn’t seem to be any possible risk related to conflagration but plenty of opportunities to plunge into the abyss.
View from Fortress walls
Having finished our tour of the castle we made our way down to the harbour to get a bite to eat. Our intention of just having a light lunch were soon thwarted by the restauranteur who insisted I must try the spit roasted lamb which was cooking at home and which would only be “10 minutes”. After we had got our drinks and he had delivered the Greek salad, which we had discussed, but not ordered, the 10 minutes was quickly revised to 30. Sarah, forced to abandon her light lunch, ordered aubergine imam, which turned out to be delicious.
My lamb finally arrived in the boot of a car and was quickly transferred to a large table outside the restaurant. Several men set about it with cleavers and knives, which little regard for hygiene. When it finally arrived on my plate it was gorgeous. Great chunks of meat covered in soft white fat, herbs and salt. It was superbly tender and by the time I had finished I was stuffed. The dogs did quite well with the fat which I did not eat. I’m not quite sure how all the fat fits with the famous Mediterranean diet, but perhaps this isn’t an issue because they only eat it once a year.
We waddled back to Basil and the late afternoon was spent having a little “rest”. Tonight it will be a sandwich, if anything, for both of us.
(Today’s title is a poor attempt at an homage to a certain Monty Python sketch – think tinned processed meat)
You know I love a distressed door!