The green salad I described is inspired from the traditional Lesbos winter salad as I adapted it from my book The Foods of the Greek Islands.  

From the first October rains up until the end of April, the greengrocers of Mytilini, the capital of Lesbos, used to sell each head of romaine lettuce tied together with two or three sprigs of borage (often with its little blue flowers), two or three scallions, several sprigs of peppery arugula, four or five sprigs of dill or fennel fronds, a few sprigs of peppery wild cress and either fresh mint or a little wild celery. Once home, these essential ingredients for the local green winter salad are thinly sliced and tossed with a simple vinaigrette.

For the spring version we often create “a multisensory food experience,” as Mind Body Green proposes. “When flavor, texture, appearance, fragrance, and beauty come together on your plate—the result is sheer culinary delight.” 

About the very common, slightly bitter dandelion blossoms —Taraxacum officinale — we read that “the golden blossoms are nutritious edible flowers beloved by herbalists, gourmets, and culinary devotees alike. Their bioactive chemical compounds have been touted for diuretic, liver-supporting, and anti-inflammatory benefits, among others. Some research has even found the dandelion plant may increase Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium, two valuable types of probiotics associated with gut health, ” the article point out.

Ubiquitous all over Greece and on Kea, the pale yellow mustard greens’ blossoms, add a delicious kick to the salad, while the pink rose geranium, and the purple rosemary blossoms and sprigs add extra fragrance to the crunchy greens and herbs. 

It’s important to cut the greens at the last moment and to slice them very thin. If they are coarsely cut, the salad will taste different.

WORD of CAUTION: Not all flowers are edible; unless you are sure what exactly you are foraging, be careful because many flowers may be toxic! 

RECIPE:  Green, Winter Salad, and the Flowery, Spring Version

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Watch the Video-Slideshow of the most important Edible Greens we forage, and more… 

During the rainy winter months, and as late as early spring, there are plenty of wild greens in the hills and mountains that surround the villages and the big cities. Middle-aged women and men gather them on special excursions. Armed with a knife and a plastic bag or a basket, the horta-gatherers can be spotted from a distance on a steep hill, but also next to a busy highway. A friend once told me that he has seen Greek-Americans gather greens on a sidewalk in New Jersey. These days, though, most city people buy horta from the weekly farmers’s markets; and they have become quite expensive, a real delicacy.

Most of the plants in the slide show grow all over the country, but there are some that are only eaten on the islands. The majority of the pictures are from Kea, and most of the greens grow in my garden.

The greens we consume today are probably the same we encounter in the texts of Theophrastus and other ancient authors: The ancient ascolymvros has become scolymos, Sonchus is now zochos, caucalis is cafkalithraetc. As these plants–their names and uses—have never been part of any school curriculum, we can safely conclude that our knowledge of them has passed orally from one generation to the next, starting in the very early times. I must have been ten years old when my Kean grandfather taught me which greens are healthy and which are foul-tasting or poisonous, while most of my friends learned it from their mothers. Horta can taste sweet, tart, or bitter, and some are wonderfully aromatic.

Apart from the greens collected from the hills and mountains, there are also some, like purslane, that grow as weeds among the cultivated crops. For centuries, poor Greeks used these wild plants to complement their frugal menu of bread, cheese, olives, and olive oil.

We learned from our mothers how the various greens should be cooked and which ones should be combined in stews and pies. We usually blanch different kinds of horta together, and eat them as a salad or side dish, simply dressed with fresh lemon juice and fruity olive oil. Like many islanders, my grandfather used to drink the broth in which the greens were boiled, adding plenty of lemon juice to it. Scientists have now discovered that most of these wild plants contain antioxidants and other nutrients which promote good health. Antonia Trichopoulou, professor of public health at the University of Athens, has calculated the various nutrients in the seven different greens which are cooked in the Cretan greens pie and found that they fulfill all the daily requirements for vitamins, minerals and trace elements.

Like my grandfather, I drink this wild greens broth not as a health potion, but because I love its taste. Every time I boil greens, I put aside bottles of it in my refrigerator to enjoy during the  following days.

We harvest the greens by cutting only the top of the root at the base of the leaves. We don’t uproot the plant. These wild greens have incredibly long, hard roots, which go very deep into the soil in order to find the much-needed moisture, especially on dry and rocky soil like the one we have on Kea.

If properly picked, the wild greens will grow again the next year and experience foragers know where to find them…

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