Today I was walking in my garden and noticed that the grapevine needed pruning, so used the leaves to make the domades, just like we did a few years ago.
Seeing this post brought back some lovely memories
After a little Skills Exchange workshop where Eileen showed us how to use the vine leaves that she pruned off her grape vine, I decided to include this in our from spade to plate session. I found this little video online on how to make them
Gluten free, dairy free and 'stuffed' full of minerals and vitamins, what a great idea

As I wanted to make sure that the leaves were very tender, I picked them from my garden yesterday and put them in brine over night. This morning, rinsed and dried them in readiness for further preparation by the group.
We started by making the stuffing following Tori Avey's (but added some sundried tomatoes.and green split peas)
Dill, mint, pine nuts, lemon and onion were all mixed in to provide a lovely fresh mixture.

The weather has been hot over the last few weeks so not very good for the lettuces, which are about to bolt, so decided to turn it into this creamy lettuce soup that could not be easier and faster to make.
Together with a little slice of bread (baked in a small Ball Jar) the lunch became a mini feast.
Whilst the filling was cooling and the lettuce soup was set aside, we walked to the back of the house where there was (the neighbour's) grapevine trailing over the fence and in need of a hair cut. We killed two birds with one stone, one the neighbour had their vine pruned and we had some leaves to take home and put in brine ourselves.
When we came back and had prepared the leaves for the brine, the table was laid, chilled soup dished out and the dolmades were gently simmering away.
We served them with a mustard dill sauce, we used dandelion jelly as sweetener but you can use honey or sugar if you prefer to do so.