Red, white and green...

...Was the theme for the royal foodie joust this month. And with the weather here touching 45 degrees c last week, I couldn't help but remember our wonderful vacation two years ago in Santorini…we landed during a freak spell of cold, driving rain in May, and wondered what kind of beach vacation this would be. But once it cleared up we had an amazing time, marveling at the beautiful white colour of buildings (A's theory was that they were regularly daubed with Greek yogurt) and the blues of church domes, the sky and the water. We also had amazing food – delicious, low calorie, incredibly healthy and flavourful and just perfect for hot weather.

I decided to do more than reminisce and to recreate at least some of the culinary flavours of Greece tonight in my kitchen. So at long last I experimented with the perfect summer salad – watermelon, with feta topped with crushed mint. A splosh of balsamic vinegar and the bite of thinly sliced red onion just accentuated the flavours more and left us feeling fulfilled and cooled down in this hot climate.

Conversely enough, the red of the watermelon looks cool despite the weather, perhaps because of the remembered juiciness, while the cool white of the feta reminded me of an incident in Santorini, where we had seen far-off snow-clad peaks...or so we thought until we drew closer and realised it was a hilltop covered with snow-white houses! And the green of the crushed mint and its fragrance add just that little spring in one's step, that light touch of freshness...