Farmer in Crete grows the famous “Greek salad” in a pot

A farmer on the island of Crete has decided to grow the famous Greek salad in a pot and bring it directly from the field to consumer’s plate.

No need to buy and proceed tomatoes, cucumbers, onions and peppers with peeling and cutting separately. “You get everything you need in one pot from the field directly to your plate,” 72-year old farmer Stavros told local media.

Consumers will only need to add olive oil, salt and oregano. And feta cheese, of course, and olives and capers if they like..

“Olive oil and salt in the pot would take away the veggies crispiness, and oregano would lose its aroma,” the farmer stressed adding that despite many experiments it was impossible to add cubes of feta cheese in the pot or olives.

“We tried again and again with feta cubes but they simply refused to grow,” Stavros said with in undertone of anger in his voice. they tried with cow-milk feta, with cow-sheep milk, with goat and even with pig-milk. “Nothing worked!” also the olives were impossible in the pot for they need branches to grow and have a very long ripe period.

“The work and growing time was not worth it,” Stavros said.

He added that it was in fact one of his sons, a holder of PhD in Agricultural Ergonomics & Sustainability, who came up with the idea #Greek salad” in a pot.

“I was thrilled, I immediately embarrassed the idea, I liked it, I loved it!” the old man said smiling bright.

His 5-acres fields were easy to be transformed into Greek-salad ones due to the fruitful soil and the irrigation system he had installed when he was growing just tomatoes for salads and canned sauce.

He and his son started small with the project small and had quite a few failures.

“Ah, it was either the tomatoes growing ripe quickly, or the onions turning huge, or the pepper grew red because of contact with the tomatoes. But we had faith, in the end we managed to regulate the growing process until they all come perfect at the same time, full ripe and tasty bites the consumer can buy in a pot, bring it home and eat it.”

The Greek salad in the pot is also the perfect tool to avoid waste and save money and time, Stavros underlined.

“Can you imagine, especially small and busy households have to buy one kilo of tomatoes and cucumbers, a few onions and peppers. You spend 15 euros in zero time, then you have the waste, the time to prepare the salad and in the end you throw away also the veggies that had gone bad because you don’t want to eat Greek salad every day, right?”

Stavros did not disclose how tomatoes, onions, peppers and cucumbers grow in one top without skin or peel, come out in small fork-conform bites.

“Well, that’s the trick, our recipe that makes us competitive, we keep it secret like a treasure,” the man said laughing under his big mustache and winking with the eye.

After two successful years of the Greek Salad project, Stavros and his son are considering to expand their business enriching their catalogue of product. They consider to add capers in the pot and sell together with the pot also a small package with “feta, oregano, olives and a small bottle of olive oil.”

Next project from his field: Local specialty Dakos Salad in a pot that is tomatoes and fresh herbs.

Their next big project for Stavros and his son, though, is to export their original product, the Greek Salad in a pot, to foreign countries, especially to big cities with small households and busy population.

“We’ll bring Greece everywhere!” the old man said in full happiness.