I found these baby grape vines at the FTI market a couple of Saturdays ago. Oddly, my parents used to have a fairly substantial trellis in their yard when I was growing up. 
When we first moved to the house, it was planted with grape vines and over the years we had this huge canopy of grape vines that only occasionally ever bore fruit, super tart and inedible green grapes that probably would have made good vinegar if we knew. And equally oddly, Mrs. MM’s father once tried to make wine from grapes grown in a Cebu farm… And, it turns out, there are grapes actually successfully grown up North and sometimes sold in baguio markets… So why, exactly would I want to buy and attempt to grow these grape vines? Actually, it’s the leaves that I am after. A good supply of grape leaves will come in handy when garnishing a grape or fruit platter, particularly if accompanied by our ornate silver grape scissors… The grape leaves would be a useful garnish for a cheese platter as well. Also, the grape leaves will be useful in some Greek dishes if I ever venture into cooking them… So it isn’t so outrageous after all… And at PHP40 per plant, it was well worth the investment to try it out!
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Grow them for aesthetic charm. The cut leaves can survive our weather without water for almost a day so they are great on fruit, cheese and roast meat platters or perhaps in flower and fruit arrangements too like ivy! Or the wilted ones to wrap kesong puti for another level of flavor and soak the wrapped cheese in oil?
Did someone say “stuffed grape leaves”?
Oh MM,your story of the grapevine in your yard made me recall that in my Mama’s backyard, there used to be a scraggly, scrawny grape vine that struggled to exist. The leaves were pretty, and I remember that the vine bore fruit only once: a pitiful tiny bunch that were tart, as you said. This obviously isn’t the right climate and soil for this plant. But one of my fantasies is to have a backyard garden and orchard complete with (yup) luxuriant grapevines heavy with dark black grapes. (*sigh*)
Hope you and your family have a great, fantastic vacation and we your legion of readers look forward to your posts about the trip.
Lovely pictures! The white background brings out the varying shades of green of the grape leaves. Clean, crisp lines and great composition. Just had to comment on it. Nice, MM!
Hi MM, we had a grape plant in our house in Pampanga unfortunately it died because of Mt. Pinatubo. The plant was brought by my dad from their farm in Saudi. Their company grew flowers, orchids and friut bearing trees & plants.
Nice pics. =)
that was cheap. . . and yeah me too im more interested on the leaves, although I’ve never cooked with it before. . .
I just got several kilos of green grapes from Ilocos region at Php 30 per kilo. It is a little less sour than the imported green grapes and not too sweet. Generally, it is ok and definitely have improved from a too sour grapes grown locally several years ago.
hello,i had a gravepine who bore red grapes,i usually sold it for 5opesos
Whoa, grape leaves! I encountered a recipe for Dolmas a little while back, but didn’t even consider trying it out since I thought it would be impossible to find grape leaves here. Now I can! Yipee!