Des vertes et des pas mûres

Literally: Some green ones and some unripe ones

Example: “Pendant son premier hiver en montagne, il en a vu des vertes et des pas mûres.” — During his first winter in the mountains, he went through the wringer.

English equivalent: To go through the wringer

Origin: It looks like a phrase saying the same thing twice, since green fruit is unripe fruit and the 13th century did contrast le vert with le mûr to mean exactly that, green wheat against ripe. But the green here is not in any fruit. The early-15th-century form was en bailler de belles, des vertes et des mûres, meaning to tell filthy stories, and vert carries the slang sense it still has today: off-color, risqué. Mûr had meant grown-up since the 11th century, as it does in l'âge mûr — and off-color stories are for adults only, obviously. The pas was added later, turning the second half into what looks like a comic repetition of the first, which it only is for people who have lost the thread. Preceded by en entendre or en raconter, the phrase keeps that original sense. Preceded by en voir, it has drifted from outrageous things to merely bad ones, and means you have been through the mill.