Simple Spanish Food

A Glimpse of a Madrid Fruit & Vegetable Stand in Winter

 I love the tiny fruit and vegetable shops that can be found in every neighborhood of Madrid.   The produce in most of them is top notch, even in winter (when these photos were taken)  and always arranged beautifully out front, enticing you to come inside.

Here's a display of thick white asparagus, all sorts of gorgeous wild mushrooms, chestnuts . . .

And yet more wild mushrooms, setas.  Late fall is the season for them in Spain. (See my posts on grilled stuffed mushrooms and a spicy mushroom empanada.)

Here's a fruit stand, frutería, which is somewhat famous in Madrid because the royal family shops there.  The fruits tend to be so perfect at this place they don't look quite real.

Torta del Casar Cheese

Here's a guest post from Julianne at Trujillo Villas in Extremadura about Torta del Casar,  a soft, rich, creamy cheese that Ana and I often enjoy when we're in Spain.

Julianne writes, "Torta del Casar is a cheese made from sheep’s milk in the Extremadura region. It’s named after Casar de Caceres because that’s where the cheese originated from. The thing that is special about this cheese is that it is cured using a wild thistle. That ingredient lends a light touch of bitterness you taste along with the rich and slightly salty flavors of this cheese. Another part of torta del Casar's flavour comes from the fact that it is aged at least sixty days.

"The consistency of this cheese is not like many others. The inside is creamy and the outside is hard. The best way to eat torta del Casar is to cut the top off and scoop out the middle to enjoy it spread  on a piece of bread, crackers, or pita chips. A cool thing about this cheese is that only 10% of production from only 8 family-run dairies is exported!"

See La Tienda's Torta del Casar page for more information.   You may also wish to check out Trujillo Villas, where Julianne works. Looks beautiful!

Madrid Chefs Recommend Restaurants and Bars with "Real" Spanish Food

Check out Lisa Abend's recent article in the New York Times  "Where Madrid Chefs go for 'Real' Spanish Food" for reviews of four restaurants and bars rarely mentioned in the guidebooks.  I hope to try at least one of them this spring.

A Canary Island Style Salad (ensalada canaria)

While in Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, we had a beautiful salad at the traditional restaurant El Padrino in the mountains overlooking the city.  This salad is easy to make, pretty, and a meal in itself. One thing I like about it is that it is not "tossed": the many ingredients are arranged separately over the bed lettuce so that you can appreciate each one.

We had this with crunchy anise-scented Canary style bread.

Ingredients:

romaine lettuce

sliced tomatoes

sliced sweet onions

sliced red bell peppers

sliced radishes

half an avocado, sliced

florets of steamed cauliflower, tossed with a good olive oil

a good banana (small "apple bananas"  make a good substitute for Canary-style bananas)

sprigs of watercress

grated carrot

a tin of good tuna packed in olive oil

halved boiled eggs

steamed corn

sliced cucumber

tinned white asparagus spears

a good olive oil

salt

Wash and dry the lettuce. Make a large bed of lettuce on a platter, and arrange each of the ingredients separately on top. Place a bottle of good olive oil, vinegar, and salt on the table.  Guests can pick what they like from the salad, and dress it as they like.

Like to try another neat Canary Island salad? Check out my post on a Canary Island salad of avocado and tangerines.

 

 

 

 

A Quick Tour of La Vegueta Market, Las Palmas, Gran Canaria

La Vegueta, the old market in Las Palmas, is packed with stalls selling local fruits, vegetables, fish, meats and cheeses--much of it unique to the Canary Islands.

These rose-colored beans and thick stubby carrots are used in delicious Canary-style pucheros o potajes (stews).

The Canary Islands are famous for fruits, especially bananas, which are quite different in both flavor and texture from the South American varieties usually sold in U.S.  supermarkets. Bananas are used in all sorts of desserts, as well as savory salads. I'll post on both in the near future.

Papayas are another specialty. See my recent post on papaya con miel.

Many of the fish--viejas, sama, sargos--are completely different from those found in the  pescaderías of the peninsula.  I've never seen some of these fish even in Madrid's huge seafood markets.   See my post "Scenes from Spanish Fish Markets" for a comparison.

Have you ever seen clearer, brighter eyes on a fish?

We tried the cherne, gallo, and viejas pictured below, and all were fabulous.

We did not get to try the morena--eel--another Canary Island specialty. Maybe  next time. . .

El mercado de Vegueta also has many local cheeses, chorizos, morcillas, and other meats, both fresh and cured.

The Best Sherry Bar in Madrid? La Venencia

Whenever in Madrid, we make a point of going to the sherry bar La Venencia at least once. We go partly out of tradition (Andrés, my father-in-law, loved La Venencia), partly for the atmosphere (very "old school"), but mainly because the jerez and food are fabulous.  The prices are also very reasonable.  At La Venencia you can enjoy a truly world-class glass of sherry and a tapa for a few euros.

La Venencia is the only place that I know in the city that serves sherry the traditional way--from barrels--and this makes all the difference. Bottled sherry is great, but sherry stored in the barrel is even better.

Keep in mind, the sherry is not drawn directly from the barrel into your glass. It has to be chilled first.  So when the bartender pulls an unmarked bottle from the fridge to serve you, don't worry. He filled it up only a few hours ago from the barrel.

The varieties of sherry at La Venencia include fino  (a tangy light sherry), manzanilla  (an especially delicate type of fino), palo cortado, amontillado,  and--probably my favorite--oloroso (dark, nutty, and complex).   All of these are dry.  (Unfortunately, I have yet to find  in the U.S. any brands of oloroso or amontillado that have not been sweetened for the export market, and I rarely see palo cortado at all--so for these I give no links to sources).

The menu of pinchos or tapas at La Venencia is short and simple, but everything on it goes beautifully with these wines: salt-cured anchovies, anchoas en salazón (see my post "All About Anchovies"), paper-thin slices of smoke cured beef (cecina),  manchego cheese , cured pork loin (lomo), and of course Spanish ham (jamón) .  When you order a glass of sherry, you will receive a  complimentary tapa of aceitunas de Campo Real, probably my all-time favorite olive. 

La Venencia is located in the old city center, Echegaray 7, Madrid

 

 

Anthony Bourdain Raves about Tinned Seafood from Spain

 

I'm always trying to convince people just how good Spanish tinned seafood can be--and how it has nothing to do with the canned seafood available in most U.S. supermarkets.  In Spain a can of cockles or mussels can be a near luxury item.  Together with good bread and wine, they make elegant tapas.

I go back to the topic again and again: see my post on Cantabrian Anchovy fillets in olive oil, or bonito del norte (albacore tuna in olive oil), or Spanish sardines (sardinas y sardinillas).  I'm aware that many people who have never tried these and other kinds of canned seafood from Spain are skeptical, so I link to experts whenever possible. (See my post The Wall Street Journal praises Galician sardines). 

Recently I saw an episode of No Reservations at my sister's. The celebrity chef and host Anthony Bourdain was in Spain,  raving about the tinned seafood--mussels, razor clams, cockles, and much more. He and his translator go on to explain how Spanish tinned seafoods at their best can be even better than fresh.

Click here to see Anthony Bourdain talking about how good Spanish canned seafood can be.

The video begins with a rant (the profanity is bleeped out).  He begins to talk specifically about Spanish tinned seafood around minute three.  

Check out the Spanish tinned seafood selection at:

Madrid's Finest Olive? Aceitunas de Campo Real

Months ago, Jim, a reader of Simple Spanish Food, asked us to identify a certain olive (pictured above) that is served in many of the best tapas bars in Madrid.

 We knew the olive he was talking about at once. We had enjoyed these olives countless times. They're small, round,  bright-green, and shiny. The texture is firm, almost crisp. The flavor is delicate but deep, with hints of oak and herbs.   Just thinking about those olives made my mouth water. But unfortunately neither Ana nor I knew what they were called.

While in Madrid for Christmas,  Ana did some investigating, and now we know. These fabulous olives are called Campo Real. They come from  a denominación de calidad of the same name, about an hour outside of Madrid.  Aceitunas camporreal are marinated in thyme, garlic, fennel, and oregano, but the herb flavors are subtle, not overpowering. They are used to bring out the wonderful taste of the olive itself.

At this time of year these olives are called Campo Real nueva--new--because they are from this fall's harvest.  That is, they've just completed their brining and marinading.  In the bottom right of the picture below (taken at a Madrid olive stand) you can see a big jar of camporreal nueva.

According to the kind bartender at Madrid's wonderful old sherry bar, La Venencia, which serves  olives from Campo Real (and only from Campo Real), these olives aren't quite as pretty later in the year, when they are no longer nueva, new.  That said, we've had them in May and even October and they looked gorgeous to us.

Unfortunately, aceitunas camporreal are not available in the U.S.--or any place else outside of Spain, so far as I know. Until recently even in Madrid they were  sold only in large quantities and served mainly in bars.  So these olives are yet another reason to visit Spain. 

There's no real substitute for them, but if you're looking for a good Spanish olive in a similar style you might try these manzanilla olives available at La Tienda.

Madrid's Restored Market: Mercado de San Miguel (a great place for tapas)

If you're ever in Madrid, be sure to stop by the Mercado de San Miguel.  It's an old-style Spanish market that has been beautifully restored. Inside you'll find tapas bars and all sorts of food stalls--fruit and vegetable stands, seafood stands, nuts and dried fruit, empanada sellers, bacalao (salt cod), fresh shucked oysters or caviar served with champagne or cava, sweets and traditional Spanish pastries--you name it.

It's also just a neat place to wander around. Take a look at the ceiling:

The only bad thing about the Mercado de San Miguel is that it is the exception: enclosed markets of this sort are disappearing all over Madrid and much of Spain.  Many Spaniards now go to the huge supermarkets like Carrefour or the corner grocery store. As a result, traditional markets are losing customers, stalls are closing, and the buildings are being torn down.   The Mercado de San Miguel has been spared, but I can't go in there without thinking of all the others that were not. 

 

I can remember going  into neighborhood markets in Madrid in the mid nineties, just before they began to fade away. Back then Spanish markets were noisy with hawkers and hard-bargaining housewives. The air smelled of fresh sardines,  squid being cleaned, air cured hams, chorizo, vinegar, and cheese.  Rabbits with the fur still on hung in stalls specializing in game. Unplucked quail lay on the counters. A guy with a dead baby pig slung over his shoulder would weave through the crowds.

You're not likely to experience anything like that at the Mercado de San Miguel. It's clean and quiet. There are a lot of tourists  snapping pictures.  But it's a great place to have a drink,  eat some fabulous pinchos, and admire the architecture.

One of my favorite stalls in the Mercado de San Miguel specializes in vermut del grifo, vermouth on tap. This is Spanish vermouth, quite different from the Italian and French types available in bottles. 

And I love the tapas at the Casa de Bacalao stall. I always get the marinated salt cod. Ana likes the pulpo a la gallega--Galician style octopus. We both get the smoked sardines. All of these  are served canapé style, on toast.

The Mercado de San Miguel is located in the center of Madrid, right behind the Plaza Mayor. For more information, check out Sarah Wildman's article "Madrid Market Bustles Again" in the New York Times.

 

Anchoa y Boquerón: A Classic Tapa

One of my all-time favorite tapas is anchoa y boquerón.  You can find these in bars all over Spain. They're also easy to make at home.

As I explain in my post All About Anchovies, anchoas are cured anchovies. In Spain they  are typically of much, much higher quality than the tinned anchovies found in U.S. supermarkets.

The boquerón is the same fish, but uncured. A  boquerón may be fresh or, in this case, pickled in vinegar, olive oil, garlic and herbs.

The flavor of a boquerón is completely different from that of an anchoa, but the two perfectly compliment each other, and when placed together on top of a piece of good garlic toast, the combination is out of this world. 

If you'd like to make a tapa of anchoa y boquerón at home, the on-line Spanish food store La Tienda sells top-quality boquerones, anchovies, and even a selection of Spanish breads to make the toast with.  Or you can make your own bread. See my recipes for easy, no-knead Spanish-style breads.   Once you have the three main ingredients, all you have to do is slice the bread, toast it, and brush it with a quality virgin olive oil and crushed garlic, and top it with a fillet of anchoa and another of boquerón, and there you have it.

If you are in Spain, you can find a tapa of anchoa y boquerón in bars just about anywhere in the country.   It goes under various names: canapé de anchoa y boquerón, montado de anchoa y boquerón, montadito de anchoa y boquerón, pincho de anchoa y boquerón, pintxo de anchoa y boquerón, or simply anchoa y boquerón. 

As with any tapa, the quality varies from bar to bar. The very best use salt-packed anchovies, anchoas en salazón, and top-quality boquerones.

To me, this tapa goes best with a simple Spanish red wine, such as a Valdepeñas or a young Rioja, or a glass of cold lager. See my posts on Spanish wines and other drinks.