Small plates to share
When I asked my husband if I should translate this recipe, calamares rellenos, as stuffed squid or stuffed calamari, he immediately responded stuffed calamari, “Americans are grossed out by the thought of eating squid”. I had to laugh, but I think he’s probably right, since his American/Canadian perspective is always more accurate than mine. So here it goes, stuffed calamari.
This recipe, for a bocadillo called brascada in Valencia, where I grew up and went to university, brings back memories. Bocadillo is what we call in Spain any sandwich made with baguette style bread. Baguette style bread, by the way, is the most common type of bread in Spain, and we call it simply pan, bread. Bocadillos are a common fare at all tapas bars and cafés in Spain, and they’re a popular midmorning snack for many. For us, students, bocadillos were an easy and nutritious lunch, or dinner. One of my favorites, brascada, was a typical and frequent meal in the evening (a few times a week) when I studied at the library of the Old University, a majestic building that, in the XVI century, housed Valencia’s University. After a few hours of studying, my friend and I would take a break at a tapas bar on the adjacent square, Plaza del Patriarca, that made the best brascadas in the city. I now make them at home, and my family loves them.
I don’t know in which category exactly to place esgarraet, salads or appetizers/tapas. Esgarraet is a dish typical of the Valencian community, and very often it is served as a tapa, on top of a slice of crusty bread, or grilled or toasted bread. It consists of roasted red peppers, salt cod, garlic and olive oil, and in some areas of (more…)
Spanish omelet, tortilla española or tortilla de patatas, is the most popular of all Spanish tapas. I dare you to find a restaurant, a bar, or a cafeteria in Spain that doesn’t serve it. I dare you to find one household in Spain that doesn’t make it. As popular as patatas bravas are when it comes to tapas, nothing overshadows Spanish omelet. And yet, like with (more…)
I have to warn you about this post: if fish is not your thing, particularly the way it comes out of the sea, then stop right here. Don’t keep reading. Don’t scroll down. The images might hurt your sensibility.
I once had a colleague, my counterpart in England (in a previous “life” I used to work in Madrid for a British (more…)
Beach, rice, and seafood, go hand in hand in my mind. It is the feeling of summer, the taste of it, what I remember and what I live and experience every summer in Spain.
Another summer constant is that my mom is the main cook. It’s her house, the one we grew up in, the place where (more…)
I’m writing this as I’ve just sat down, trying to catch my breath after the hike to la ermita de Santa Lucía, Saint Lucia chapel in Alcocebre, Spain. The breathlessness is real, as the hike is a steep one, trying to navigate rocks, some of them part of a glacier plateau, and bushes of wild rosemary and the many other varieties of wild herbs and low Mediterranean pine trees (more…)
This post is for my older sons. In honor of them, yes, of course. But more than that, to quiet their disappointment. You see, I have been posting on Mama Ía blog for months, the food of Spain, but also the dishes I’ve been cooking in America for years, the Spanish way. Yet for my sons, cooking Spanish is cooking the traditional (more…)
Appetizers are a wonderful invention. So much so that, in Spain, we have created a new category of dish called tapa, or pincho, or montadito (the name changes depending on the region of Spain you’re in) based on small plates, equivalent to what in America we would call appetizers. Tapas can be so flavorful that we like to (more…)
I’m multi-tasking as I write this, trying to get tickets for our trip to Spain as well as writing this post. I’m looking forward to our trip, and as they say, getting there is half the fun! This includes trying to make sense of the dates available for every member of our family, accomodating summer jobs, work, soccer camps and (more…)
