Spain

Churros, or Spanish doughnuts

August 20, 2010 Food & drink

We spent a week in Barcelona recently, and walking around the city, you notice little bars and cafes everywhere selling hot chocolate with long, piped doughnuts, ribbons of fried batter coated in sugar and sold in cones or paper bags. Ethan latched onto the idea, as kids do, that he wanted to try churros, but [...]

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Salt cod brandade

August 11, 2010 Food & drink

Remember that salt cod I made the other week? Here’s what became of it. Brandade de morue or brandade de bacaloa, depending on if you’re French or Spanish is a simple emulsion of salt cod and olive oil, most often eaten with bread. It’s common across France and Spain, and versions of it exist in [...]

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Ametilles Garapinyades, or sugared almonds

July 24, 2010 Food & drink

The list of ingredients here is impressively short, but the technique is fiendishly difficult and needs a lot of concentration, good timing and, inevitably, a few botched attempts before you get it right. It’s worth persevering, though. Almonds coated in a crust of crystallised sugar? What could be better than that? Put 155g of almonds [...]

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Alfajores, Spanish spiced fruit and nut biscuits

July 21, 2010 Food & drink

The coincidence of a week in Barcelona and a publisher sending me a copy of Frank Camorra’s staggering Movida Rustica cookbook has left me cooking a lot of Spanish food. I make no apologies for this, but warn that it may continue for a while yet. Movida Rustica is three hundred and sixty-eight pages long. [...]

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Bar Celta, Barcelona

June 30, 2010 Eating out

Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter is a rabbit warren of narrow streets and alleys, lined with small shops and houses, washing strung over balconies to dry in the Mediterranean sun. Every so often, the claustrophobic streets open up into large, open squares, with tables, chairs and a generally continental buzz. Back in the alleys, there are some [...]

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Santa Caterina Market, Barcelona, Spain

June 18, 2010 Food & drink

Markets have been the social and cultural hubs of towns and cities for centuries, millennia, even. They’re meeting places, trading places, places to eat and drink, places that play a central part in the community they serve. The traveler can gauge the temperature and mood of a town by heading straight for its market. Ambling [...]

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Movida Rustica by Frank Camorra and Richard Cornish

June 9, 2010 Books

Frank Camorra owns and operates a Spanish restaurant in Melbourne, Australia called MoVida. It’s wildly successful and highly acclaimed. This book, MoVida Rustica, written in conjunction with Richard Cornish is Camorra’s latest evangelistic push for Spanish cuisine. MoVida Rustica is an absorbing and captivating book, part recipe book, part travelogue, documenting Camorra’s culinary trips of [...]

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Paella, with chicken, artichokes and oloroso sherry

March 20, 2010 Food & drink

Paella is the cornerstone of Spanish food. This version marries chicken with artichokes and the deep, sweet smokiness of old oloroso sherry. Start by browning 350g of boned and skinned chicken, cut into 2cm chunks in olive oil over a moderate heat in a wide frying pan or paella pan. The chicken doesn’t need to [...]

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Croquetas de bacalao

August 20, 2009 Food & drink

These croquetas are from Sam and Sam Clark’s Moro Cookbook, a book that’s seeing some real service in my kitchen recently. It’s a wonderful book, full of practical and delicious recipes. Croquetas are a standard tapas dish, something you’re going to find nearly anywhere in Spain. They’re the perfect snack food, and, really, what’s not [...]

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Spain

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