When in Spain, Eat like Locals do

I asked the kids at home if they would like to go the club for swimming. They didn’t want to go swimming but agreed to come with me to spend few hours at the club and probably try some Canarian food.

Our social club is a great place to spend few hours. It offers beautiful view from all sides and over looks the San Marco beach that has black sand. It is well-equipped club with tennis lawn, play area for kids, swimming pool, sauna, gym, indoor games room and a small restaurant.

We headed straight to the restaurant hoping to eat a typical Spanish food. The menu card had pizzas, sandwiches and few tapas.

We ordered squid fritters, French fries, salads and tortilla. The bread was freshly baked and the lunch was filling. I was hoping I had brought my chili sauce with me because Spanish don’t eat chilies at all and many times I find the food bland.

tuna salad

freshly baked bread

vegetarian salad which contained mayonnaise,pineapple and raisins

egg omelette called tortilla

squid fritters

Okay, I agree what we actually ate were just tapas, one of Spain’s great contributions to world’s gastronomy, and Spanish are seen indulging in this kind of tapas at any hour of the day, eating tapas and sipping beer or cortado (strong coffee) is their general passtime. It’s a good way to sample variety of tastes in short time.

Spanish eating habits are very much different from other Europeans. Spanish normally don’t have breakfast like a king but instead have small meals during day with a large meal during siesta time.

For breakfast they have freshly squeezed fruit juice, sweet roll, croissant or pastries. If you go early mornings out, you are likely to see Spanish enjoying freshly fried Churros with hot chocolate.

At around 11am you see them again in the restaurants having their bigger breakfast, that’s ‘merienda’ or ‘elevenses’ which is always sandwich or ‘bocadillo’ made from baguette and filled with anything from tuna fish, cured ham, cheese or meat.

Lunch hour is the feast time for Spanish people. All the shops close from 1:30pm to 4pm and it’s siesta time. Proper meals at eaten at this time which consists of lentils with chorizo, rice and fish/poultry/meat. Their meal lasts for an hour and it’s a grand feast followed by desert or fruits. Even the restaurants are full during this time with offers of ‘menu del dia’ that is a three-course meal with fixed price and includes starters, mains and desserts. Bread and drinks are also included in the price and sometimes coffee as well. This is more economical that ordering a la carte.

All the shops close around 8pm, and Spanish people socialize after 8pm, eating tapas and sipping beer, to return home around 10pm.

Dinner is very light, just soup, salad and maybe a sandwich while enjoying their favorite TV programs in Spanish language only.

Food Bashing and Gnashing

The other day I was attending a food demonstration, the host used just 20% of the ingredients and the rest he just dumped it aside. One of the persons in the audience was offended and scolded him for wasting food.

In India, we worship food Goddess called ‘Aandata’. From childhood this fact is drilled into our head that one must never waste food and that we must fill our plate with only sufficient amount that we can finish it. Left-over are neatly packed and used for some other day. At every Indian festival, food is served with passion and even in communal kitchens; the food is prepared over the hymn in praise of Lord. People who dine in a restaurant pack a doggy-bag of the food that is left at the table, to pass it to a hungry beggar out on the street or bring it home for their next day breakfast.

So how do we react when we see people waste food?

Or throw the food around just for a thrill?

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 The girl in this picture is not only wasting tomatoes but is somersaulting in tomato sauce!

LaTomatina Festival is celebrated in Bruno, Spain where they have tomato fights for over two hours.  Such festivals will never be allowed in India. Indians, who saw this festival in a Bollywood film ‘Zindagi nah Milagi Dubara’, tried to replicate this festival in places like Delhi. Bangalore and Mysore but were unsuccessful because like I said before ‘We don’t believe in wastage of food in any form’ unless of course if it is wheat grains in Punjab which is allowed to rot because of lack of storage space.

But that’s another story.

In Bruno, Spain, the tomatoes are specially grown for this festival and there is a ritual to be followed. The first event of the Tomatina begins with ‘Palo Jamon’ which is a greasy pole with a ham on the top. While one person tries to reach the ham through greasy pole, the crowd grows frenzy with singing a dancing and showering sprays of water from hose in an effort to drop him off the pole. As soon as someone is able to drop the ham off the pole, the signal for tomato fight is given with tomato squashed and thrown at each other.

And they paint the city red…..

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Another fruit that is found in abundance in Spain is grapes. If you walk in the rural areas of Spain, you are likely to find bunches of grapes peeping over the ledge. You may pluck the grape and chew while you jog or feast your eyes till the grapes rot. In the town of Haro in the La Rioja region of northern Spain is the festival called a ‘Batalla de Vino’ or ‘Battle of Wine’ whereby the buckets and buckets of wine are poured at each other just like we play Holi in India. The goal is to drench everybody in wine from top to bottom.

Now, would we waste so much wine in India?

In another small Italian town called Ivrea, thousands of oranges arrive in the city during the festival called ‘Battle of Oranges’ whereby there is flinging of oranges with great force between teams to celebrate the town’s defiance against the ruling tyrant who was eventually killed by a local miller’s daughter.

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 In Italy this playing with oranges and squashing them during food fight is not considered as waste because these are the leftovers from annual harvest and would have to be destroyed under EU rules.

Maybe they don’t know the recipe of orange squash?….er…or the fact that they can export it to neighboring countries?

Sometimes the waste is not for fun or to celebrate some festival, but waste is the result fight against the law makers.

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During my visit to Boston some years ago, I looked deeply into the Charles river to check the color of the water as I imagined it to be of dark brown color. The tourist guide informed me about the wastage of 342 chest of tea that was dumped into the river in the course of three hours by Americans dressed in Mohawk warrior disguises back in the year 1773. The river was deep brown color for months after this revolution and I wondered what it must have looked like as the river flowed, passing through different surrounding cities. Did the people bend down to taste the waters? Or did they add lime and had green tea?


 The Boston tea party has often been referred in other political protests. When Gandhi met with the British viceroy in 1930 after Indian salt protest campaign, Gandhi took some duty free salt from his shawl and said with a smile, that the salt was “to remind us of the famous Boston Tea party.”

Food is the favorite subject in every home and many of the cuisines can be created or improved upon. There are many food channels on TV which inspires us to cook various recipes. MasterChef is the favorite TV channel which is enjoyed world over but nothing beats the culinary Olympics called ‘Bocuse d’Or’, the two-day, biennial global culinary contest founded by the 84-year-old master, Paul Bocuse, and considered by organizers the Olympics of cooking.

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This is the interesting event where chefs are invited from all parts of the world and throughout the day, the commentators pumped up the crowd, encouraging ear-piercing whistles, hoots, cowbells, chants, shouts and there is a loud playing of recorded songs. Accuracy is not the top priority of the commentary at all, be it in English or in French. Pine nuts become peanuts; beef becomes buffalo. Bread sounds like thread. The fish and meat dishes all get mixed up and I am sure lots of food gets wasted at this event too……although they do lose points if they waste too much…..

The food fight goes on around the world for different reasons, some for entertainments while others for getting even, but if u decide to waste, then just waste on pepper spray to show anger and on cream confetti oozing out of the can for fun….... tried those???

Paella Making Ritual on the street of Malaga, Spain

In my earlier post I have discussed about the Paella making festival in Spain where a big rice dish is made in the middle of the road for the whole neighborhood. The whole community cooks together and eat with much dancing and merry making. 

My cousin who lives in Malaga was kind enough to share the photographs of this festival that took place this year.

A complete Paella dish contains assorted vegetables, assorted sea food, assorted meat and it is topped with shrimps and clams.

Paella is made in huge paella pan and a big group of chefs contribute their help, it is served with bread and wine

While the paella is simmering, the folk are busy with fiesta of music and dance

Thank you Johnny Shahdadpuri for sharing your pictures with me.