Olives for breakfast.

I've just come back from a fabulous and very hot few days in Spain - my first visit.  My husband and I enjoyed a few child free days in the sun while they were having their own holiday in France with their Scout Group. I was looking forward to enjoying the food and it seemed the ideal opportunity for a blog post as I haven't written one for ages.

We arrived late at night and the first meal consisted of chilled Cava and olives as that was all there was in the villa - but I wasn't complaining!  In the morning we headed out in our cute little red rental Fiat 500 to the local supermarket - Pepe La Sal.  They had an impressive array of whole cured hams hanging up behind the meat counter and an equally impressive array of cakes and pastries - I wish I had taken  a photo. There was also a big fridge full of ready made microwaveable tapas dishes (discussed later) but we didn't have a microwave. You could get the ham sliced to order or buy it ready sliced in packets.  Similarly the cheeses. There were olives stuffed with all sorts of fillings, we thought we'd try the smoked salmon and the serrano ham ones. We bought ham, cheese, bread, olives, local unsalted butter, Allioli (creamy garlic dip), crisps, and nibbles.  Then we headed back to the villa for assembly of our DIY continental breakfast, and very delicious it was too, as you can see:

On closer inspection, we had bought three sorts of sliced ham, the cheapest was €3.05 for 104g, the next most expensive was €3.59 for 72g and the last one was a mind boggling €8.57 for 72g!!  We had been joyfully throwing goodies in the trolley without noticing the price, after all we were on holiday...  I looked them up and the cheapest was Centro D.O. Teruel - a serrano ham- for more information try the following link: 

http://jamonesairesano.es/en/designation-of-origin-of-teruel/

The mid price one was Iberico a Maquina, which from some googling appears to be an Iberian ham possibly where the pig is fed on acorns. The final one (and it WAS the most delicioso, having a very deep flavour) was Bellota a Maquina. Any readers who can tell me the difference please do because I  haven't been able to find out!

Our breakfasts were so filling, and eaten quite late, so we didn't really bother with lunch other than wine/beer and crisps and the odd Mojito (from a Chinese restaurant where you could sit outside on a sofa looking out to sea, we never had any food there, just enjoyed drinks and the free wifi!!!) and saved ourselves for dinner.  Sometimes I made my own tapas, a little slice of bread with Allioli and tomato/cheese, topped with an olive.  I would have liked to try more tapas dishes in a restaurant, and might next time, but it can work out quite expensive if your're not careful, and also I didn't seem to be hungry at the right moment.  All our evening meals were eaten al fresco, so as not to waste a moment of the wonderful weather, and there seemed to be a theme of orange tablecloths and/or napkins.

The first night my husband had prawns wrapped in bacon followed by lamb chops, and I started with a lobster salad, which truly deserved to have it's photo taken:

followed by slow roast piglet with orange sauce. Both mains came with chips, picked red cabbage served warm and mixed vegetables. All was delicious, especially the orange sauce. We never did have a dessert!

The next morning we popped down to a little convenience store called Deli Merkat (affectionately known as the deli meerkat) for bread, chocolate croissants and a beef tomato which I thought would go well with the rest of the ham and cheese, and it did, being packed with flavour.  The fruit and veg was not a perfect looking as at home, the rest of Europe seem to embrace "inglorious vegetables" rather better than we have.  To learn more see :

http://www.wimp.com/allsupermarkets/

Dinner on day two was at a fish restaurant - I had grilled sardines followed by Sole Menier (Sole Meuniere) and hubby had prawns with garlic followed by rabbit with garlic. Again both mains had the same accompaniments - buttery rice and crushed potatoes with olive oil and a sort of aubergine thing.  All good, though they didn't manage to get our starters out at the same time, and to be fair my husband's glass of pre-prandial gin was so enormous it should really have been served in a bucket!!  There was only a thimbleful of tonic in the huge glass - it was the first time ever he has asked me to "help him out" with an alcoholic beverage!!

On the last night, we found a restaurant that specialised in paella. I had only had this dish once before, and obviously never an authentic Spanish one, and really wanted to try it, but there was a snag.  They would only cook it for a minimum of two people, and my husband really didn't want it, as it's not his type of thing at all, he wanted steak.  So after some discussion, and not having a starter or dessert, I ordered a Paella Marinera for two all to myself!! I really hoped it was going to be good as it was €30!  Eeek!  The waitress gave us some funny looks and I suspected this had never happened to her before but when it arrived, it was delicious and included baby squid and squid rings, mussels, clams, white fish, shell-on prawns and langoustines. Peeling them gave me yellow fingernails! I did have to leave some of the rice, and my husband enjoyed his steak with salad and chips.  The white wine was a bit rough though, we wished we had ordered red instead.

before...

and after!

Speaking of the wine, it was generally very good, we had Cava, Verdejo, Torres de Casta Rosado (the Spanish seem to drink a lot of rose), Campo Viejo white Rioja, and various house whites (variable!)  The Spanish beer - Mahou was lovely too.

I would definitely go back to Spain, I loved the outdoor dining and the whole experience. And they eat more vegetables than the French.

Thank you for reading,

Caroline :-)