Category: Travel

Over the County Line to Kent

Chica Andaluza55 Comments

Bexhill on Sea sits in the county of East Sussex.  Not too far away is the county of Kent, often known as The Garden of England because so much of the UKs fruit and vegetables (not to mention hops for beer making) is grown here.

A few weekends ago we celebrated our 7th anniversary. It actually falls on 11th November which many people here in the UK know as Remembrance Day or Armistice Day in honour of those who died in action and to commemorate the end of the First World War (the War to End All Wars…if only) at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.  A notable date for many reasons.

We headed over from East Sussex to Kent to stay in the beautiful fishing village of Whitstable, famous in particular for its Whitstable oysters.

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On the morning of 11th we went to nearby Canterbury, a beautiful medieval city and saw some moving Remembrance Day ceremonies.

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We even managed to get into the Cathedral during the service, but it was packed so we retreated to admire from the outside.

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We had two beautiful meals in local restaurants.

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We ate oysters out in the cold winter sunshine.

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Look, they recycle their shells, how clever is that? Not sure what they do with them though!

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We walked along the sea walk to the harbor.

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Admired the beautiful choice of fish for sale.

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Of course, Big Man enjoyed a pint of the local beer.

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And we ate a curiously quirky but wonderfully delicious dessert of Blue Cheese Ice Cream. I´m determined to work out how to make it (unless anyone has a recipe) as I imagine it would be incredible with walnuts, honey, figs, dates etc as an alternative to Christmas pudding.

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Of course, all good things must come to an end. Back to work Chica and Big Man!

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Fingers Crossed

Chica Andaluza70 Comments

Fingers Crossed…

So, I am typing away in the dusty, and as yet untouched, sitting room of our Victorian House in Bexhill. I´ve missed you all and I´m sorry I can´t comment on your blogs. Internet access here is via a dongle and after about 5 days I was told that I had “exceeded my data allowance”. Oh dear, naughty Chica. This may mean that I won´t be able to download some photos I want to show you of what we have been doing.

The kitchen was ripped out.

A damp proof course was put in, the floor was leveled and a quick coat of paint followed, although it will eventually be tiled.

Then Big Man put down some oak flooring. It was meant to be a cheaper floor, but it was a bargain and we couldn´t resist.

Next up is fitting the kitchen, the appliances and tiling. But hopefully more of that next week.

And the dogs? Of course, they still manage to find a quiet spot amid the chaos and are enjoying long walks on the beach when the working day is over.

I´ll stop now as I don´t want the internet police hauling me in for further “excesses”, but I do send you all the best from a wet, grey and rainy Bexhill on Sea (well, it is a Bank Holiday Weekend here in the UK, so it´s to be expected!) and cross your fingers that this works!

Well…things are sort of working….

Chica Andaluza65 Comments

We are already five working days into our refurbishment project and things are moving on quickly. I seem to have spent every day talking to builders and workmen, negotiating prices, booking in days for them to work and translating impossible sounding things from English to Spanish and vice versa. I am learning a lot of new words!

The dogs are behaving beautifully and napping wherever they can.

Little original features are emerging from behind layers of paint.

And yes, that carpet has gone!

Meals are still fairly scratch, no great cooking has been happening, but I hope you understand.

On the downside, the (dingle, dangle) dongle I have bought to connect to the internet allows me to pick up e-mails, go to my blogging home page, post and reply to comments. However, it only lets me go to one or two other blogs and blocks many of them telling me they have adult content. Now, I don´t imagine for one moment that you have all decided en masse to start posting saucy recipes or racy photos, and think I´ll just have to accept that for a while I won´t be able to read all your lovely blogs. I´m sorry, I do miss this, but I hope you´ll understand.

I´ll go and stand in the naughty corner for a while if it would help.

But then I couldn´t finish clearing the garden which is already looking so much better.

A Safe Arrival

Chica Andaluza66 Comments

2300 km later and we´re in the UK. The sun is shining, we almost thought we´d arrived in the wrong country!

A blissfully uneventful journey, Big Man drove all the way (what a star) as I was suffering from a nasty bout of tonsillitis and feeling dreadful (but am on the mend now).

We drove past windmills in Castilla and La Mancha.

Spanish Bulls across the country.

Sunflowers in France.

And then the first drops of rain as we said goodbye to France in Calais.

Finally a big hello to England and the famous White Cliffs of Dover.

After a day of recovery and a look at the house we decided that we´re going to take advantage of my parents´ good will and a nearby holiday place they have and stay in their lovely flat for a little while as the house is a bit of a disaster zone right now.

A typical English Sunday was decided on. A long walk with the dogs to reward them for being so good. This is the beautiful Pevensey Castle.

Some delicious British Sirloin, cooked simply on the griddle.

Then hot apple crumble with creamy, ice-cold vanilla ice cream melting on top.

Ok, the rest is over…time to get to work.

Well, we will be watching kite surfing on the beach nearby and the Olympics too!

Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye….

Chica Andaluza113 Comments

So, this is it (click there if you want to hear a good old wartime song)! All the waiting to sort out legal documents for the house purchase is done. The ferry crossing is booked from Calais in Northern France to Dover on the south Coast of England. The dogs have seen the vet and have more documents than we do. The car is packed with tools, wine, beer and other essentials. The picnic is being made. The passports are in my bag.

Eager to go, the dogs keep trying out their “spot” in the car. They even have doggy seatbelts they have to wear on the trip!

We´re off! The trip to the UK to renovate a little Victorian house in the seaside town of Bexhill on Sea starts tomorrow, very early in the morning. I should point out that this is a Property Development project, our grown up “job” (for now at least). We will be back to Spain and Up Our Mountain as soon as the property is fit to live in and looking nice and hopefully some lovely people will rent it for a year or so and be very happy in it!

We´ll drive across Spain, skirting around Madrid and then up to the border with France at Irun/Bayonne at the edge of the Pyrenees. By tomorrow night we hope we´ll have reached Bordeaux where we´ll stop in a motel for the night. No time for anything glamorous as we´ll be up early the next day and heading up and across to the North coast of France via the edge of Le Mans then skirting east of Paris and finally the Port of Calais.

A long, long drive…

A quick hour and half ferry crossing later and we´ll be spotting the White Cliffs of Dover, then a left turn along the coast to our destination. About 2200 km, or 1300 miles in total in 2 days. Phew.

But don´t worry, we won´t starve. We have cool bags packed with ice blocks and plenty to eat. Tortilla, of course.  And an Empanada.  Baked Scotch Eggs are being made later today and tomorrow night when we stop I´ll make an Ensalada Cateta as that´s an easy one and will make a change from picnic food.

We have some lovely chicken wings (they´re huge as they´re from our own chickens) which I rubbed in crushed garlic and smoked paprika then left them in a little bath of chicken stock and white wine for half an hour before seasoning then roasting them for 45 minutes in a medium oven.

Finger Lickin´Good! (sorry, couldn´t resist saying it).

Bacon butties for tomorrow morning and then on Friday I am sure we´ll stop in France to buy some lovely hot coffee and buttery croissants to start our day.

It will take us a few days to get settled, and fingers crossed that the internet I have sorted out will work. Apologies in advance for possibly not being able to keep up and comment as much as usual, but I´ll do my best as I would miss you all too much.

Eek…scary, hairy carpet!

Hopefully I can keep you updated on our progress with some “Cooking Under Fire” thrown in. The kitchen is being pulled out this week and the new one won´t go in for a week or so, but I do have an oven, a sink and a table. Honestly, what more do I need?!

So, wish me well, we´ll drive carefully and I´ll see you all again soon.  Maybe we can all share an extra-large portion of Fish & Chips on the beach?

Runner Bean Salad and Back Home Up the Mountain

Chica Andaluza63 Comments

Another hectic few days in the UK, but more of that in a moment. It was a good trip, and I even got to meet my blogging buddy Claire from Promenade Plantings. We had a wonderful little break sitting on the sea front, drinking rosé wine and getting to know each other better.  And then she gave me a bag of her super delicious peppery radishes. How lucky am I?!

As ever, I came back with some goodies to enjoy here Up the Mountain. A fabulous Ottolenghi cookbook, which is already inspiring me with some amazing recipes. Can´t wait to try them out.

I also bought myself some cooling racks for my baking which I had wanted for ages. Well, I had been balancing an oven rack on top of tin cans which wasn´t ideal. And in the shop, next to the baking racks I spotted some adorable mini loaf tins which just pleaded with me to leap into my suitcase. Of course, I obliged them!  I expect you have also spotted my guilty (not so) secret of Cheese & Onion crisps.

Big Man had kept busy in the veggie garden in my absence and picked tomatoes, courgettes and almost three kilos of runner beans…and I had only been away for four days.

Some of the beans went into a delicious salad at lunchtime today. Thinly sliced raw runner beans, tomatoes, sweet onions and green peppers with chopped basil and a lemon and garlic vinaigrette.  All from our garden, it did make me feel a very happy Chica.

Then, just when I thought my first day home couldn´t get any better, my lovely neighbour came round with a fantastic present for me. Look at this beautiful mixer. She said she had it stored away in her garage and hoped I would make good use of it. You bet I will!

And now for some exciting news. Regular readers may have noticed that I have been making more trips than usual back to the UK in the last few months. Well, they weren´t all back to London to visit my family, but to sort out a project that Big Man and I will soon start working on. We will be heading over to a little seaside town on the south coast of England, called Bexhill on Sea. In just under 3 weeks in fact, so not long to go now. We will pack up the car with tools, supplies, two dogs and almost definitely some Spanish cheese and jamon. We will drive across Spain and France and when we get to the UK we will be setting up base in a little Victorian house which is in need of some love and attention.

Scary carpet…this house needs some love!

Hopefully over the course of about a month we will be able to restore it to a liveable condition (while we live in it ourselves). We will be polishing floorboards, putting in a kitchen and bathroom, unearthing the little garden and breathing life back into it.

I think there´s a pretty little garden hidden in there….

It´s going to be hard work, it´s going to be stressful but it´s going to be fun and a wonderful experience.  While we do this we´ll have to cook and eat and we´ll be sharing our little adventure with you before we head back to Spain once it´s all done. I do hope you join us for the ride, and please be prepared for dust, rain and laughter along the way.

Best Friends and Favourite Foods

Chica Andaluza70 Comments

I am truly blessed when it comes to friends. I have some extra special best girlfriends who have been there for me through the good and the bad, the happy and the sad, the youth and the wrinkles. Ria and I met at school, a wonderful convent in South London, and have been best friends ever since.

We laughed through our school days, she sent me stamps to write to her when I went to University as I was poor and she was earning. She also gave me a sewing box as a going away gift and still, to this day, gets me to adjust her clothes and sew on buttons. We even worked at the same company for a few years and mopped up the tears through tough endings to relationships in later years.

She invited me to a weekend with friends in Scotland without telling me we would be walking part of the West Highland Way. She knew I would have refused, but we had fun and I forgave her, eventually.  Then I told her she was doing a run to raise money for Charity and she didn´t complain once.

Hot, sweaty but very happy with what we achieved!

We know and love each other´s families like our own, and also know our way around each other´s kitchens. Very important indeed.

When we both hit 40 within a month of each other (not soooo long ago), we threw a massive party then went off on a Round the World Trip.  I have a lovely photo of us on our last day before we headed back to London. It was taken in Hong Kong on the Kowloon ferry. We don´t look glamorous, or made up. In fact we look exhausted, a little chilly, but happy. We had spent about 3 months in each other´s company 24/7 and not a cross word or row, just fun, laughter and quite a few adventures.

I moved to Spain permanently six years ago, and we had to find a new way to make things work across the miles.  E-mails, phone calls and of course, visits.

So, when your best buddy comes to visit you don´t want to spend too much time in the kitchen as there is talking, laughing, dog walking and wine drinking to be done.

We barbecued squid which we enjoyed in the sunshine.

We ate what we jokingly called a “deconstructed chicken salad sharing platter for friends” – cold cooked chicken, spiced cauliflower, a platter full of delicious vegetables and topped with blanched then grilled asparagus with a lemon dressing and mayonnaise. Perfect for sharing.

And of course, my best friend knows how much I adore curry, so several happy hours were spent in the kitchen cooking up a storm, or the “Cortijo Curry” as we called it. Goat curry, tarka dhal, spinach and tomato curry, poppadums and roti.

I´ll share the recipes with you soon, but now I´m tired, happy and sad, and rather full up, so I´ll leave you with a photo of the perfect dessert for friends who don´t have time to make dessert.

San Isidro and a little walk around the village

Chica Andaluza66 Comments

The 15th May is the Feast of San Isidro Labrador, the Patron Saint of Farmers. He´s also the Patron Saint of Madrid, do pop over to BlueJellyBean´s blog and check out her beautiful recipe in celebration of this feast day.

One of the three village bars (and there are only about 250 inhabitants!)

Summer has arrived like an explosion. No gentle easing into gradually warmer days. It turned overnight from Spring to Summer and temperatures in the 30s just a few days ago.

View from the village

The celebration of San Isidro is one of the first big summer celebrations, and is particularly important in villages like ours.  Most of the inhabitants rely on the land to employ and feed them to some degree or another. Things are tough in Spain right now and work is scarce. Today is symbolic for many of these land workers and planting today hopefully carries a blessing from San Isidro for a good crop. Tonight we finished planting the last of our vegetables garden…well, we´ll take help where we can get it!

Main Street!

The statue of the Saint was blessed in the little village church and processed down through the village to our little sports centre which has a large building used for village gatherings.

It´s a Pueblo Blanco, a white village. Perhaps not the quaintest or prettiest, but it has a certain charm. The streets were quiet today as most people were in the church when we arrived.

Obligatory Old Boys sitting on a bench in the square

Although our village celebrations were scaled down from previous years, there was still time to enjoy a plate of rice together and have a few drinks.

The cooks did a great job!

Oh, and a little dance of course.

Little Dancing Queens!

Boiled Gammon and Parsley Sauce

Chica Andaluza60 Comments

Some dishes, to me, are so typically English and bring back memories of food from my past.  Gammon is cured (usually wet cured in a salt brine) pork, from the leg.  It can be bought smoked, as an entire joint or as steaks.  It just can´t be bought in Spain, so I will have to work on a way to make my own.

Meanwhile, I picked up a few small joints of gammon on a pre Christmas shopping trip to the strange place that is Gibraltar.  A couple of hours´ drive from Malaga, it is a British Overseas Territory on the southern Iberian Peninsula.  I have to confess it´s not my favourite place as it seems to contain all that is bad about Britain packed into a very small area…but I don´t wish to offend and I am sure there is much more to it than I have ever seen on two brief shopping trips.

A trip to Gib, as it´s known to the Brits, allows us ex pats to stock up on things (particularly food) that we miss and either can´t get hold of or can´t be transported over easily by our visitors.  So, amongst many other food goodies, gammon it was.  I thought that Big Man would enjoy it as he loves pork and ham, but I knew it would be a new and interesting taste for him.

Gammon can be roasted or boiled and served hot or cold.  I decided to do a hot dish, boiled gammon with parsley sauce, which is a typical dish of comfort food from my homeland.

Ingredients (serves 4)

  • One small brined gammon (about 750g)
  • About 6 carrots peeled and chopped into large pieces
  • 2 medium onions peeled and halved
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 4 cloves
  • Water to cover
  • 6-8 medium potatoes boiled in their skins and peeled and halved to serve

For the parsely sauce you will need half a litre of home made béchamel sauce (infuse the parsley stalks in your milk before making it) and two tablespoons of parsley stirred in at the end. For extra flavour, use half milk and half stock (from boiling your gammon).

Simply put the gammon, onion, carrots, bay leaves and cloves into a deep saucepan and cover with water.  Don´t use salt – it will be fairly salty from the brine. Bring to the boil, skim off any scum that rises to the surface, cover and simmer gently for about an hour until the gammon is tender.

When the gammon is cooked, leave it to sit in the hot stock while you cook your potatoes and make the parsley sauce.  I used one cup each of milk and stock (which should both be cooled) , 2 tablespoons of plain flour, 1 tablespoon of oil and whisked everything together over a low heat until it started to boil and thicken.  This is my cheat´s way of making white sauce.  Finally I stirred in my chopped parsley and let it sit for a few minutes.

Remove the gammon from the stock and slice or chop (it will not slice easily when it´s warm, but I don´t mind chunks!).  I put some runner beans into the stock with the carrots and onions, bought them up to the boil and then strained the vegetables, reserving the stock for soup. Serve with the boiled, peeled potatoes and vegetables and enjoy the lovely steamy smells of gammon and parsley that will float up and fill you with a sense of comfort.

Red Shoes and Ruins

Chica Andaluza55 Comments

The best things in life are free, so they say.  On the whole I´m inclined to agree.  Love, friendship, laughter…oh, and blog awards.  They are all marvellous aren´t they?  Linda from Savoring Every Bite very kindly passed The (Red) Educational Shoe award onto me.

I can fully understand why she was awarded it in the first place, do pop on over to learn so much about Italian family, culture, food and generally about making every little moment in life into a special memory. When Linda passed the award on, she mentioned some of the “travels” she had been on via my blog, so today we´re going travelling. To just outside the beautiful City of Cordoba to be precise.  But before you pack your toothbrush I want to do the time honoured thing and pass this award on to a new blogging find.

JPWaldron has a fantastic blog which he calls “A free guide to foraging for all”.  See, I told you the best things in life are free.  If you live in the country, or aspire to or even just dream about it, I promise you´ll love what you find over there. And you´ll certainly learn a lot.  I´m sure he won´t mind being sent a red high heeled shoe…I think it´s a metaphorical shoe after all!

So, Cordoba.  I have a very soft spot for this beautiful city as Big Man and I had our first “date” there way back in September 2005.  Can you date when you´re a grown up? I like to think so.  Anyway, we go back there as often as we can and spent a fantastic weekend there at the end of January to celebrate my birthday.  I´ll show you some photos of this amazing city another day.

Today we´re heading about 10km out of town to an amazing archaeological site, The Medina Azahara or Madinat al-Zahra.  We´ve visited before, some 5 years ago and since our first visit an amazing vistor´s centre has been built and much more of this amazing abandoned city uncovered and restored.  Unbelievably, it´s free to go in, if you are ever lucky enough to be in the area, make it a priority.  It´s an incredible experience that you´ll always remember.

The city is considered to be one of the most important mediaeval archaeological sites in Spain. It covers 112 hectares and was the political and administrative capital of Al-Andalus (Muslim Spain) for a large part of the 10th Century.

There is something very special about this place, it never feels crowded and it´s easy to imagine the Caliph and his city doing business, receiving guests from around the world, and the thousands of servants keeping the city running.

There were several mosques, one of which can be seen clearly.

Stunning archways, this one they believe was the Prime Minister´s house.

Beautiful gardens…you can almost hear the trickle of water which flowed around the city.

So, do linger a while and soak up the peaceful atmosphere, and before you leave, take a final look back over the site and the city of Cordoba in the distance.

Hasta luego, come back soon…