It´s been a hectic little morning up our mountain. A nearby complex which offers rural holiday accommodation – http://www.cortijolasmonjas.com/ – just in case you want to have a look at the same lovely scenery I see every day, ran a four hour workshop on distilling aromatic plants. More of that later in another post. I got home so relaxed by the lovely smells of lavender, geranium and melissa, I wasn´t really in the mood for “proper” cooking. Big Man had been tidying up the vine in the vegetable patch, so he was hungry. I needed something fast and filling.
Well, not being a girl who is ever likely to be caught with her fridge empty, I pulled together a speedy potato salad. It´s green because of the avocados that are very much in abundance here at the moment, and because I used a big bunch of chives from our garden.
So, here it is, in all it´s delicious simplicity, for two people.
Two large potatoes cooked in their skins then peeled and diced
Four rashers of grilled bacon, chopped
One large avocado, peeled and diced
Half a cup of cooked peas or broad beans (guess what I used!)
Half a cup of chopped green olives
One grilled red pepper, peeled and chopped
Some finely chopped chives (I used about 2 heaped tablespoons)
One heaped tablespoon of mayonnaise
One small tub of natural yogurt (mixed with the mayo)
Pepper – you may not need salt because of the bacon, it´s down to you
Mix up all your ingredients, season and then stir in the mayonnaise and yogurt mixture. Also good as a side dish, but we just dug in and scoffed the lot!
It´s the end of May and we only got round to planting out all those little plant plugs on 21st May, shame on us. We´re usually at least a few weeks earlier, but never mind. The weather seems to be turning to summer, and I took a little look around this morning to see how things were doing. Five days on, and I couldn´t believe my eyes. Fortunately things catch up quickly here and I know, at least if the weather stays fine, we´ll be eating most of what we´re growing now into November.
The runner beans seem to be growing a few cm each day. Luckily we have plenty of canes for them. We had to put down some slug pellets, not really in keeping with our organic aims, but there seems to be a plague of slugs and snails this year.
Jack and The Beanstalk...
The broad beans are still in full production, the freezer is also well stocked for when they do die off in a few weeks.
Beans, beans are good for you...!
We´re very excited about our potatoes as we´ve never grown them before. Big Man was reluctant as they do take up a fair amount of space. However, they´re drying out now and will be ready to dig up soon, then once we´ve dug over the soil and given it whatever (organic) feed it needs, we´re going to put other things in. I have seeds for dwarf runner beans (including some very funky yellow ones, which I´m quite excited about). We´ll definitely put some radishes in as they grow so quickly, and then some lettuces as choices here in the shops locally are mainly limited to lettuce hearts or iceberg.
Tired Potato Plants - which is good!
Last year a neighbour gave us some little cucumber plants which he had grown from seeds of his previous year´s crop. They went crazy and we had loads of delicious little cucumbers all summer long. We took his advice and saved the seeds from one cucumber which we let grow fat and sad looking. We planted them 5 days ago, and despite Big Man being convinced that nothing would come of them, this morning we found lots of little sprouts…we´re so proud!
Tiny Cucumber Sprout - Future Gazpacho Ingredient
Our artichokes continue to flourish, but we will put some new plants in this year as the current ones are now three years old and getting tired.
Artichoke leaves, a perfect snack for slugs
Our tomatoes, peppers and aubergines have taken root well.
Pepper or Pimiento
Big Man hates aubergines (or eggplants) with a passion. I, on the other hand, adore them. Sometimes I sneak them into dishes without telling him and he cant always tell. I love Melanzane Alla Parmigiana, and make this as a treat all to myself so we have planted a little row of them to keep me happy.
Aubergines. Love ´em or hate ´em?
And our lovely little lemon tree seems to have found its pace and keeps us supplied with juicy fruit for squeezing over grilled meats, making dressings and slicing into our “sun downers”.
Ice and a slice anyone?
And just to prove that it´s not all about veggies, here´s a gratuitous shot of one of our roses…
Ok, so I say the word Gazpacho, and what do you think of? A bowl of a chilled tomato based soup, with chopped pepper, cucumber and possibly more tomato floating on top? I´m right, aren´t I?! Ok, so enough with the questions. You´d be right of course. But you´d also be wrong. Well, not wrong exactly, just probably not aware of the different versions of Gazpacho that exist in Andalucía. Gazpacho is Andaluz (i.e. from the Andalucían region of Spain) rather than Spanish. Just as Paella is Valencian and not Spanish.
It´s all getting complicated, so maybe I should start at the beginning. Andalucía has always traditionally been more reliant on agriculture (farming, olives, goats and pigs) than industry. Based on hard labour through grafting on the land, or the “campo”. So what did those hungry labourers do at midday, apart from take a well deserved rest in the shade of an olive tree, that is? Well, they took their lunch, or the makings of it, with them. Life was, and still is, fairly tough for a lot of people. Poverty reigned and many of the traditional dishes came about through necessity. Ask any older person here what the key ingredients of a gazpacho are and they´ll tell you “water, vinegar and salt”. And it´s true, they go into all the versions. The reason for this was to make you thirsty. And therefore drink more water, and thus feel full up. Your belly was full of liquid and stopped you craving more food.
So, we have our country men with a twist of salt, a bottle of vinegar and a knife. Water came courtesy of a nearby stream, and the vegetables that went into their gazpacho were those that could be found in the countryside around them. Sometimes tomatoes, peppers, onions. Other times wild leaves, oranges or a melon.
The gazpacho you see above looks, and actually tastes, like a very finely chopped salad in a bowl of iced water. I won´t lie to you, that´s pretty much what it is! When I first came here, I admit that I didn´t really “get” it. Now that time has passed and I´ve endured quite a few very hot summers, it all makes sense. A chilled bowl of iced salad/soup, with a little tickle of salt and vinegar, the tang of fresh mint and the crunch of all my favourite summer vegetables goes down a treat when you can´t face doing anything more energetic than swatting a fly away and adjusting your sombrero.
Our village prizes this version of Gazpacho so much that it has a three day Fiesta Del Gazpacho dedicated to it every first weekend in August! All good fun, although we tend to slake our thirst afterwards with a cold beer or a few glasses of wine. And then, when we´ve cooled down, we all take to the dance floor and Paso Doble until dawn. Happy days.
If you want to try it, you´ll need (roughly, as the quantities are really down to you) for four bowls:
Half a lettuce heart finely shredded and chopped (this is what you will do with all the vegetables)
Half a green pepper
A medium tomato, peeled
Half a sweet onion
About a third of a normal cucumber, peeled or one small Spanish cucumber
About 15 large mint leaves
A handful of broad beans if you have them (optional)
White wine vinegar
Salt
Iced Water
Some Ice cubes
Mix all the salad ingredients in a large bowl and pour over water so that the vegetables are just covered. Gradually start to add salt and vinegar to taste (they tend to use a lot of both here, but go steady until you get a flavour you like). The locals say it should taste “alegre” which is happy or lively! Add a few ice cubes and leave for at least half an hour so that the mint really infuses the water, then ladle into bowls, lower yourself onto a comfy chair in the shade of an olive tree, tilt your sombrero over your eyes and enjoy.
Go one, give it a go, you might like it! And it´s a wonderful way of getting your “five a day”…
Although we live in a fairly isolated hamlet, Bread Man stops by every day except Sunday and we also have another one that comes three times a week. No problems getting hold of that staple carbohydrate for us. However, I enjoy making bread, and don´t always fancy the same type every day, so we restrict our deliveries to three times a week and then I make whatever takes our fancy.
This recipe is one that I generally mix up in the bread maker, but cook in the oven. I do this because I prefer the more rustic shaped loaves I get when I finish them off myself, and because I can cook them with a pan of boiling water at the bottom of the oven to give them a great crust.
Ingredients go into the bread maker in this order
350 ml of water
1 tablespoon of olive oil
4 cups of strong bread flour
Half a cup of whole meal flour
1 ½ teaspoons of salt
1 sachet of easy blend yeast
This dough can also be made without a bread maker as I used to use this recipe before I bought one. I made the bread using the all in one method i.e. put all the ingredients into a bowl and mix by hand until they come together, then knead for at least 15 minutes until the dough starts to become silky, leave to rise in a lightly oiled bowl and covered with a floured tea towel. Leave to double in size, knock back, knead again, leave to rise and then a final knock back and shape into your loaf then leave to rise a final time.
Whichever method you use, put your loaf onto a floured surface which you will be able to use to slide the bread into the oven and onto a heated baking sheet. I have some flexible chopping boards which work fantastically for this.
When you have shaped your loaf, cut a few slashes in the top and sprinkle the surface with flour. Heat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius and put your baking tray inside. Heat a kettle or saucepan of water and when you are ready to cook, place a deep tin at the bottom of the oven and fill with hot water. Slide your loaf onto the baking tray and cook for about 45 minutes. Exact timings will depend on your oven, but it should sound hollow when tapped on the bottom.
Remove from the oven and allow to cool – try to resist cutting into it while it´s still hot, or you´ll end up with lots of crumbs and slices of bread with holes in them!
En joy with your favourite toppings – butter, cheese, jam or with a drizzle of olive oil and a sprinkle of salt “al estilo Español”. Or try this http://wp.me/p1hSAl-12 which is My Favourite Spanish Breakfast! (Sorry. am having huge problems inserting links, so it probably doesn´t look pretty, but it links to another recipe)
Many years ago, in most Mediterranean countries, salt cod (or Bacalao as it´s called here) was poor man´s food. Whole cod was salted, then dried in the sun to be stored and used when fresh fish was scarce. Nowadays, it´s become rather a luxury item, in the same way that offal and bizarre cuts of meat have become trendy around the world.
Fortunately for us, Portugal is only about 4 hours´ drive away, so we get to have a few breaks there every so often throughout the year. Also fortunate for us is the fact that the Portuguese consume huge amounts of Bacalao and sell it at greatly reduced prices. The supermarkets there will sell you anything from small flakes of cod to flavour soups and stews, to entire cod which they can chop up into portions with special electric saws. Before it´s rehydrated, the salt cod is tough but bendy, and it would be virtually impossible to cut it up at home.
On our last visit we stocked up, as it can be frozen, and have enjoyed many meals with our “Souvenir of Portugal”. Sadly we´re coming to the end of the supply, but on the plus side, this means we´ll have to plan another little break over there.
When you´re anticipating eating salt cod, you have to plan ahead. De salting it can take anything from 2 to 5 days, depending on the thickness of the fillets you have. Of course, you can also use fresh cod, in which case you can just go straight ahead and cook.
Put your fillets in a container which will allow them to be completely covered in water. If it´s hot, put the container in the fridge, but it´s not necessary if the weather is cooler. Try to change the water at least 3 times a day and test the cod by holding it up to your lips. Then lick your lips! You´ll know when it´s ready when it has lost that strong salty taste, although it will always retain a small trace of it. Just be warned, dried salt cod doesn´t smell too great. Overcome any revulsion you may feel, the finished dish won´t taste anything like it smells right now!
There are many, many ways of preparing salt cod – deep friend in batter, roasted, grilled, poached in sauce. This is a simple recipe which, once the cod has been desalted, is relatively quick and easy to prepare.
For 2 people you´ll need
2 large salt cod fillets, desalted
2 large potatoes roughly chopped and boiled for 5 minutes
A cup of broad beans (use the pods too if they´re tender) chopped and blanched for a minute or two
An onion finely sliced
2 cloves of garlic finely sliced
About 3 tablespoons of olive oil
Black pepper
A lemon
If you´re lucky enough to have a terracotta cooking pot, do use this as it seems to add something to the flavour. If not, don´t worry, a deep frying pan will work just as well.
Put the oil, garlic, onions, potatoes and beans into the frying pan on a very low heat. You will now slowly braise these in the olive oil until all the vegetables are tender. You don´t want to brown them, so keep the heat low and half cover with a lid or some foil. Stir occasionally to get them all covered in your lovely olive oil. Incidentally, this style of cooking potatoes is known in Spain as “a lo pobre” or poor man´s style. Usually they´re done with strips of green peppers though, and not broad beans.
Once the vegetables are ready, lay your cod fillets on top, skin side up. Cook them gently for about 3 or 4 minutes (without moving or prodding them) or until the underside is no longer opaque.
Flip the fillets over, they´ll now only need a minute or two to finish cooking.
Remove from the heat and serve with plenty of lemon to squeeze over. I also like an extra drizzle of “raw” olive oil, but if you´re watching the waistline (as I really should be doing) then leave this out. You probably won´t need to add any salt, but taste it first and decide for yourself. ¡Buen Provecho!
Now, before I get going I have to apologise that I haven´t posted a photo of the finished dish! It´s been a cold, wet rainy day up the mountain after a very stormy night. Big Man, the two dogs and I were tired and grizzly after a night of no sleep and needed comfort food to fill our bellies and soothe our frazzled nerves. I can only think that we were so in need of something calming that we were tucking in and sipping a glass of Rioja before I realised that I hadn´t snapped the finished result. Apologies, it was a delicious bowl of braised chicken, spring vegetables and steaming mashed potatoes.
Because we don´t have a machine to pluck our chickens for us, and as I don´t have the patience to pluck chickens “en masse”, they are skinned after dispatch and usually cut up and frozen. One chicken was kept whole so that I could cook a one pot dish, and today was its day. I cooked it slowly on the hob in a large tagine that I have, but it can equally well be cooked in a heavy based saucepan with a tight fitting lid (I think they may be called Dutch Ovens in the US) either on the hob or in a very slow oven.
It´s a simple dish with only a little preparation, then you go away and forget about it for a few hours whilst enjoying the smells of slowly braising chicken wafting through your home.
Here´s how to do it…
One whole chicken (with or without skin) or chicken pieces for however many people you are cooking for
About 3-4 carrots per person, peeled and cut into large chunks
A cup of broad beans per person (but feel free to use whatever vegetable is seasonal)
Half an onion roughly chopped per person
A tablespoon of chopped parsley and of olive oil per person
Grated lemon rind to taste and the juice of half a lemon per person
Seasoning
About 2 medium potatoes per person, peeled and quartered – keep these in a bowl of water until needed
Extra olive oil
Milk (optional)
Mix the carrots, beans, onion, parsley, lemon zest, juice and olive oil in a bowl. Season to taste.
Crunchy Spring Vegetables
Put half the vegetable mix at the bottom of your cooking dish then place the chicken on top. Use the rest of the vegetables to fill the chicken cavity and tuck and the lemon shells in with the chicken.
Rub a little olive oil, salt and pepper over the chicken, put the lid on and place on a low heat. This needs to cook very slowly for about two hours. Check every so often and if it looks as though it´s drying out, add about half a glass of water. If the lid of your pot fits well, you should find that the chicken starts to cook in its own steam. When the chicken is almost cooked (i.e. it looks cooked on the outside but the juices do not quite run clear when you stab a thigh with a skewer), remove the lemon shells and put the potatoes in on top of the bed of vegetables and around the chicken.
The potatoes will take about another half an hour to cook, by which time the chicken will be cooked.
Remove the potatoes and mash with a little milk or the juice from the chicken and vegetables – it´s your choice!
Serve the chicken with the vegetables and mashed potato. Now you only have one cooking pot to wash up and, if you have them, you can use any leftovers plus the bones to make a delicious stock for another day.
Having spent the day rushing around and generally being a busy bee, I wanted something quick and easy for a light supper. Leftovers from a chargrilled chicken dish made the night before included most of a chicken breast, so I decided to make some fritters and serve them with a big mixed salad.
Here in Andalucía they often make fritters with salt cod (which has been soaked and desalted) and serve them with Molasses (or sugar cane honey as it´s called here) drizzled over. When I was first introduced to this concept, I wasn´t sure it was going to be for me. The idea of sweet and salty mixed together seemed strange, but then I thought about how in the UK we often eat meats with fruit sauces (pork with apple sauce, turkey with cranberry) and realised that it wasn´t such a weird idea. I´m so glad I did give it a go as it´s a fantastic combination and works really well with these fritters.
Beautiful Jar of Miel de Caña
If you just can´t face the thought of Molasses though, a sweet chilli dipping sauce or mayonnaise also tastes great with these little fritters.
Ingredients used (which are approximate) made 14 fritters.
1 x 150g sweetcorn which I blended to make creamed corn (we can´t get it here)
Half a large or one small chicken breast, grilled and then finely chopped
4 heaped tablespoons of self raising (or cake) flour
About half the empty can full of milk
2 tablespoons of finely chopped chives
1 egg
Seasoning
Oil for frying (I used olive oil)
In a bowl add the flour and egg to the sweetcorn and mix well. Gradually add the milk until you get a paste the consistency of a thick porridge. You may not use all the milk, or you may need a little more, it will depend on your flour. Add the chicken and chives and season to taste.
Heat your oil in a deep frying pan and when ready, drop heaped tablespoons of the mixture in, flattening them out slightly with the back of the spoon.
Each side will take about a minute to cook, remove, drain and serve. And if you´re feeling Spanish, you can call them Tortillitas de Pollo, Cebollina y Maiz. Olé!
When I was a child I used to go with my beloved Grandmother Olive to visit my Great Grandmother Minnie. Minnie lived with one of her daughters who ran a children´s home and had her own little cottage in the grounds. There was space for them to grow vegetables and keep chickens and as a child born and brought up in London, I was fascinated by this little piece of country living.
I was allowed to go to the chicken shed and collect eggs and I remember always taking great pride and pleasure in this. The smell, the warm eggs under a broody hen, the clucking – it fascinated me and I always dreamed of owning a few chickens.
When Big Man and I moved to our home, we also ended up with a small olive grove with about 30 trees. We talked about one day getting a few hens so that we could enjoy free range eggs. And then one day, my dream came true. Big Man came home with a hen and five tiny chicks. The chicken empire has grown and grown since then. The chickens have moved from a small lean-to shack at the end of our vegetable patch to what we now call “Chickenopolis” in our olive grove.
Chickenopolis is a complex structure, made entirely of recycled bits and bobs we have either found or been given. It has a rather grand chicken house, given to us by some friends, along with six of their hens when they moved and couldn´t take them with them. Attached to this is a sheltered run for when it´s raining and they don´t want to go outside. Having said that, although I´m very fond of all my chickens, they´re not the brightest creatures in the world and will happily stand out in the pouring rain all day as long as there is something on the ground to peck at. Adjoining this, rather like a terraced house in a Victorian street of London, is where the Fat Boys live.
The Fat Boys, turn away now if you´re squeamish, are all cockerels and a different breed which grow quickly and are bred for eating. Rather than buy 6 week old chickens which have been pumped up with chemicals and hormones, we buy the chicks and give them a happy (and chemical free) life for about 4 months. They grow fat naturally, and then when their time comes, they are dispatched quickly and as pain free as it´s possible to do and enjoyed in delicious meals. Once the freezer is full, the next batch of Fat Boys starts off again.
Our chicken population varies, but we have space for about 20 fat boys at a time as they have to be kept separately from the others. We currently have 10 hens and 2 (very happy) cockerels. We are just about to put a broody hen to sit on some eggs, so hopefully once she settles we´ll have a new clutch of chicks 3 weeks later.
Last Spring´s Chicks
Our hens can roam free around the olives and take themselves off to bed when the sun goes down. They´re quite bright in that respect! The olive grove is dog and fox proof, but every now and then you´ll lose one – it´s sad, but a fact of life. One of our neighbours traded us three of his hens a few months ago. We thought they were mature, but realised this week that they were probably younger than we thought as it looks like they have just started to lay eggs. We know they must be those responsible for the Funky Eggs, as all our hens are over a year old and have been laying for some time now.
When a hen first starts to lay, it sometimes lays a really tiny egg. Our new hens have clearly not read the manual about what shape they should be either, as we are getting the funkiest conical eggs at the moment too.
Never mind, we love our chickies, they make us laugh, and in return for what they give us, we hope they enjoy their lives in our little olive grove.
The end of the orange season and the start of a spring glut of broad beans and mint means that it´s time here for a refreshing, light and easy salad.
Most people here have at least a few citrus trees in the gardens, some have tens or hundreds of them. After three years our lemon tree is now producing more than we can cope with, but we only planted our orange last autumn, so still rely on the good will of friends and neighbours for our supply. Fortunately, we have very obliging friends and neighbours who keep us in oranges.
When I still went out to buy them, in the early years, I was surprised to be asked in the little local shop “if I wanted oranges for eating?”. Well, of course I did, what the heck did they think I was going to do with them? Of course, now that I am a wise old country biddy, I know that oranges are sold for eating (slightly more bitter) and for drinking (i.e. for juicing). The later are softer, juicier (naturally) and incredibly sweet. The difference is noticeable and as we eat a lot of salads made with oranges here, it´s worth looking out for the right ones.
This salad can be varied depending on the time of year. In the autumn, with the next crop of oranges, I substitute the broad beans for pomegranate pips. Either way, the colours and combinations of tastes are stunning. This salad goes particularly well with oily fish like sardines or mackerel or with fatty meat like lamb or goat. As a starter it´s delicious with a plate of salty jamon and another of a salty cured sheep´s or goat´s cheese. A cold glass of iced dry sherry finishes things off perfectly.
For two people you need:
Two or three bitter oranges, skin and pith removed and cut into small chunks
About half a cup of fresh broad beans (raw)
About 10 mint leaves shredded
Olive oil
Salt (flakes or coarse sea salt) and freshly ground pepper
Place the oranges on a plate, pouring over any juice that you have collected when peeling them. Sprinkle over the beans and mint, season and drizzle over the olive oil. Make the salad about half an hour before eating and keep chilled before serving.
It´s an unusual mixture of tastes, but it works for me. Do hope you enjoy it!
Now, I am very much of the opinion that birthdays are to be celebrated. Whether you´re 4, 24, or 94….life is a wonderful celebration and what better than to mark the start of a new year in your life than with a little something special.
Big Man came from a very large family, and once he and his siblings had gone beyond the age of celebrating with a small cake and a cup of hot chocolate all round, birthday celebrations became a thing of the past. Then he met a crazy English/Italian woman who wanted to live in Spain with him, and who loved to mark an occasion with a bottle of something and a cake. The poor dogs were “christened” so many times that they began to get over excited every time we opened a bottle of Cava.
Yesterday we took a day out for ourselves and went to visit a town I had not previously been to. About 100km away from us (albeit by some very twisty mountain roads) lies the beautiful Baroque town of Priego De Cordoba.
The day was hot and humid. This was unexpected as we had dressed for cooler weather. First we had a wander through the little alleys of the old town. For me, geraniums are the typical flowers of the Mediterranean and the people of the Province of Cordoba are rightly very proud of their patios and displays of flowers.
Geranium Heaven
Peaceful Patio
When the heat became too much we retired to the courtyard of a restaurant in the shadow of the old castle. While we tried to make our minds up over what to eat we dithered over ordering a cold beer or a glass of Gazpacho to quench our thirst. Oh well, “just order both” we thought, and what a great idea that was.
Decisions, Decisions...
Cold glasses of wine followed with an amazing starter which was called “Sephardic Salad” on the menu. It consisted of a selection of vegetables slowly braised in olive oil and garlic and served cold with lots of bread and small local twisted breadsticks to dip and dunk.
"Sephardic" Salad
Main course was Rabo de Toro, or oxtail cooked slowly with pink peppercorns and served with sauté potatoes. Delicious. When I can figure out how to do it I´ll add a link to my recipe for this. Sorry, I´ve tried but can´t seem to work it out!
Rabo De Toro with Pink Peppercorns
We were too full for pudding but ordered strong coffees with a separate glass of ice. You add sugar to your hot coffee if you take it, then pour the coffee over the ice and wait a moment for it to chill your coffee. Perfect.
Spanish Iced Coffee
Suitably refreshed we headed into the castle and I overcame my fear of heights to climb to the top of the tower for some beautiful views of the city.
Feeling wobbly...but it was worth it for the viewA quiet spot outside the Castle walls
Then we headed back through the old streets to what used to be the “Royal Butchers and Slaughterhouse”. Sounds grisly, but it was a beautiful, shady patio with a fountain bubbling away in the centre of a columned courtyard.
Just a perfect day...
We stopped a while and just soaked up the atmosphere. Big Man agreed that birthdays are most definitely for celebrating, it was a very special day.
So in 2016 I turned 50. I was in Italy for my 21st, 30th and 40th. To keep this birthday tradition going I always knew I'd be in Italy for my 50! This blog starts with my 5 week adventure in Puglia but my love affair with Italy continues.....
Chica Andaluza 