Restaurant suggestions • Culinary dictionary • Eating culture & Tapas • Ingredients • Specialties • Drinks • Mediteranean recipes • Culinary festivals Axarquia

Specialties

Because Spain is a large country with a lot of mountains each region has developed a different cuisine trough time. A lot of people only think about grilled sardines and paella when they think about Spanish eating culture. These light summer dishes you find along the coast, but it will surprise a lot of people that inland they eat real heavy farmers food like spicy sausages, all kinds of beans, bacon, meat, meal soup, potatoes etc. They also eat a lot of game like duck, rabbit and all kinds of birds. Traditionally these meals were made with animal fat instead of oil. Fresh fish simply couldn’t be transported inland in time and farmers eat what grew on their land.

The Spanish don’t really use a lot of herbs (besides garlic and lemon), but if you go to better restaurants you could find Mediterranean herbs like thyme, basil, paprika, oregano, mint and parsley. Besides that they also use laurite (stews), saffron (paella), cumin and coriander (seeds).

Tapas

Tapas could be any tiny snack like a piece of chorizo, manchego (sheep) cheese, olives, Serrano ham, potato salad, meatballs (albondigas), tortilla etc. They also use a lot of fish or shell fish like shrimps (gambas), squid, mostly deep-fried. Also tasty: fried aubergine with syrup. In a tapas bar you can often choose from a glass vitrine or you pick some fresh made tapas from the menu.
Tapas comes from the word ‘tapar’ which means ‘cover’. The Spanish used to cover the drinks with a saucer against the flies, and then just put a small tapas on it. In Northern Spain they put their tapas on a little wooden stick and call it ‘pincho’ (pinchar means sticking).

Gazpacho

This ice cold summer soup is made of tomatoes, cucumber and garlic. It’s often served with some sweet pepper, cucumber and croutons. In Cordoba they have a thicker version made with old bread which is called ‘salmorejo’.

Paella

Paella is a yellow rice dish with al kinds of sea food and sometimes even some chicken. The colour comes from the spice saffron. This popular traditional dish is cooked in large pans. You can see this on Nerja’s Burriana Beach around 14:00 every day where they have 2 meter pans over an open fire. If you see paella on a sign outside a restaurant in 5 different varieties, you can be sure that it’s not freshly made.

Crema Catalana

This is the Spanish version of crème brûlee, but it often has a softer caramel top. The base is sweet vanilla pudding with cream. In a lot of restaurants they don’t sell home-made desserts anymore. The crema catalana version of the factory is usually just ice cream with caramel.

Zarzuela

This is a mixed fish dish with tomato sauce that can be made in all kinds of ways. Usually you only find this dish in better or typically Spanish restaurants.

Tortilla

A Spanish tortilla is traditionally made of potato, egg, olive oil and salt, but they can add onion, sweet pepper, Serrano ham, chorizo etc.

Dorae al sal

This delicious traditional meal is dorade (sea bars) from the oven in a crust of sea salt, which you break before eating. Because it takes a long time to make, you’ll only find this rare meal in a very few restaurants (in Nerja in Restaurant Paraiso).

Aioli

Aioli basically is garlic mayonnaise, sometimes with some parsley or dill added. In summer it’s sometimes made just with milk to avoid salmonella and it’s even forbidden for restaurants to make it themselves with raw eggs. It’s eaten for example with bread or tortilla

Ajoblanco

White garlic soup (Fiesta de Ajoblanco in Almáchar takes place in the beginning of September).