1,000 Foods To Eat Before You Die: A Food Lover's Life List (66 page)

One of Ferran Adrià’s extraordinary, edible creations.

It’s too late to sit down to one of the much-celebrated dinners created by Chef Ferran Adrià at El Bulli, the Costa Brava restaurant that was declared the most influential in the world. It closed in July 2011, supposedly forever, although it will reportedly reopen as a research foundation.

But if the palate must be denied, the eyes and mind need not be: All of the master chef’s intricately scientific culinary magic is revealed clearly, mouthwateringly, and mind-bogglingly in the documentary
El Bulli: Cooking in Progress.
The film exposes the wizardry of molecular cookery with such realism that one can almost smell and taste the glorious, intellectually wrought outcomes. Essences of herbs and fats and fruits and meats and shellfish are reduced to mere filmy gels and dreamy foams, carefully carved or re-formed into morsels. Colorful edible mosaics adorn Adrià’s plates, looking as though nature had always intended them to take their current form.

Molecular cuisine’s naysayers miss the point: No ultramodern deviation, its techniques are in fact an evolution of classic French methods for concentrating flavors by the use of reduction. The scientific methods and equipment now available to curious-minded chefs are actually being put to quite a traditional purpose.

Feeling frustrated by the enticements
revealed in the film and wanting to try your hand at the techniques? There are books that explain Adrià’s thoughts and methods and even include a recipe or two. Or, depending on your finances and patience, you could visit restaurants that feature similar examples of this futuristic gastronomic genre, such as Alinea in Chicago (see
listing
) and the Bazaar in Los Angeles.

Where:
In Chicago
, Alinea, tel 312-867-0110,
alinearestaurant.com
;
in Washington, DC
, Minibar by José Andrés, tel 202-393-0812,
minibarbyjoseandres.com
;
in Los Angeles
, The Bazaar by José Andrés, tel 310-246-5555,
sbe.com/restaurants/brands/thebazaar
.
Mail order:
For a DVD of the documentary
El Bulli: Cooking in Progress
directed by Gereon Wetzel (2011), barnesandnoble.com.
Further information and recipes:
Modernist Cuisine at Home
by Nathan Myhrvold and Maxime Bilet (2013);
The Family Meal
by Ferran Adrià (2011).

With its glistening amber overtones and luxuriously rich texture, this extraordinary confiture made with Seville’s famous bitter bigarade oranges (the same fruit used to prepare the French classic
canard à l’orange
) is perhaps the most sophisticated of marmalades. It’s especially delicious as prepared by the sisters of the Monasterio de Santa Paula, about a half-hour’s drive from Seville, in Andalusia.

These gentle nuns, who have taken vows of silence, gather many of the oranges they need from their own orchard within the compound, then simmer them into burnished, bittersweet perfection in this gold-brown confection, rendering it more intense than the sweeter, lighter Dundee orange marmalade (see
listing
). It is sold only at the monastery by young acolyte trainees or older, retired sisters released from their vow of silence. Other fine marmalades made at this monastery include fig, chestnut, and more, but the
dulce de cáscara de naranja amarga
is the way to go.

Where:
Monasterio de Santa Paula, Calle Santa Paula 11, Santa Paula, Spain, tel 34/954-540-022,
santapaula.es
.

The ideal antidote to summer’s heat is a cold soup of crushed ripe tomatoes with finely diced cucumber, peppers, and onions, tossed with croutons, olive oil, and vinegar. Cool, biting, and acidic, it is the very definition of refreshment and one of Spain’s top contributions to gastronomy, second only to paella in its familiarity to eaters all over the world.

No newcomer to the global stage, it is even referenced as “gaspacha” in
The Virginia Housewife
by Mary Randolph, the 1824 cookbook thought to be the first published in America. (Though that dish isn’t much like the real thing.) The more authentic gazpacho’s route to America, like that of many now common, once “foreign” foods (including pizza, originally known as “pizza pie”), occurred in the wake of World War II.

The tomato-based version Americans are most familiar with is the definitive Andalusian dish. Now one of summer’s premier appetizers, it used to be served at the end of a meal. Farther back, the dish began its life as a lunch salad for farmworkers, brought to them in the fields by their wives on summer’s hottest days.

In Spain there are a number of variations on the theme, chiefly
gazpacho blanco
, or
ajo blanco
, a specialty of Málaga. The white soup is a blend of garlic, bread, and almonds, garnished with green grapes. All gazpachos, though, seem to have at least three elements in common: bread, oil, and vinegar.

Where:
In Seville, Spain
, for white gazpacho, Bar Ajoblanco, tel 34/954-22-93-20,
barajoblanco.net
.
Further information and recipes:
The Foods & Wines of Spain
by Penelope Casas (1982);
saveur.com
(search gazpacho andaluz);
epicurious.com
(search ajo blanco).
Tip:
Gazpacho is essentially a summer dish, best when made with juicy, vine-ripe tomatoes. It may be prepared in other seasons, with good-quality canned tomatoes that are improvements over mushy fresh specimens. To keep the soup very cold when serving it in summer, freeze some of it in ice cube trays, to be popped out and added to the soup so it will be chilled but not diluted.

A hearty appetizer made of simple ingredients.

Among the many diverting aspects of the sophisticated Madrid restaurant Casa Lucio is the clientele, a set of smartly dressed and self-assured movers and shakers from the world of politics and high society. Gathered in the trim,
handsome setting, these fortunate diners sample such dishes as sizzling baby eels in garlic and oil (see
listing
) and the massive
churrasco
, a well-marbled chateaubriand steak that weighs about a pound and is blood-rare under its crusty charring. The restaurant’s service is of the ultraprofessional sort found at world-renowned establishments. But one attraction not to be ignored, as humble as it sounds, is the stunning appetizer known as
huevos estrellados
: broken eggs.

The dish arrives at the table heaped high on a huge platter, a mountain of golden brown sliced potatoes topped with broken fried eggs. (Straight out of the pan, the eggs are transferred to the potatoes and then encouraged to break, so the yellow yolks slide over the hot potatoes.)

When you know it is about to be followed by a gargantuan steak, watching this hearty appetizer get wolfed down for the first time can be a little shocking. But the dish’s appeal becomes all too easy to understand once you have a taste. Egg yolks become a supple sauce for the olive oil– glossed, well-peppered potatoes, and as a bonus, the cooked whites add a satiny softness, for an earthy, satisfying experience. Cured Spanish ham or chorizo often joins the mix as well.

A similar dish, credited to Don Quixote’s beloved La Mancha, is known as
huevos estrellados mojete.
In this version, eggs and potatoes are slowly cooked together in a heatproof casserole. If it seems a bit heavy as a first course, try it for brunch or a simple supper.

Serves 6

6 large starchy potatoes, such as russets, peeled and thinly sliced

2 teaspoons coarse kosher or sea salt, plus more to taste

⅓ cup olive oil, preferably Spanish

2 cloves garlic, peeled and lightly crushed

½ teaspoon Spanish sweet paprika

½ teaspoon Spanish hot or smoked paprika (see
Note
)

8 extra-large eggs

Freshly ground black pepper

1.
Toss the potato slices with the salt and place them in a heatproof 2-quart casserole, preferably earthenware or cast iron. Add the olive oil, garlic, and paprikas.

2.
Cook the potatoes slowly over low heat, shaking the casserole back and forth once in a while so the potatoes soften evenly and turn a bright golden color, about 30 minutes. If the potatoes tend to stick to the casserole, place a heat diffuser underneath and continue cooking, adding very little more olive oil only if needed.

3.
When the potatoes are tender, break the eggs over them and sprinkle a little salt and a lot of black pepper on top. Cover the casserole and continue cooking the eggs until set, about 5 minutes.

4.
Gently slide the potatoes and eggs onto a heated platter or cut them in portions and slide them onto individual heated plates. If the egg yolks break, well, so they should to be truly
estrellados.

Note:
For a milder result, eliminate the hot or smoked paprika and use a total of 1 teaspoon of sweet paprika.

Where:
In Madrid
, Casa Lucio, tel 34/913-65-32-52,
casalucio.es
.
Further information and additional recipe:
for a variation with chorizo,
tastingtable.com
(search huevos estrellados).

Given that ham is simply a hind leg of pig, cut above its hock, or knee joint, and cured and preserved by salting, drying, and sometimes smoking, the number of its possible variations is impressive. A classic mentioned in the records of the ancient Gauls and Romans, it was brined and smoked even then. In medieval days, hams of many types were made all over Europe, differing according to the breed of pig, what the pigs were fed, and how the hams were cured and stored.

No ham has a more noble heritage than Spain’s; it is perhaps the best of the lot. Based on the Jabugo black-footed pigs, acorn-fed natives of the mountain town of that name, the ham is earthy, meaty, and substantial while still remaining lean. Its distinctive sweet-salty, toothsome quality begins with the pig itself, an Iberian variety known for its black or dark gray trotters (and so dubbed
pata negra
). Curing is done by dry-salting—the hams are hung in the air for one year without any smoking—and the delectable result bears a characteristic unctuousness, with soft yellowish-gray fat surrounding the meat and adding a luxurious note to the ham’s flavor.

Jabugo ham used to be unavailable in the U.S. Fortunately, the import bans were lifted, but the price rremains sky-high.

Where:
In Madrid
, El Museo de Jamón, a museum-delicatessen that offers tastings, tel 34/915-41-20-23,
museodeljamon.es
.
Retail and mail order:
In Manhattan, Queens, and Princeton, NJ
, Despaña,
despanabrandfoods.com
.
Mail order:
La Tienda, tel 800-710-4304,
tienda.com
.
Further information:
jabugo.com
.
See also:
York Ham
;
Yunnan Ham
.

Glistening and alive, fresh from the sea, mollusks and shellfish such as mussels, clams, shrimp, and squid get an aromatic transformation in this Spanish specialty from the earthy, flavorsome duo of garlic and parsley. The mingling of these two ingredients lends character to a basic steaming liquid of white wine and strong seafood stock. The result is gently cooked shellfish in a satiny green sauce with a tantalizing and intense scent.