1,000 Foods To Eat Before You Die: A Food Lover's Life List (68 page)

One of the most unctuously rich and flavorful of paellas is made with black squid ink, decked out with the tiniest flecks of the squid itself—called
arròs negre
, it’s a charcoal-gray enticement that suggests caviar and fresh ocean breezes.

Paella’s composition sparks a competitive streak among its cooks, and the etiquette surrounding its service follows suit. Some insist it is best as a midday meal, while others argue that it must be eaten for supper. Some cooks finish it in the oven after it’s simmered over an open flame, while others consider that an act of blasphemy. No one disagrees that the key to the dish is the Valencia-grown rice, most especially the variety known as
bomba especial
, and that the smell of wood smoke is essential.

Where:
In Valencia
, Restaurante La Pepica, tel 34/963-71-03-66,
lapepica.com
;
in Beverly Hills
, La Paella Restaurant, tel 323-951-0745,
usalapaella.com
;
in Miami
, Casa Juancho, tel 305-642-2452,
casajuancho.com
;
in Washington, DC
, Taberna del Alabardero, tel 202-429-2200,
alabardero.com
.
Mail order:
For paella pans, amazon.com (search for stainless steel or carbon steel paella pans by Garcima or Paderno).
Further information and recipes:
La Paella: Deliciously Authentic Rice Dishes from Spain’s Mediterranean Coast
by Jeff Koehler (2006);
Made in Spain
by José Andrés (2008);
cookstr.com
(search spring paella).
Special events:
International Paella Competition, Sueca, Spain, September,
foodsfromspain.com
(click Shop, Travel & Dine, then Festivals); Pinot and Paella, Temple, CA, June,
pinotandpaella.com
; Paella Lovers United Annual Get-Together, Austin, TX, November,
paellaloversunited.com/wordpress
; the noted Spanish chef José Andrés, who operates three Jaleo restaurants in Washington, DC, hosts paella festivals sporadically,
jaleo.com
.

The peppers are dried and ground.

Say paprika and everyone thinks of Hungary, but in fact Spain currently holds the aesthetic high ground with its version of the beautiful brick-red spice known there as
pimentón.
That glowing seasoning begins as fiery Spanish
pimientos
, slowly smoke-dried over wood before being pulverized. The smoking burnishes the chile heat of the pepper to play up its fruity overtones, and the result is a pungent flavor and a fiery sting. Small wonder that high-profile chefs of all stripes have embraced the seasoning in their various cuisines, especially for use in barbecue glazes and sauces.

One of the dishes that profits most from this smoky Spanish paprika is
pollo al pimentón
—a small chicken cut into eight parts and lightly fried in olive oil until it attains a bright, golden brown patina. Onions, garlic, and diced sweet green peppers are added and sautéed until soft, along with a little flour, some pimentón, and, for good fiery measure, a hit of cayenne pepper. Some water or stock and crushed tomatoes are stirred in, and the whole is covered and baked. Upon serving, the chicken is tossed with dollops of sour cream, gently turned through the steaming sauce to create a pink-white moiré pattern as pretty as it is delicious. It’s not a far cry from Hungarian chicken
paprikash
—and given that Spain was once a part of the Austro-Hungarian empire, this should come as no surprise.

Retail and mail order:
In Manhattan, Queens, and Princeton, NJ
, Despaña,
despanabrandfoods.com
.
Mail order:
amazon.com (search santo domingo pimenton de la vera).
Further information and recipes:
The Gastronomy of Spain and Portugal
by Maite Manjón (1990);
The Basque Kitchen
by Gerald Hirigoyen (1999);
recetasamericanas.com
(search receta pollo al pimento—you may need to translate the page.)

A “poor-folks’ dish” that pleases all kinds.

If garlic soup sounds like slim fare, consider the belt of protein provided by the sunny poached egg adrift in this heady, translucent bronze soup. Admittedly light, it is one of the simplest dishes imaginable—and indeed, it is Spain’s
quintessential “poverty dish.”

Credited primarily to the Castilla y León region, the potent potable has comforted generations in a country with a long-held custom of hearty peasant soups meant to warm and temporarily fill body and soul. Clearly devised for economic reasons, the soup consists of nothing more than water, dried-out leftover bread, garlic, olive oil, and egg.

Traditionally nourishing as a mid-morning restorative after three or four hours of farm work, the garlic-water-and-egg combination is now ubiquitous throughout the Mediterranean. In Portugal’s Alentejo province, cilantro paste is added to the brew. For a more luxurious touch, heavy cream and a shot of dry sherry are added at Casa Irene, a hotel-cum-restaurant on the banks of the Garona river in the Pyrenees.

Utterly homey and comforting in any setting, the soup is said to be a cure-all for all kinds of common ailments—not least because it makes you break a sweat.

Serves 4

½ cup good Spanish olive oil

5 cloves garlic, peeled and thinly sliced

5 thin slices white bread, crusts removed and bread cubed

2 teaspoons sweet Spanish paprika

Salt

4 extra-large eggs

1.
Heat the oil in a deep, wide, heavy saucepan or soup pot over moderate heat until it is shimmering. Add the garlic and cook until it is a light golden brown, 3 or 4 minutes. Do not let the garlic burn.

2.
Stir in the bread cubes and paprika and cook until the paprika loses its raw smell and the bread begins to toast, about 3 minutes.

3.
Add at least 1 quart of water to the saucepan; the water should cover the bread cubes. Add a couple of pinches of salt. Cover the pan and let the soup simmer gently until the bread softens, about 7 minutes. Taste for seasoning, adding more salt as necessary. Increase the heat to high and let the soup come to a rolling boil.

4.
Break an egg into each of 4 well-heated soup bowls and ladle the boiling soup into each bowl. The eggs will cook when they are broken with a spoon at the table, but only if the broth is boiling hot.

Notes:
Individual heatproof casseroles are preferable to bowls, as they can be filled with soup and heated, and the egg broken into each as it is removed from the heat.

Water is the traditional liquid for this poor man’s dish, but using a light beef broth instead wouldn’t hurt a bit, both for flavor and sustenance.

Where:
In Artiés, Spain
, Casa Irene, tel 34/973-64-43-64,
hotelcasairene.com
;
in Madrid
, La Bola Taberna, tel 34/915-47-69-30,
labola.es
;
in Newark, NJ
, Spain Restaurant, tel 973-344-0994,
spainrestaurant.com
;
in Cleveland, OH
, Mallorca, tel 216-687-9494,
clevelandmallorca.com
.
Further information and recipes:
The Foods & Wines of Spain
by Penelope Casas (1982);
Cooking in Spain
by Janet Mendel Searl (1987);
foodnetwork.com
(search sopa de ajo garlic soup).

What does squid have that its fellow mollusk, the octopus, lacks? The midnight-dark, silken ink that graces rice and pasta dishes wherever squid are eaten, but most temptingly in Spain and Italy. Best and most delicate when drawn from the small calamari—slightly larger squid produce a stronger, saltier ink—the liquid need only be cooked slightly to become a velvety, seductive sauce that strongly suggests an essence of caviar.

Enticingly earthy, excitingly saline, quintessentially rich, and a bit dangerously lurid, the ink may be simmered with the whole small squid, or prepared on its own as the base for a crystal gray paella in which bits of squid tentacle are the only solids other than the rice. In Spain, squid might be stuffed with minced ham, onions, garlic, and bread crumbs and bathed with an ink sauce enlivened with onion, brandy, and a touch of hot chiles. In Italy, squid ink makes a wonderful sauce for slim pasta and also blackens the broth for the risotto dubbed
nero.

In some markets, especially those catering to chefs, you can purchase squid ink that has been extracted from the calamari for you—easy to acquire, but highly perishable. Unless frozen, the ink should be cooked within a day or two of extraction. Pre-inked commercial products such as pasta are easier to handle, but less exciting to taste.

Anything this thick and dark seems like a great candidate for nutritional benefits, but there are arguments on that score. Some cite the minerals and protein, others see only calories and high cholesterol. Fortunately, squid ink is eaten in small enough amounts to render the discussion moot.

Where:
In Venice
, Corte Sconta, tel 39/041-522-70-24,
cortescontavenezia.it
;
in New York
, Osteria Morini, tel 212-965-8777,
osteriamorini.com
.
Mail order:
La Tienda, tel 800-710-4304,
tienda.com
(search squid ink nortindal; tinta de calamar).
Further information and recipes:
The Basque Kitchen
by Gerald Hirigoyen (1999);
The Foods & Wines of Spain
by Penelope Casas (1982);
saveur.com
(search rice with squid ink).

An appetizing display of tapas in Madrid, Spain.

Boquerones
(fresh whitebait fish served in vinegar).
Tortillas de camarones
(tiny batter-fried shrimp).
Papas aliña
(“dressed” potatoes, or potatoes fried in olive oil with vinegar, onions, tuna, and parsley).
Patatas bravas
(chunks of fried potatoes coated in a spicy sauce made from tomatoes and peppers).
Tortilla española
(wedges of potato omelet, see
listing
.) Small slices of the rosy, nutty Jabugo ham from free-range, acorn-fed
Iberian pigs.
Puntillitas
(tiny squid cooked in olive oil with garlic, parsley, and lots of salt).
Montados de lomo
(small pieces of bread with a slice of meat on top, such as marinated loin of pork fillets).
Chorizo a la plancha
(slices of grilled spicy pork sausage). Fresh anchovies. Various locally cured olives and native cheeses.

Sound like a pre-dinner snack?

Welcome to the world of tapas, a term that describes an array of small dishes offered in progression. Authentic tapas—bar food served in small portions—is a culture unto itself. In Spain, tapas bars (
tapeos
) reflect a local approach to life in which at-home entertaining is relatively uncommon. After the day’s work, people show up at the
tapeo
not just to eat and drink but also to relax, meet friends, chat with the owners, and get ready for the post–10 p.m. dinner hour. In regions such as the Basque country of northern Spain, the tapeo tends to be one stop of many, a bar-hopping experience in which one typically orders a few tapas at each juncture. By contrast, Andalusians linger in one place, sitting at tables and making meals of their tapas.