We begin this journey with a catalogue of aspirations assembled ambitiously and with good spirit: through recollection and remembrance of peoples, places, sounds, and sites, we write a menu of hopes and results that will in syncopation and synergy propel us to – mares, montañas, colinas, cumbres, valles, mesetas, llanos, terrazas, costers, ciudades y puntas […]
We headed out towards Pais Vasco through the stunning Picos full of trout streams, quilt-work gorges and valleys, tiny hamlets and inns along the road and streamside, this is a blissful place. When we could, we pulled off for a sample of local foods and ciders and lo and behold, we hit the jackpot at a small, mom and pop inn and restaurant offering local honeys, ciders and cheeses, La Fonda Del Cares. Served with individual signs made from hazelnuts, these were cheeses and honeys from the cluster of villages in the Picos de la Europa. From the complex, aged ewe’s milk Penamellera, smoked cow and ewe’s milk Gamonue del Valle, Chivita Cabra, soft cow’s milk Afuea’LPitu Atroncau with pimento mixed into it, and the creamy blue cow’s milk Picon we were in heaven. Slather some dark honey from up the mountain on the ‘honey trail’ onto some home-made wheat bread and wash it all down with Sidra, or a young Joven Ribera del Duero. Blissful, simple, pure and unadulterated, these foods are un-pre-portioned, aren’t rolled off the back of a freaking semi-trailer goddamit. Why why why do we need anything else?
Oct 7
This gallery contains 8 photos.
Later, back in Oviedo, we did make it to a cider house and sampled everything we could. These people are serious about their cider, cheese and honey as Peruvians are about ceviche and Pisco Sours. The hotel staff said that the best place to sample these regional specialties in Oviedo would be “Calle Gascona”, which […]
Buenos vinos se hacen en el campo, no en la bodega
Travelling along the Northern coast of Spain, or the Costa Verde, we are treated to dramatic landscapes of plunging valleys, soaring peaks and secluded coves and small bays with crashing waves. The cold Atlantic breezes and pounding surf make me think of Maine, or even Cape Cod, sometimes Big Sur. I keep thinking more and more of octopus, the prized Percebes, or gooseneck barnacles so treasured for by Spanish because of the perilous nature of their harvest by wet-suited daredevils who leap from rocky perch to rocky perch with waves crashing them into the stone, or worse at times. The fantastic anchovies from this area we serve at MAS, or the Bonita belly or Ventresca with which we make our ensalada atun. Right now, eyes on the road, GPS loaded up, we have to make Oviedo by dusk to view the Calatrava designed Hotele Ayre in its full white, Superman’s Citadel-like illuminated glory and take a freaking shower!
Despite the industrious modernity of Oviedo with its row-upon-row of apartment blocks, urban core, nightlife, we are here to eat at the table of the mountain king! Nestled up against the Picos de la Europa mountains, Oviedo is a good jumping off point from which to enjoy the cider houses, and rich, blue-veined cow’s milk cheeses like Valdeon, Picon, Cabrales, or the dark, burn-the-back-of-your-throat molasses-like chesnut and wild bee honeys, and yes, more different kinds of jamon, chorizos, and cured meats. They also have the Chuleton, or buey, a ribsteak from an older cow, dark, minerally, meaty, meat-a-licious meat on the biggest rib bone charred heavy on the outside warm and purple-y-rare on the inside. Laid out sliced on a sizzling stone platter with flaky white sea salt on top. More on this beauty later.
Our goals in Asturias were to see the villages and meet the makers of the blue-veined cheeses, maybe some of the goat and sheep’s milk producers too, and of course, sample Asturian cider as a local, in a cider house splashing and laughing along with everyone else as platter after platter of incredible foods are delivered to revelers. We almost got our wishes. We cruised down to a seaside village, Cudillero, for an authentic taste of Asturian seaside cuisine and were greatly pleased by the results at Cafe Los Arcos. This quaint, storybook setting is populated by few people dedicated to entertaining the vacationers and droves of sightseers looking for a cliffside view of village life. It was all that and the food was surprisingly good, fresh and plentiful. We shared a patio with a scroungy cat too pooped to pester us, too jaded by human contact to care about our presence, or perhaps wisely warily suspicioius of such a large predator such as Tomas he still kept one eye open as sentinel. By now I we’ve eaten either octopus or calamares with every meal, here we added more of both, baby clams in a seafood broth w giant Habas beans, and then went on to angler fish, or Rape or Pixin Brasa as it is known here. Roasted in a wood-fired oven with loads of garlic there’s nothing like whole fish on the bone. We love the seafood preparations over charcoals, sometimes made from olive pits, it lends a nice smokiness to these rich Atlantic species so full of oil and brine like Merluza or hake, Sea Bream, or the Rape. Percebes were 100 Euro/k so we passed on those but I will find them again! All was washed down with more Asturian apple cider poured prestidigiously by our server from 90degrees above his head into a glass held below the waist, splashing it against the sides of the glass to open or refresh the yeasty aromas and mellow the tart acidity.
Oct 5
Planning a trip like this requires a certain degree of flexibility and improvisation because of distances, availability of the producers, and harvest time pressures. Sadly we could not visit our friends in Bierzo at Luna Beberide or at Bodega Guimaro in the Ribiera Sacra DO to taste their scrumptious red that is a new addition […]
mas in spain 