Tapas are the best way to eat!

This month of July, I’m kicking off the first post on Spanish Tapas Month! Tapas are small amounts of various dishes that are put on the table to share. They are perfect for the hot weather, and for all the barbeques and buffets that you may be heading for this Summer.  We were down in the South-West of Spain in the region of Andalucia in April and got to taste a whole screed of different tapas.  I wanted to try to recreate some of them at home and to share them with you, plus tell you stories of some of our experiences in Spain (which before I even start, I need to say that it’s a place you HAVE to go to if you can!).  The first tapa I would like to introduce to you is small battered and fried fish that you eat whole. My husband and youngest son adore these! They’re really easy to make at home, especially if you have a deep-fryer. I don’t actually have one, but I found that making the fried fish in a wok with oil in it worked really well too.

Which fish to use

You can use any small fish that you can eat whole to make these fried fish. In my opinion, the smaller they are the better. The fish I used are called in pretres in french, which is literally translated into priests in English.  As they clearly aren’t really priests at all, I imagine that they must have another name in English.  If anyone knows it, I’d love to find out what it is! You can also use small sardines or anchovies if you can’t find any priests swimming around where you live that are small enough to fry.

How to order food in Andalusia

The first town we visited in Andalusia was the dazzling white Granada, presided over by the Alhambra palace. It was only April, but the temperature was already over 30 degrees C, so while wandering around the winding streets of Granada, we had to combat the heat by taking lots of “rest-stops” to drink a cold beer or two. If you’re in Spain and you want a beer, just ask for “una caña (pronounced can-nya) and you’ll get a refreshing glass of beer every time. 🙂  Now, the fabulous thing about Andalusia is that, in many places, whenever you order a drink, a plate of free food comes with it.  It doesn’t get better than that!  The free tapas are not just chips and nuts, but are often surprisingly substantial, like the fried fish featured in this post.  We did get a little confused though, as in some places, you pay for the tapas; some places give them out for free. At some bars, we ordered tapas (that we paid for) and then ALSO got free ones every time we got new drinks. Even if you pay for the tapas, they’re generally incredibly cheap for big plates of food.  Forget needing to go to a restaurant for dinner: just go to any tapas bar!

Alhambra is wasted on the youth

Anyway, the Alhambra was very beautiful and the intricate carvings and colours in the rooms were breath-taking.  The palace was only slightly marred by four hot and tired children who kept on complaining how boring it was…oh, those were ours and the kids of our friends, so we unfortunately couldn’t roll our eyes and tut-tut in our friends’ general direction while looking smugly at our own children, as none of the kids were studying the wall-carvings and commenting on the history behind the building as they should have been.  They made it up to us later at dinnertime when they disappeared off into an orange tree-ringed square we were tapa-ing at (I think I should make a new verb!) and left us to drink cañas and eat like pigs while they played football with some locals. 🙂

For other delicious tapas, check out the recipes for salmorejo, roasted green peppers

and bean and capsicum salad ! Happy tapa-ing!

By Lisa Watson

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Tiny battered fish

A delicious tapa from Spain that you can recreate at home: small battered and fried fish that you eat whole

Course Appetizer, Snack

Cuisine Spanish

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time 5 minutes minutes

Total Time 10 minutes minutes

Servings 4 portions

Ingredients

• 500 g small fresh fish 17.6 oz
• 150 g Flour 5.3 oz
• 50 g Cornflour (Cornstarch) 1.8 oz
• 1 Egg
• 1 tsp Salt
• 250 ml (approx) Water approx 1 cup
• 3 - 4 Ice cubes
• For deep frying Light oil e.g. vegetable/sunflower

Instructions

• Sift all the dry ingredients together.
• Add the egg, and mix.
• Slowly add the water, while stirring constantly, until you have a reasonably runny mixture.
• Add the 3 or 4 ice-cubes and stir.
• Wash the fish and pat them dry with paper towels.
• Pour the oil into a wok or a high-sided pot (if you don't have a deep-fryer) and heat it until it reaches around 180ºC (350°F) .
• Dip the fish in the batter and fry them a few at a time. Add them quickly, but one by one, otherwise they'll all stick together in a big battery mass!
• Drain them on some paper-towels, sprinkle with salt, if needed. Eat immediately!

The Big Debate About Pavlova

So, already with the title I wrote “Pavlova: the Giant Meringue from New Zealand”, I’ve made any Australians reading this fume and yell at their computer screens, “But it comes from AUSTRALIA , not New Zealand!!!”.  Welcome to the secret Cold War between New Zealand and Australia!  Each side insists that pavlova, anzac biscuits and lamingtons originated where they live.  Things can get quite heated. People stop being invited to barbeques.  It’s serious stuff.

When To Serve Pavlova

Pavlova is served at every twenty-first birthday you go to.  It used to be a big deal to turn 21 in my parent’s time, as that’s when you could drink alcohol and vote. Now the age for both has dropped to 18, but people still celebrate turning 21 with groaning tables of food and large parties (often with lots of alcohol, if I can hazily remember my University years!). Pavlova pretty much always puts on a star appearance as the dessert.  Of course, it’s also served up on other special occasions too.  I’m not sure why only at festive times; I think maybe because of the lashings of cream on top of it.  It actually only has three egg whites in it, so it’s not terribly decadent.

Is Pavlova Really Difficult To Make?

There’s a myth that always circulates about making pavlova: that it’s very difficult to make. Apparently, it is said that you either have the pavlova gene or you don’t.  There are all sorts of hints floating around to make it work, like using a copper bowl, adding the sugar in many different ways, adding stabilisers, chanting in Incan and forming magical symbols in the air while it is mixing…..the list is endless.  I’ve found that if you use a standing mixture and have an oven that keeps its temperature well, there is no need to fear.  In the end, if the pavlova falls and cracks a little, it gets covered with whipped cream and fruit in the end, so it doesn’t matter, right?!

Pavlova should be crunchy on the outside, and melt-in-your-mouth soft on the inside when it is cooked properly.  That’s something you can’t tell until you actually cut into it, so if you want to make this for a special event, I suggest you try it out first at least once before you do it.  That means that you’ll have to eat it, but we all have to make sacrifices sometimes.

How To Decorate Your Pavlova

To decorate it after you’ve piled the whipped cream on top of it, you add whatever fruit you like.  It’s particularly good with red berries when they’re in season.  For the pavlova I made for this post, I put sliced pears that I’d poached in water and sugar (so they don’t go brown) and a few frozen raspberries on top.  Many people in New Zealand use mandarin slices and kiwifruit if they make it in the Winter.  In the end, you can put whatever you like on the top, after all any fruit or chocolate goes great with meringue and cream!

Travel Photo of the Week

I’ve chosen a photo from New Zealand, naturally, as that”s what I’ve been writing about.  This is Mt Eden, an extinct volcano in the middle of Auckland, the largest city in NZ.  It is built on many extinct volcanoes (well, let’s hope they are!).  They was a fantastic children’s book written years ago in NZ called “Under The Mountain”, where the portal to this terrifying world was through the base of  Mt Eden’s crater.  I must read that to my kids to scare them silly!

By Lisa Watson

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Pavlova

The Giant Meringue from New Zealand

Course Dessert

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 10 minutes minutes

Cook Time 45 minutes minutes

Total Time 50 minutes minutes

Servings 1 pavlova

Ingredients

• 3 Egg whites
• 200 g Castor sugar 1 cup
• 1 tsp White vinegar
• 3 Tbsp Water
• 1 tsp Vanilla extract
• 4 tsp Cornflour cornstarch
• 400 ml Whipping cream 1 1/2 cups
• Fruit your choice for decoration

Instructions

• Heat the oven to  150ºC (300ºF).
• Using a standing-mixer, beat the egg whites until they turn white and start to get fluffy.
• Keep beating and add the sugar a little bit at a time.
• Add the vanilla extract, vinegar, cornflour and water while still beating.
• Continue to beat the mixture until it is thick and glossy (see the photo in the post for the ideal thickness).
• Trace a circle on a piece of baking-paper, using a dinner plate as a guide.  Turn the paper upside-down (so you don't get lead in your pavlova!) and place it on a cookie tray.
• Scrape out the mixture and shape it into a circular, flat mound.  If it sticks to your utensils, dip them in water and then cotinue.  Smooth the egg whites until you have the shape you want.
• Bake it in the oven for 40 - 45 minutes, then turn the oven off, and let the pavlova cool in the oven.
• When it is cool in can be kept for two or three days in a dry place.  Just before serving, whip the cream until thick, and decorate it with your choice of fruit.