An onion less ordinary

I’ve made a base camp for myself in El Saler, the gastronomic heart of Valencia, to start work on You Had Me At Jamon the book. My desk overlooks rice fields which seems an apt inspiration. The farmers have flooded the fields with water, so now the sunsets are doubled and thousands of birds swoop around to feed. On my first Sunday I was invited to join the Dasi Dasis on a family outing to eat Calçots. They know I can’t resist anything to do with food, I told them they should call me the seagull.

Over twenty of us piled into cars and drove north to Castellon. Calçots are most definitely a Catalan thing, but the trend has caught on and they’ve started cultivating them further south. After receiving my invitation I was watching a programme about farming. They showed a village in Tarragona, where locals and tourists were celebrating the arrival of Calçots, long white onions which are cooked over a wood fire and then eaten with a special romesco sauce. I love nothing better than a Spanish food festival. They are masters at celebrating locally grown produce and getting everyone eating and drinking together. These calçotades (calçot eating fiestas) are all go at the moment as we enter the season.

Unlike the television broadcast, we arrived at a go-kart track. They were offering a carrera (race) and calçot double combo. Whilst budding Alonsos whipped round the track, I kicked back with an ice cold beer, chomping on olives and warming up my appetite. Known specifically as Calçot de Valls, they hail from Valls in Tarragona. They are officially protected by a denominacion de origen, which Spain uses to identify their finest produce and acknowledge exactly where it comes from (like pimentos de padron or manchego). Though the ones we were about to eat had been grown locally and not in Valls, we were no less excited as we entered a massive barn with long tables set out before us. Each place is set with a bright orange bib and plastic gloves. We don are equipment feeling a little bit like doctors preparing for surgery. Then waitresses appear and set down large clay roof tiles filled with the charred calçots.

The calçots, like all good things in Spain, are cooked over a wood fire. When the exterior is charred and black they are bundled into groups and wrapped in newspaper for around half an hour to finish cooking. When they arrive they look almost like leeks. I am shown by my friends how to hold the calçot by its tail, peel a little of the outer leaves and then pinch the end to pull the blackened exterior away. 

You are left with a delicate, tender calçot ready to dip into a special romesco salsa. The white part of the calçot is long and fine and just right for eating. To do this you have to dangle it into your mouth, careful not to slap sauce all over your face. It is juicy and sweet with a hint of charcoal. Although a tiny bit stringy you can use your teeth pull away the young tender white flesh of the onion. The sauce is lovely, smooth and sweet. It is made with an interesting list of ingredients, tomatoes, garlic, almonds, hazelnuts, bread, dried nora pepper, rosemary, olive oil, jerez vinegar, salt and pepper. 

The slight nuttiness of the salsa works well with the freshness of the calçot and overall it is a delight to eat. My teenage friends who spent the car journey perplexed as to why they were driving all that way to eat onions, admitted they were rather nice.  So much so, that I munched my way through at least ten.

Considering I thought alliums were comprised of mostly water, I felt surprisingly stuffed. It seems nobody had remembered to mention to me that the second course would be a generous bbq of meat and embutido (cured sausages). The meat was cooked over the same fire that the calçots had been, and is the traditional way to follow them at the calçotades, along with a liberal dousing of cava. Plates heaped high with rabbit, chicken, beef, chorizo, longaniza (sausage) and morcilla (black sausage) were passed around. I was crazy to think this would have been a one course event. Luckily I live by the principle 'if you change the flavour I can keep eating', so I tucked in.

The wine flowed, children ran around and eventually we couldn’t eat anymore. There was one more race to be had, so I sat back in the last of the afternoon sun and nursed a strong coffee. These eating expeditions always take it out of me, but there is nothing better than being surrounded by good company and amazing food (especially when you get to wear a bib and gloves).