There was one thing I had to do before leaving Spain this
summer. Return to El Saler. It was here I entered the Spanish family kitchen,
sat down at the large table, and really learnt how to eat. Like a first love,
it has a special place in my heart, and for good reason.
I returned to find the whole village chatting under the
shade of trees, trestle tables lined with food and cerveza chilling in buckets of ice. The Dasi Dasi sisters
had organised a special aperitivo event, where for one euro fifty, you got a
drink and a racion of food. This is warm up eating, an hour of
eating and drinking before you actually eat lunch. Exactly why I love Spain.
The local restaurants offered their best dishes for sampling. For a village
that is made up of a few streets, it has a long list of regional specialities.
My friend Maria Jesus handed me a tray and herded me to Bar Leo, where I waited
patiently but happily for fish to be fried.
Boquerones are a
popular tapas dish in Spain. They are fresh anchovies, white and delicate with
a hint of the sea, and nothing, I repeat, nothing like the salty suckers you
get on pizzas. In Bar Leo they roll them directly in flour, using a colander to
shake off any excess. Then they are deep fried in hot clean olive oil. The
result is spectacular. The feather light coating gives a little crunch to the
succulent tasty fish. You can eat them whole, like a seal would a fish, or
fillet them with your teeth. Carrying the heaped tray of them back to the
garden, without eating the lot, was harder than you’ll ever know.
With my cold cerveza,
and a handful of tickets, I worked my way through the array of dishes. First
up, Clotxinas (Mediterranean
mussels). These beauties are hauled in from the Mediterranean sea. Much smaller
than their Galician cousins, they are a joy to eat and bursting with flavour.
They are always cooked al vapor, which means without any water. Simply clean
and put in a deep saucepan over heat. Add a few garlic cloves and chunks of lemon, followed by a liberal dousing
of white pepper. Cook with a lid on until all the shells are open. You
will find a miraculously fragrant broth appears, spiked with pepper, it's exquisite. My four year old friend Ferran adores them. He offered me the final one as if it were the last chocolate in the box, his face aware of the
sacrifice he was making. On the other table, I spied his younger cousin Olga
wolfing down caracoles (snails),
and taking the time to make sure she had got all of the caldo (broth) out of each one. It’s a real heart warmer to
see kids enjoying the dishes, which are so much a part of their culture.
Looking at the scenery here, it is easy to see the
connection between the surroundings and what is on your plate. To the left is
the sea, bringing the clotxinas, calamari, pescado, marisco (mussels, squid,
fish, seafood). Turn to the right, and the albufera (fresh water lake) delivers the rice for the paella and eels for the all I pebre. The
countryside that stretches off into mountains, is hunting ground for caracoles,
cornejo y pollo (snails, rabbit and
chicken). It also makes a bed for the hundreds of fruit trees and rows of
vegetables that grow in abundance nearby.
El Saler is a gastronomic dream masked behind the guise of
another seaside village. It might be modest, but it is rich in food culture. As
the neighbours ate and laughed together, it was clear, that the way to the
heart of the community, is through its stomach.
Fork notes:
- Top 5 El Saler Dishes: Paella Valenciana (paella with chicken, rabbit, beans and snails). All-I-Pebre (eel stew with garlic and chilli). Clotxinas (mediterranean mussels, only in summer). Bogavante (brothy rice dish with lobster). Calamari y cebolla (sweet squid and onion soup).
- Don’t miss the fun of the apertivo. Have a quinto, which is a tiny bottle of beer, the perfect accompaniment for a little something something.
- Lunch should take you a long time, enjoy every moment of it.
- If you are in El Saler don’t miss Casa Carmina for arroz (rice dishes) or Bar Leo for pescado frito o a la plancha (fish both fried or grilled) .
- If all that eating takes it out of you. Opt for a café carajillo, an espresso with a shot of brandy. That ought to cut right through it.
- Failing that, take a siesta my friend.
