Tapas: The Topic

[Meow-Mix]

Whats your favorite tapas?

[Stone]

Can I ask a question about tapas, the way they originated in Spain? My understanding was that they originated as "bar food." Restaurants would serve small plates of food to patrons drinking wine at a bar, and they would rest their plates on their glasses of wine.

In America, of course, tapas restaurants have evolved to serve full meals of what I consider to be little more than appetizers. At entree prices. Not that they don't taste great, but I just don't understand the allure of this style of dining. I "get" family style restaurant dining. But spending pretty high prices to get a bite of this and a smidgen of that . . . I don't get.

[tighe]

Can I ask a question about tapas, the way they originated in Spain?  My understanding was that they originated as "bar food."  Restaurants would serve small plates of food to patrons drinking wine at a bar, and they would rest their plates on their glasses of wine.

It may be a myth, but the most entertaining story I read about the genesis of tapas in Spain was that they were initially pieces of meat, sausage or whatever, put on the bar to keep the flies away from patrons' drinks and not intended to be eaten. At some point, someone started eating these pieces of bug bait and the tapas tradition was born.

I agree that 'tapas' has become a generic term for small servings of food here in the US. I really enjoy eating this way, but I would prefer that the term 'tapas' be reserved for items that might actually have Iberian origins.

[vserna]

A decently authentic bit of information is to be found here:

http://www.arrakis.es/~jols/tapas/indexin.html

[Bux]

The more tapas I've had and the more I've had tapas in different regions of Spain, the less able I am to give a clear description other than snacks or things to eat with drinks. They may well be traditional foods, or they may be an open sandwich of brie and smoked salmon. They may be an elegant little plate with squiggles of sauce looking like a cross between nouvelle cuisine and Japanese kai-seki food or they may be some homely scoop of chickpeas and stewed spinach or a mass of sangre. The may be cold or they may be hot. If the latter they may be freshly made, or nuked in the microwave. If there's one universally available tapa, it must be the tortilla, which resembles an Italian fritatta and not a Mexican tortilla. If a dish is offered on a menu in more than one size, the tapa will be the smallest portion. Frequntly one has the option of ordering a portion, a half portion, or a tapa.

[fresco]

In America, of course, tapas restaurants have evolved to serve full meals of what I consider to be little more than appetizers.  At entree prices.  Not that they don't taste great, but I just don't understand the allure of this style of dining.  I "get" family style restaurant dining.  But spending pretty high prices to get a bite of this and a smidgen of that . . . I don't get.

Agree that some restaurants have seized upon tapas as a way to overcharge and under deliver. But I also wish that the Spanish way with snacks was a lot more widespread over here.

I remember coming across a little hole in the wall bar in Valencia that was completely packed. You ordered a glass of wine or beer at the bar and also a bowl of mussels or clams, prepared a couple of different ways, but very simply. You ate and drank, threw your very small paper napkin on the floor, and ordered more.

If there was a place like that near me, I'd been in it a lot. Of course, the health department would probably close it down inside a week because of the paper and other debris on the floor.

Mussels, of course, have become bar food in many North American cities, but not in quite the same way.

And while we're on the topic, I'm going to be in Madrid in a few months. Any tapas bar recommendations would be much appreciated.

[Carlovski]

In the Uk there are are a lot of 'Tapas' places - not in the original sense of the word, but more like sit down restaurant type places, who serve Tapas like food. The quality is variable (There is a national chain, which is the most widespread, which has some reasonable things, and some really bad ones) - the independent, neighborhood style ones normally being better.

There was also a bit of a boom in this sort of food in pub/pub-restaurants when Spanish food became 'The New Thai' (I know one place which went from serving Italian, to serving south-east asian to serving spanish food, in the space of three years!).

As a Gastronomic experiences, none of these places are much good, but for an informal, fun meal with a group of people , with plenty of wine (Or sangria!) it can be good - the food is usually served quickly, you can try a wide variety of food, and it stimulates conversation - good for a post work on a Friday night for example.

There is an interesting place near me which serves food in a similar style, but with a variety of food styles, all sourced with local ingredients. I went recently for a friends birthday, and that was quite enjoyable (If a little stingy on portions).

[docsconz]

I have some of those highly regarded spanish canned goods including the big white asparagus, piquillo peppers, squid in its ink, chipirones, ventresca tuna, angulas and pulpo in oil (olive and vegetable). We are having a Tapas event for 6 people not including ourselves. What is the best way to serve them. In addition we will be making some prepared dishes with recipes taken from Penelope Casas' book Tapas: The Little Dishes of Spain.

[hjshorter]

What are you making from Tapas? It's a fabulous cook book, one of my very favorites.

What do you mean by:

What is the best way to serve them.

How to prepare the food, or how to set it out to eat? If the latter, it depends on how much advance prep you have. Serve as a buffet if most of your choices can be made ahead, or serve as a series of courses if you've chosen things that need last-minute cooking.

[docsconz]

Most of what we will be making will be done so ahead of time and so we plan a buffet. My question was primarily about the canned products. Should I just serve them right out of the can or use them in the recipes from the book? I want to use them to their best effect. This applies especially to the asparagi from Navarra and the piquillo peppers. My wife and I are still deciding which recipes to use from Tapas. Any specific recipe suggestions?

[AlexP]

Hello,

I enjoy cooking from a Penelope Casas book, but I usually just use the recipes as references, so I cannot really point you to a specific one.

When it comes to the Esparragos, using the Spanish word, I would serve them out of the can with two sauces, an alioli and also vinaigrette. That is how we always eat them back home.

The Pimientos de Piquillo, you have a couple options, either out of the can with some olive oil, chopped garlic, anchovies (typical preparation) or cooked with some kind of filling (salt cod, tuna...)

All depends in how much work you want to do while the guesses are at your house. I have the best time when I can cook different tapas at different times and serve them as little dishes. It keeps me in the kitchen more time, but it is fun.

Check the recipes by Penelope on Clams and Green Sauce, Mussels, Croquetas, Empanadillas, Gambas al ajillo... For me they are quite good traditional tapas.

Sorry, after rereading you post you want most of the work done in advance... If the can stuff is good quality, I would not use it for cooking (e.g. the tuna) The squid you might want to warm it up, but others might have better suggestions for this.

A good selection of cured meats and cheese could eliminate workload and make great tapas.

Finally, I would suggest flans for desserts, which can be done ahead of time and are delicious. Penelope does have several recipes.

Buena Suerte

Alex

[Bux]

Alex is on top of this. I can add to, or flesh out, some of his comments, but I can't disagree with anything he's said here. I suspect you may find that Americans may not appreciate tinned and jarred products nearly as much as they are appreciated in Spain. At least that's been my experience and, in truth, I'm still learning. Nevertheless, this also sounds like a great experience for your guests. Americans may also be put off by anything being served out of the can, but I remember reading about a respected French restaurant years ago, that served sardines from the tin precisely because they were proud of the brand they were serving. You make the decision about how you want to serve your guests.

One piece of advice I'd have is to drain most of the foods of their packing liquid. That goes for all of the stuff packed in vegetable oil and maybe even most of the stuff in olive oil (taste first) and replace that with a little really good oil. I'd have no problem using extra virgin Italian olive oil. It's much harder to find really good Spanish olive oil, but of course that's good too. By the way, I've found most Portuguese olive oil to be a good buy, at least in certain neighborhoods in NYC. The south village (south of Greenwich Village) is an old Portuguese community, or at least the remnant of one with a few remaining delis.

If I were to cook any of the canned goods, it would be the peppers. That's a personal choice and I'd want to stuff them and serve them warm. I see no reason however, not to serve them at room temperature with a little olive oil. You could also stuff them with the tuna and serve them at room temperature. I had a sort of hero sandwich at a little bar in Madrid that had olive oil packed canned tuna, achovies and roasted peppers. I was surprised at how good it was. It was really a memorable sandwich.

[docsconz]

Thank you for the suggestions. They are good ones. While we plan on preparing most of the Tapas ahead of time, we still plan on doing a manageable number a la minute. we just don't want to be completely in the kitchen.

I believe the canned goods are high quality. We either brought them back directly from Spain or ordered them from Tienda.com. I particularly like the suggestions about the esparragos with aioli or vinagraitte and the pimientos. AlexP, for your stuffed pimientos, how exactly do you prepare them?

[AlexP]

Well, I am pretty sure that other members would be able to give you a more detail and better recipe, but for a general idea, you can follow these basic steps:

- Cooked the stuffing they way that you would like. E.g. If you want a shrimp and sea bass stuffing, you might want to sauté the shrimp with some garlic, and onions... maybe chopped the shrimp to have a more consistent mixture. You might want poached the sea bass in some fish stock... You get the idea

- Stuffed the peppers

- Passed the stuffed peppers by some flour and egg and fry them in olive oil. (Some preparations skip this part)

- You could make a sauce with the liquid of the pimientos (From the jar) a blended pimiento, and some fish stock for example.

- Finally arrange the pimientos and the sauce in a pan and bring to temperature

I hope that you get an idea of what a recipe could be - make stuffing, stuffed, fry pimientos, make sauce, combined sauce and pimientos, and bring to temperature. In general, what to do within these steps have to be adjusted to your taste.

Hopefully others can give us better directions or options. I have cooked them just a couple times, usually I eat them with tuna or anchovies on a salad.

Alex

P.S.: I am not claiming that this is a traditional method, just what I have in my head at the moment.

[dls]

While doing a google search on an unrelated subject, I came across several tapas recipes from Tasca Restaurant in Brighton, MA that, on brief glance, appear to use many of the items that you have and can easily be prepared ahead of time. See following link.

http://www.tascarestaurant.com/resource/recipe/recipe07.htm

[docsconz]

Thanks for the suggestions. That link looks interesting. I particularly like the sound of the ventresca and red pepper toast.

[Bux]

Just want to add some personal notes on stuffed piquillo peppers. The very best I've had were probably in France in a one star Basque inn near the border. (For the moment, I'm not counting a dish of stuffed piquillo peppers and small squid of the same size as the pepper created by Daniel Boulud for Cafe Boulud as it's a bit more complex.) The peppers in the Pays Basque, as I recall, were stuffed with a puree of dried codfish--basically a brandade and served with a bit of concentrated broth that may have been fish stock or chicken stock. They were probably baked in the oven, but may have been heated on the stove top. At any rate they were not fried or battered, nor were they covered with cheese as I've had them at times. I don't find the cheese and codfish a very successful combination. I wouldn't really gratinee them with cheese, but if you stuffed them with meat, oxtail ragout for instance, a little Idiazabal on top and a few seconds in the broiler, might be nice. I don't know if I've ever had them stuffed with anything other than dried cod puree or brandade, but I saw a recipe for oxtail stuffing that sounded good as well as one with mushroom stuffing.

Cheese in France is a course between the last savory course and dessert. In Spain, cheese is more often a snack or tapa. I have purchased good Manchego in NY, so it's available. Oddly I've purchased it in an Italian specialty shop which also carries great Gruyère. The shopkeeper informs me that both Gruyère and Manchego are popular in Italy and that's why he carries them.

[ludja]

While doing a google search on an unrelated subject, I came across several tapas recipes from Tasca Restaurant in Brighton, MA that, on brief glance, appear to use many of the items that you have and can easily be prepared ahead of time. See following link.

http://www.tascarestaurant.com/resource/recipe/recipe07.htm

Thanks for the link dls; they have some reallly nice recipes and other informative links!

The idea given above re: the piquillo peppers stuffed with a tuna filling and served at room temp or slightly warm sounds very good. I also really like good canned tuna with white beans, lemony vinagrette, red onions over greens or not.

I've also been on a slight quince kick (made my own paste before Christmas) so I like the idea of serving that with cheese (Manchego?).

Was browsing through some recent shows of the Splendid Table (Lynne Rossetta Kasper, Public Radio) on the web and one of her guests had a recipe for an interesting saffron-infused oil. Maybe this could be an interesting addition to one of the tapas

Also, I don't have the recipe on hand, but I remember an interesting almond ice recipe given in a Bon Appetit article on tapas. Almond ice cream and orange granita? Another idea for dessert...

edited to add a few extra ideas.

Edited February 3, 2004 by ludja (log)

[docsconz]

I am thinking of stuffing the peppers with peeky-toe crabmeat and serving them with a white sauce.

I am also thinking of grilling razor clams. I had them at the Boqueria in Barcelona and they were awesome. Does anyone have any suggestions on technique?

I have some nice fresh Meyer lemons and am thinking of making a Meyer lemon-poppy seed ice cream for dessert. I could combine this with a blood orange sorbet. I know that these aren't really Spanish, but that's ok, since we're not in Spain Nevertheless, I'm looking for some degree of authenticity with the Tapas themselves. I'll be serving Lustau fino sherry with them

Some definites right now include Pan con tomate, tortilla espanola, plain spanish almonds, manchego with membrillo, spanish olives, anchovy tart (using anchovies de L'escala) Monkfish "lobster style", oysters on the half-shell, stuffed pork loin and asparagus with alioli and vinaigrette. we'll also probably do angulla toast, ventresca and pepper toasts, mussels en escabeche, pulpo and squid from a can and something with canned cockles, possibly clam toast and gambas al ajillo. Beef tenderloin tips in garlic sauce and spicy lamb brochettes, both from Casas are also possibilities that we are considering.

[docsconz]

By the way the genesis of this little dinner was a donation for a local charity. My wife and I are hosting the auction winners.

[hjshorter]

Will you be able to get good tomatoes for the pan con tomate?

My book is in a box right now, but remembering what we've made, I can recommend these recipes:

marinated olives

marinated pork loin

the potato salad with citrus, capers and dill

another salad with new potatoes and tuna

squid braised in beer

wild mushrooms cooked with sherry

gambas al ajillo

any croquette recipe

Do you have a source for salt cod? It would be wonderful as a stuffing for the peppers.

[docsconz]

We had our Tapas party last night. I must concur with all of you who praised Casas' book. The recipes were excellent.

We had aspirations of doing more than we succeeded in putting on the table, but it was just as well since we had too much food as it was. Spanish canned goods proved to be up to the hype. I loved the ventresca , piquillo peppers, asparagus from Navarra and olives, was less enthusiastic about the mussels en escabeche and didn't even get to open angullas, pulpo or calamari as time ran out on us.

My wife and I made a number of dishes from Casas. As I said the recipes were great and the dishes all came out really well with one exception, which I'll get to later. In addition to a good recipe, I'm a firm believer that good quality ingredients are essential. We purchased many of the Spanish products from Tienda.com with good results, but the fresh seafood we purchased from Browne Trading Co. in Maine was outstanding.

Dishes:

Uncooked:

Wellfleet oysters on the half-shell with Meyer lemon wedges - extremely fresh oysters served on a bed of rockweed. They were delicious, but stronger flavored than the winterpoints I have previously purchased from them. I prefer the Winterpoints.

Esparragos "Cojonudos" El Navarrico 6/8 muy grueso esparragos blancos de Navarra served cold with alioli. These were excellent with a very soft texture and delicate flavors.

Ortiz El Velero Ventresca Tuna in olive oil . This is different. Very silky and rich. This is not your grandmother's canned tuna (unless she grew up inSpain). I had the little bit left-over for breakfast this morning. Yum.

Spanish almonds. Great with sherry or on their own.

Canned mussels in escabeche. Not my favorite. The testure was fine, although I wasn't crazy about the sauce which was sort of a sweet and sour. I'm generally not keen on this type of sauce anyway. This was my least favorite item of the night and the only one I don't particularly care if I have again.

Canned green Spanish olives that we bought in Barcelona. For some reason we can't get them like this here.

Manchego and membrillo. This is a sublime combination that mixes salty and sweet to perfection. The combination was bought from Tienda.com

Cooked (most recipes taken or derived from Casas):

Pan con Tomate: We used Rockhill Pane Paesano that is perfect for this catalan staple. We were able to get adequate tomatoes for this, so that not quite of August quality, it was still pretty good for February.

Tortilla Espanola. My wife used Casas' recipe. It came out perfectly and was about as good as I've ever had. This is saying something, because this is comfort food for me. Perhaps because of Spanish influence (or the revers?) "Potatos and Eggs" is a dish common to Southern Italian/American cooking. My mother used to make it frequently, especially for picnics.

Chickpeas and Spinach. A very tasty vegetarian dish

Crab-stuffed Piquillo Peppers. This was one of my two favorite dishes of the evening. This was a stunner, a dish both beautiful to look at as well as delicious to eat. The colors were amazing. The peppers were stuffed with fresh Peeky Toe crabmeat from Browne. I wish I had time to take a picture of it to post it. Oh well.

Shrimp al Ajillo. Delicious and simple to prepare.

Stuffed Pork Loin. Good, but the most disappointing dish, primarily because it was overcooked.

Beef Tenderloin Tips in Garlic Sauce. The best of the meat dishes.

Lobster and Endive Salad. My other favorite dish mostly because the lobster was sooooo good. I bought the lobster from Browne and I can say that I have never tasted better, sweeter lobster. As good, maybe. The lobster was so good, that I picked the carcass clean while I was preparing the dish. I'm generally not a huge fan of roe and tomalley, but this was a revelation. While I am attributing the outstanding flavor and texture to the lobsters and their freshness, I suppose the cooking method might have been a factor as well. They were boiled/steamed in a seasoned fish broth that also had plenty of rockweed in it. Whatever the case, this simply served dish (lobster meat on endive leaves with a simple lemon-EVOO dressing) was outstanding.

Chorizo in Puff Pastry. Very popular.

Spicy Lamb Brochettes. Tasty. We used shoulder meat rather than leg. While good, leg might have been better.

Anchovy Tart. Recipe from Sheila Lukens Around The World Cookbook that we have prepared successfully in the past. It did not disappoint.

Wines:

Lustau Jarana Light Fino Sherry. Solera Reserva Light colored, bone-dry and flinty.

Lustau Almacenista Light Fino del Puerto. Solera matured by Juan Luis Gonzalez Obregon. A bit darker, but still bone-dry. Both were excellent matches for the foods served.

Dessert:

Meyer Lemon and Poppy Seed Ice cream/ Morroccan-Spiced Blood Orange sorbet and dark-chocolate dipped strawberries. these were all home-made. I got to use the ice-cream maker we got for Christmas. The citrus came from Riding C Ranch in California.

It was a fun night, although the clean-up lasted for quite a while.