Richard Jernigan -> RE: I don't always drink coffee... (Feb. 19 2017 21:15:48)
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First time I went to Spain by myself at age 18, the first place I stayed was a relatively inexpensive pension in Madrid. The first morning I asked the desk clerk where to get breakfast. He suggested a bar in the same block. It was a working class place. Most of the customers seemed to be in the building trades, getting ready to go to work. They didn't pay much attention to me until they heard my Latin American Spanish, then I got a little ribbing. I asked the bartender what he had for breakfast. The answer was molletes and coffee. In Mexico molletes are day old bolillos, split and toasted, sometimes with butter. In Madrid that morning they were day old bolillos smeared with fresh tomato paste and toasted. I asked for cafe con leche. The coffee tasted burnt, the milk was thin and watery. I asked for orange juice. The bartender looked at me as though I were an oddball, rummaged around in a small refrigerator, and came out with a miniature bottle of brilliantly orange colored battery acid. I felt obliged to choke it down. A couple of the customers at the bar asked me whether I was going to join them with un traguito, so I went for it. I was served a small glass of paint thinner with a very high alcohol content, which the bartender insisted was brandy. I never had brandy for breakfast before, and I don't remember having it since, but for the hearty tradesmen it was an essential part of the meal. I was prepared thus for further adventures in Spanish gastronomy. As recently as three or four years ago I stayed at a decent hotel in Triana, since all the hotels in downtown Sevilla seemed to be booked up. The nearest place to eat was a tapas bar, where the food was villainous and the staff were rude. I ate once at a better place a little further from the hotel, much better food and service. When I went back I was told I couldn't sit where I wanted to, though the restaurant was empty. I simply walked out without a word. But I've had some great meals in Spain, for example a stew of jugged hare at the Restaurant Pedro Romero in Ronda, after I had become more prosperous, and before the restaurant was overrun by busloads of tourists from Marbella. In Granada the tapas and raciones at Bodegas Castañeda just off the corner of the Plaza Nueva have always been great, as well as the gazpacho on a hot day. In the Albaicin, just across the street downhill from the Plaza San Nicolas, there is a restaurant with an outdoor terrace. The food and wine are respectable, and the view across the Darro of the Alhambra and Generalife with the snowy Sierra Nevada behind them, reflecting the red-violet rays of the setting sun, is one of the world's greatest sights. The cocido madrileño was delicious at that restaurant a couple of blocks off the Paseo del Prado in Madrid where it is the specialty. In fact there are a number of good restaurants in Madrid, including a few hidden gems. Years ago on a freezing day in midwinter I wandered into a place on a side street near where the main Union Musical Española store used to be, not far from the Puerta del Sol. The modest restaurant specialized in seafood. I ordered a hot-pot of merluza and vegetables, with grated yellow cheese melting on top. I happily washed it down with some decent white wine. Never could find the place again. Now that I think of it, in Madrid there was Antonio's. I'm sure Antonio is long gone now, he was a fair amount older than I. The specialty at Antonio's was thick steaks. If you happened to sit where you could see into the kitchen, you saw the huge iron pots of boiling olive oil. The steaks were marinated, then flung into the boiling oil and fished out when they were done just right. The house made lemon sherbet was great. When corridas still started at 4 PM in Madrid, the place to go afterward was El Callejon. The callejon is the narrow passageway between the wall in front of the seats, and the other wall that actually borders the sand. None of the waiters at the restaurant made it to Las Ventas, but they watched on TV, and could discuss the fine points with the diners. They served a roasted shank of lamb, and stewed spinach with whole cloves of garlic, doused in lemon juice. El Callejon has been closed now for decades. Botín used to be good. The main dining room downstairs was pleasant. The location in Arco de Cuchilleros just off the Plaza Mayor was convenient, Bernabe's shop used to be just across the street, with three beautifully decorated masterpiece guitars in the shop window. Contreras was in Calle Mayor. But they tell me Botín is now trampled by tourists and the food has gone downhill. I haven't been to Horcher in decades, but it was still the bee's knees in the 1960s. Grand luxe, tuxedoed waiters, serried ranks of silverware, the whole bit if you wanted to wear your good suit and put on the dog. They say the room is still nice, the service good, but the food is old fashioned. But in Italy, where we spent six weeks year before last, I can't remember a bad meal anywhere...well, come to think of it, I can recall one that was indifferent, but not actually bad, as many have been in Spain and elsewhere. The only other place I have been that could claim such a record is south Louisiana. We lived in Baton Rouge for two years, and made it fairly often to New Orleans. Never had a meal that was less than good, and had several really great ones, some of them in places we just wandered into. RNJ I just realized that the phrase to "put on the dog" is obsolete, even in Texas. It means to behave in an ostentatiously prosperous manner. "Putting on the dog" has something of an ironic slant, both in description and in execution.
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