‘Zorionak’ = Season’s Greetings
‘Olentzero’ = the Basque Father Christmas

It’s December 25th and we’re off this afternoon to Italy and the UK for a couple of weeks, so here’s a last post before we leave.

Dec 21 - Santo Tomas
Christmas festivities begin properly here on December 21st with ‘el dia de Santo Tomas’, St Thomas’s Day, on December 21st. This is the major winter fiesta throughout the Basque Country, and is celebrated in the usual style here in Bilbao – with the population out in the town in force and plenty of music, eating and drinking in the streets.  Many people dress in traditional Basque costume, rather as the Scots might go out for a boozy night out in kilts and other traditional garb. (As I’ve mentioned before, there are lots of parallels between the nationalism of the Scots and the Basques). (NB: Following a computer disaster, I lost all my photos of Santo Tomas, so have had to find appropriate replacements from the internet...)

By now you won’t be surprised to learn that a major theme of the day is food. The streets around the Casco Viejo are lined with stalls (‘txosnas’) – around 250 in all – forming a huge ‘mercado rural’ – a farmer’s market – selling delicious food from the ‘baserris’ (farmhouses) in the countryside around Bilbao – fruit, vegetables, bread, cake (especially ‘Pastel Vasco’ – ‘Basque Cake’), meat, cheese, cider and so on. There’s also lots of mistletoe for sale. There’s a real sense of the countryside coming to town, a tradition that stretches back to medieval times.

On Santo Tomas everyone eats ‘talo y xistorra’. ‘Talo’ is a kind of soft floury flatbread similar to a Mexican ‘tortilla’, but a bit heavier. ‘Xistorra’ (pr. ‘chistorra’) is a sort of mild spicy sausage, essentially a fresh ‘chorizo’ that needs to be cooked before eating. On the day, the combination is sold to thousands from stalls all over the Casco Viejo, with the ‘talo’ cooked on hotplates and the ‘xistorra’ fried in big pans. And everyone drinks cider (‘sidra’) – always popular here, but this marks the beginning of the cider season.

You take your ‘talo y xistorra’ and your bottle of ‘sidra’, find a space with your friends, and ‘hang out’. And then you ‘hang out’ a bit more, possibly finding a bar and moving on to some wine or beer. The streets of the Casco Viejo are crammed, in fact, from about midday onwards, with thousands of people ‘hanging out’ and drinking until the early hours of the morning. You can hardly move there are so many people. People may get a bit tipsy but there’s no serious drunkenness, and it’s a nice atmosphere.

We spent the day ‘hanging out’ with some of Pietro’s work colleagues, who include a few Basques, a Catalonian, a Cantabrian, a Russian, an Estonian, a Dutchman, a couple of Poles, an American, and a Colombian: a typically international ensemble of research scientists….

Here's a video of the event from the Basque TV channel:
http://www.eitb.com/en/video/detail/1207250/video-bilbao-donostia-celebrate-santo-tomas-fair/

Dec 23 – The Arrival of Olentzero
On Christmas Eve, children leave their shoes by the Christmas tree and overnight Olentzero, the coalman, comes down the chimney and leaves presents for them, by their shoes. If they don’t behave themselves, they will only get a lump of coal. Images of Olentzero have appeared all over the place in recent weeks. Here are a few from local shop windows and houses:

Olentzero is far more than a Basque version of Father Christmas. Contemporary manifestations of Olentzero seem to represent a merging of the Christian and Basque traditions, but Olentzero’s roots are in the ancient traditions of Basque mythology – which has more in common with, say, the Celtic tales of pre-Christian Britain than with Christian sacred tradition.

There are several different versions of the Olentzero story, but basically he is said to be one of the ‘jentillak’, the giants of the Pyrenees which are at the core of Basque mythology – along with the mountain-men – ‘basajaunak’, the river-maidens – ‘lamiak’, and the mountain goddess Mari  (probably no direct relationship to the Christian Mary, by the way).  Interestingly, the word ‘jentillak’ has the same origins as the word ‘gentiles’ – meaning pre-Christian. It is now thought by many that the Basques may have been here in the foothills of the Pyrenees since the Stone Age, and the jentillak are said to be the mountain giants who built the dolmens and other ancient structures in the Basque mountains. They eventually disappeared, leaving only Olentzero behind. Olentzero then left the mountains and became a Christian, earning his living as a coalman  / charcoal-burner in the Basque forests.

Nowadays, Olentzero seems to be a cross between a symbol of Basque rural life and Father Christmas. He wears traditional Basque clothes (beret and scarf etc. rather than red gown), he’s jolly and chubby, he drinks and smokes a pipe, he sometimes has a white beard, and he brings presents to children. And he’s a coalman – so he has a genuine reason for coming down the chimney!

However, this is a rather sanitised version of the original stories, apparently promulgated during the post-Franco Basque revival in the 70s and 80s. In the original stories, he was sometimes depicted as a rather frightening man of the forests and mountains. This dark side of him is clearly signalled by his occupation – coalman – and even in the lovable modern version, he is sometimes shown with his face covered in coal dust.

In Bilbao, there’s an Olentzero parade on December 23rd, to mark his arrival into the city from the mountains. This is really the Bilbaino equivalent of pantomime, and just about every child in the city comes into the centre of town to see it. The scene on Gran Via was quite amazing: thousands of wide-eyed little children being held on their parents’ shoulders to wave at Olentzero as he went past!
Here's a rather good video of the event from the internet, followed by some of my photos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3CxrNfInno

Olentzero is accompanied by his wife Mari Domingi, a variation on the ancient Basque goddess figure Mari. (Another variation, Marijaia, is the symbol of the Bilbao summer fiesta).

And there are also the Basajuanes - the mythological wild mountain men who often feature in Basque country dances:

Then on Christmas Eve, people carry effigies of Olentzero around the streets, and sing special Olentzero carols. Children collect sweets and treats on the way.

You can see some rousing performance of Olentzero carols, and some images of Olentzero doing what he does, here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHto3CoDICs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjRXb_cds0w

and this is a splendid one filmed in a Basque village:
http://vimeo.com/18082024

Dec 24 – Nochebuena
At Christmas, the main meal (usually fish followed by ‘turron’) takes place on Christmas Eve  (‘nochebuena’). We had an Anglo-Italian Christmas with Pietro’s Italian boss, his English wife, their children and his Italian sister’s family, in a village a few miles outside Bilbao. We started with English mince pies and Polish poppy-seed cake at the nearby house of another English scientist and his Polish wife, and then moved on to the main meal – delicious ravioli followed by salmon, with yummy Basque Cake (‘Pastel Vasco’) and almond cake afterwards. Here’s the Pastel Vasco, with the very ancient Basque symbol, the ‘Lauburu’ or Basque Cross, on it. (Yes, it is related to the swastika, but never mind that.)

We were joined for  Christmas by a very obliging gang of insects who showed great interest in one of our desserts:

3. Dec 31: New Year’s Eve - Nochevieja
Sadly, we won’t be here for New Year, but the tradition is to eat 12 white grapes at midnight, one for each month. Eat them before the twelve chimes are up if you want good luck in the coming year.

4. Jan 6: Dia de los Reyes – Day of the Kings
Again, sadly we won’t be here on January 6th. But this is the biggest celebration of the season. Big parades. People dress up as the three kings. More presents.  And no doubt lots of singing, dancing, eating and drinking on the streets….

And finally…
Zorionak! Happy New Year! I leave you with a few pictures of Bilbao at Christmas:

If you come to Bilbao expecting ‘tapas’, you will be disappointed: there aren’t any. Instead there are ‘pintxos’.  And it’s hard to convey just how culturally significant ‘pintxos’ are here. Sometimes it seems as though the entire society revolves around them. 

You might think what I’m about to describe is something that just a few young, lively going-out types are into, or a gimmick for tourists. You’d be wrong. First of all, pretty much everyone in Spain goes out all the time, as I’ve made clear in previous posts. Secondly, pretty much everyone in the Basque Country – of all ages and classes – goes out for ‘pintxos’.  Every bar and café in every city, town and village serves ‘pintxos’.

In Britain, people go out for beer, possibly accompanied in a rather incidental sort of way by some rather paltry crisps or nuts. Here, the drink is incidental: it’s the food that matters, and it’s what forms the focus of going out.

‘Pintxos’ are similar to ‘tapas’ in both content and function, and yet different in some significant ways: it’s quite complicated to explain – but I’ll try….

Like a ‘tapa’, a ‘pintxo’ is a small snack that you have with a drink or before a meal. However whereas a ‘tapa’ is a very small bowl of one specific dish  - e.g. a handful of ‘aceitunas’ (olives) or a few fried ‘pimientos’ (peppers), or a few spoonfuls of ‘patatas bravas’ (spicy tomatoey potatoes) or a few ‘albondigas’ (meatballs) – a ‘pintxo’ is an assemblage of food presented on a small piece of bread and (usually) held together with a cocktail stick or toothpick (a ‘pincho’ in Spanish). Imagine something like a large-ish elaborate canapé, and you’ve sort of got the picture.

Unlike ‘tapas’, you can’t vary the size of ‘pintxos’. A ‘tapa’ might be five meatballs or six meatballs, or you might decide to order a bigger plate of meatballs, which would make it a ‘racion’ of meatballs rather than a smaller ‘tapa’. But a ‘pintxo’ is a ‘pintxo’. It is what it is and it can’t be larger or smaller or different: it is a coherent whole rather than a portion of something bigger.

Unlike ‘tapas’, you don’t eat ‘pintxos’ by picking them bit-by-bit from a plate. A ‘pintxo’ is meant to be able to be eaten off the stick in one or two delicious bites (although some of the more sophisticated bars serve things in little glasses or bowls that need to be eaten with a spoon - the one below is roast beef and crunchy rice on a spinach puree...)

Unlike most conventional ‘tapas’, many ‘pintxos’ are quite elaborate creations and quite sophisticated gastronomic treats. The ‘pintxo’ has developed, in fact, into a popular gastronomic form. A typical ‘pintxo’ might, for instance, consist of a small piece of grilled red pepper with a small slice of goat’s cheese, a piece of ham and a small piece of grilled aubergine on top, all held together by a toothpick; or a succulent piece of cod with ‘pil-pil’ sauce; or some ensemble involving bits of squid or octopus (urgh!); or a piece of freshly cooked tuna with caramelised onion (see picture below); etc. Some pintxos are much simpler than this, others even more complicated.

Unlike ‘tapas’, ‘pintxos’ are never free. Whereas, apparently, in other parts of Spain, you might in some places be given a ‘tapa’ free with your drink, that would never happen with a  ‘pintxo’.

Note that in Spain (unlike in the UK) there are no ‘tapas’ or ‘pintxos’ restaurants (except in a few very touristy areas). They are eaten as a snack, usually before a meal, and always with drink; and they are served at bars and cafes. (That’s not to say that a few ‘pintxos’ might not be had instead of a meal…)

Like ‘tapas’, ‘pintxos’ are at the heart of much socialising. If making an evening of it (which many do), people go on a kind of crawl from bar to bar, having one ‘pintxo’ and one small drink at each before moving on to the next: here, this is known as doing a ‘txikiteo’.  People have their favourite bars and their favourite ‘pintxos’ in each bar, and the whole thing is highly ritualised. (Below are a few of the bars near us).

At each bar, you choose a ‘pintxo’ and order a drink – usually a quarter pint of lager (a ‘zurrito’) or a small glass of wine (a ‘txikito’) or some grape juice (‘mosto’), or a rather disgusting but very popular local sangria-type thing called ‘kalimotxo’, which is a mixture of cheap red wine and coca-cola(!).

That makes it seem simpler than it is. On a Friday or Saturday night, or at lunchtime on Saturday or Sunday, there is usually a huge crush around the bar with dozens of people trying to indicate what kind of ‘pintxo’ they want, as well as order drinks. There might be as many as 20 or 30 different ‘pintxos’ to choose from, and every bar has its own specialities, many of which can’t be found anywhere else. In keeping with the general tenor of social life in Spain, it’s a quite high energy and ‘in your face’ business – noisy and crowded, and even a bit stressful (though in a good way).

This is all well and good if (a) you know what the different types of ‘pintxo’ are and can recognise them and (b) if you can say what you want in Spanish. It’s trickier when there are people around (like us, and tourists) to whom that doesn’t always apply.  It’s often impossible to tell what a ‘pintxo’ is actually made of. Something that looks like it might just be an innocent piece of grilled vegetable might turn out to be hiding a piece of blood sausage or part of an octopus; that wonderful looking croquette could have anything in it, and often does; that nice salady thing under that lovely little piece of cod might actually be chopped crab meat. Some bars have little labels that tell you what they are; most don’t.  If you take too long ordering what you want and have to ask what everything is in a mix of English and Spanish, people begin to get stressed. The whole thing depends on being quick and efficient. The bar-people have a tricky enough job without people being slow and indecisive.

Then there’s the whole business of deciding who does the ordering and paying. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you all have to study what’s on offer and tell the bar-person what you want individually, which slows everything down and crowds the bar: much more sensible to put one person in charge of getting the ‘pintxos’ in each bar. And as for paying – there can’t be any ‘going dutch’: far too complicated. Apparently, the Basques often pool their money at the beginning of the evening, creating a kitty from which to draw. Paying happens at the end, when you’ve finished. You tell the bar-person how many pintxos you’ve had and they tot up the total: they’re usually an extraordinarily cheap 1.5 Euros (£1.20) each.

There are hundreds of places serving ‘pintxos’ in Bilbao, and thousands altogether around the Basque country. The more humble places will have a selection of three or four very simple ‘pintxos’. In many bars, the counters are piled high with many different kinds of ‘pintxo’. More upmarket places may have a big selection of ‘traditional’ ‘pintxos’; or they may have a more sophisticated modern selection, with a variety of ‘pintxos’ in different shapes and sizes and with more unusual ingredients or combinations.  There are annual ‘pintxo’ competitions, too – and of course plenty of ‘pintxo’ tourism, especially in San Sebastian, the gastronomic centre of the Basque Country, where ‘pintxos’ are a major part of the local economy.

But all this only scratches the surface of what’s going on. The structure of the week revolves around ‘pintxos’. Groups of friends go out for ‘pintxos’ on Friday and Saturday evenings from about 8pm; they might do the ‘txikiteo’ and make an evening of it, or they might just have a couple of ‘pintxos’ before going on for dinner somewhere.  ‘Pintxos’ are perhaps even more socially significant on Saturday and Sunday lunchtimes, when families and friends meet in the bars and cafes all over town for a few ‘pintxos’ before the big family meal in the afternoon.  Between 12 and 2 the streets suddenly come alive with people eating ‘pintxos.’ On Sunday, many people roll out of church straight into the ‘pintxos’ bars and then home – or out – for the family lunch.  When there’s a fiesta, everyone eats ‘pintxos’. You might stop for a ‘pintxos’ or two on your way home from work.

And the group of friends you do the ‘txikiteo’ with on Saturday night is no random group of friends: it’s your ‘cuadrilla’, a group you’ve been part of since you were at school. (Most people in Spain stay in the town of their birth: moving away for university or work is not as common as it is in the UK.) Many ‘cuadrillas’ are single-sex, it seems. If you’re married, you and your wife are likely to be going out separately, in two different ‘cuadrillas’.

‘Pintxos’ are often accompanied by singing or folk music, too. In our street, for instance, there’s often a folk song being sung by a group of Basques in berets while they enjoy their ‘pintxos’, or a little band of folk musicians playing to entertain the street drinkers.  And of course, in the end, like most things here, ‘pintxos’ are as much about the post-Franco revival of Basque culture as anything else. The ‘pintxo’ has developed from being a simple slice of bread with a piece of meat or cheese on it to being an elaborate cultural ritual and culinary art which is a symbol of the Basque way of life.

The weather forecast this weekend; looks like we'll be doing the Christmas shopping in shorts and sandals.... Hope you're all managing to keep warm over there in the UK.

There’s no doubt about it: Spain has a sweet tooth. We first suspected this when we saw the incredibly sugary and fatty things Spaniards eat for breakfast – ‘cruasanes’ (sticky sugary croissants), ‘torrijas’ (eggy bread), ‘leche frita’ (fried custard!), etc. We then noticed how the little bags of sugar they give you with your coffee are twice as big as anywhere else. Then we were introduced to ‘chocolate con churros’. A picture was emerging.

So let’s start with ‘chocolate con churros’. This is the ultimate comfort food, the national sugary fatty vice: a glass of thick, thick, hot chocolate served with deep-fried batter-sticks – a bit like crunchy pancakes. Apparently usually eaten for breakfast or late at night, but patently ideal for any time of day when you might be feeling peckish and/or bedraggled. (Note the picture below in which the cafe proudly announces that it is available all day - 'todo el dia'.)We have found it particularly good on the way home from some expedition on a damp autumn or winter evening, (or even summer, for that matter: we have yet to test the spring).

‘Leche frita’ is fantastic too. It’s a toast-shaped slice of set custard rolled in flour, egg and cinnamon, and fried. Yum.

And now to cakes.... sold in ‘pastelerias’ (cake shops). These are some of the local specialities:

• The ‘carolina’ is particular to Bilbao, apparently. It’s a cone-shaped soft meringue with a chocolate and egg coating on a pastry base:

·      The ‘pastel de arroz’ is basically a custard tart and oddly doesn’t have any rice in it despite being called a ‘rice cake’:

·      The ‘pastel vasco’ (basque cake) has a light creamy-custardy filling:

·      The ‘tarta di Santiago’ – actually from around Santiago de Compostela (Galicia) – but apparently also popular here in Bilbao (which after all is a stop on the Camino de Santiago) – is a delicious soft almond tart with icing sugar dusting over a stencil of the Cross of Saint James:

Then there is a category of nutty sugary things that are not quite cakes and not quite sweets, and which apparently come mostly from Andalucia, where the almonds come from (literary types – hope you spotted the Charley’s Aunt reference.) 

The most famous one is ‘turron’ – which we might call nougat or nut crunch or nut paste, depending on what kind of ‘turron’ it is. Turron is big at Christmas – you eat it after the big Christmas meal, which takes place on Christmas Eve rather than Christmas Day. Round the corner from us is a quaint old ‘turroneria’ which sells it – Turroneria Ivanez:

Turroneria Ivanez has been in the family for 5 generations and has wonderful old pictures in the shop:

Marzipan is also very popular at this time of year. Huge marzipan cakes (bought by the slice) have started to appear in the cake shops (below), and bags of little marzipan dogs (‘perritos de mazapan’) are popular. (Dogs are another national obsession, by the way).

More intriguing (though less attractive) are ‘polvorones’ and ‘mantecados’, of which I had never heard before. I am still not at all certain what the difference between them is. The name ‘polvoron’ comes from the word ‘polvo’ meaning ‘dust’ (cf English ‘pulverise’), and the sweet itself is a compacted ‘dust’ of flour, sugar and nuts, which crumbles into powder when broken. They come in dozens of different varieties and flavours, often with cinnamon, and are wrapped in traditional wrappers in many colours, a bit like Italian ‘amaretti’. Again, they are particularly popular at Christmas, and currently seem to be being sold in greengrocers!

The Spanish version of Christmas cake has also started to appear in the shops. It’s called ‘roscon de los reyes’ – the ring of the kings. (Jan 6th – twelfth night – is here called ‘dia de los reyes’ – the day of the kings – and is apparently as big a celebration as Christmas itself, with children even getting a second round of presents!)

And finally - ice cream. Oddly, ice cream does not seem to be as big a deal in Spain as it is in Italy (when did you last come across a Spanish ice cream shop?). In fact, in Barcelona we noticed that all the ice cream shops sold themselves as purveyors of ‘Helados Italianos’. In Bilbao, though, there are three very good ice cream parlours dangerously close to our flat. (Not that we ever go to any of them, of course...).

Of the three, the most extraordinary one – apparently generally seen as the best in Bilbao – is called ‘Nossi-Be’, and it is extraordinary because in addition to all the normal flavours, you can have ‘bacalao al pil-pil’ (salted cod) ice cream and ‘txipirones en su tinta’ (squid in its black ink) ice cream. This is Heston Blumenthal territory, methinks. But I have never seen anyone eating either of them.

I can, however, recommend their ‘chocolate and chilli’ ice cream, and their ‘Idiazabal cheese with membrillo and walnuts’.

Next time... Olentzero, the Basque Father Christmas....

Eating out is complicated here – much more so than Italy where you basically have a choice between pizza at a pizzeria or a proper meal at a restaurant. Here, there seem to be endless sorts of meal you can have at any number of different types of eating place at various different points of the day – although they all basically serve different combinations of the same dishes in one size or form or another! And the other complication is that there are huge numbers of eating-places to choose from, because eating out is a national obsession. People categorically do not go to each other’s houses to eat or meet. They go out.

We haven’t eaten out a great deal. We’ve been enjoying preparing fresh, local produce and eating it at home, we can’t afford to eat out often (in terms of money and bodyweight), and anyway we’ve got a whole year to sample what’s on offer. However, we have now eaten out enough to begin to get the hang of it.

Putting it very simply, if you want a full meal you can go to a ‘restaurante’ (varieties of which include the ‘asador’ – specialising in meat – or the ‘polleria’ – specialising in chicken – or the ‘marisqueria’ – specialising in fish). Or you might go to the ‘comedor’ (dining room) which is hidden at the back of many ‘tabernas’ (pubs/bars) – often so hidden that you wouldn’t know it was there unless you had lived in the area for years - many of which serve very good traditional food very cheaply.

Another type of restaurant is the cider-house (‘sidreria’ in Spanish, ‘sagardotegea’ in Basque). There aren’t many here in Bilbao: they’re mostly in the San Sebastian area. But we did visit one in a village not far from Bilbao, Fika (one of the villages bombed by Hitler at around the time of the Gernika massacre.) We didn’t have the whole massive ‘sidreria’ meal experience, but we did have some cider, and experienced the traditional way of serving the cider direct from the barrel, with the cider issuing in a long stream reminiscent of urination and expertly caught in several glasses by the bar-person!  The main cider season is January-April, when apples are in season, so we will report more after Christmas.

Another type of restaurant we learnt about after a few weeks here and which the guide books won’t mention at all is the ‘euskaldun batzoki’ which is a traditional restaurant run by the Basque National Party: every neighbourhood has one! This seems to suggest how central food is to Basque culture, but no doubt food is also a way to lead citizens to the ballot box…

If you don’t fancy a full meal, in some restaurants and many tabernas you can have a lighter meal – a kind of bar-snack – in the form of ‘raciones’, which literally means ‘portions’ – a sort of large helping of basic tapas-style things. So you might order ‘raciones’ of ‘patatas fritas’ (chips), ‘patatas bravas’ (spicy tomato and potatoes), ‘pimientos verdes’ (fried green peppers), ‘rabas’ (squid rings (urgh!)), ‘albondigas’ (meat balls), etc.  And if you order several different ones it’s expected that you might all share.

To complicate things further, there is a version of ‘raciones’ called ‘cazuelitas’ (stews) – often served in restaurants or tabernas which specialise in bowls of delicious fish and meat stews, served from steel or earthenware pans. There’s one near us called Rio-Oja, which is a rather wonderful place. You sit at the bar in front of a row of beautiful stews in huge steel pans and eat your delicious stew.

And to complicate things even further, for snacks there is ‘tapas’ – although here in the Basque Country, there is no tapas: rather there is a tapas equivalent (though it’s not really like tapas at all) which is called ‘pintxos’ – of which more in a later post.

If you’re going out for a meal, the most important thing to know is that the best time to eat out is lunchtime, because every restaurant and comedor has a ‘menu del dia’ (menu of the day) which it serves at lunchtime and which is phenomenally good value. For instance, a couple of weeks ago I had:
·      Starter: Lasagne made with fresh tuna
·      Main course: Whole grilled turbot with garlic sautéed potatoes
·      Dessert: a Basque trifle called ‘gosua’
·      Half a bottle of decent red wine
·      Half a bottle of mineral water
·      Plenty of bread
for 20 euros (= £16)! And that was expensive because it was a weekend. It might have been as  little as 12 euros on a weekday.

We’re not quite sure how they can afford to provide all that so cheaply (and it was very good food) – but we think it is because everybody seems to eat out all the time (well, perhaps that’s a bit of an exaggeration…) so all the restaurants can pretty much guarantee being full at lunchtimes. And indeed if you go for a walk any day (including weekdays) at about 3pm you will see cafes, restaurants and tabernas bursting at the seams with people having lunch.

And what can you expect to eat? Well, first of all the vast majority of restaurants serve traditional Basque food, or a slightly modern take on it. There are a few Chinese, Japanese, Italian (and even German!) restaurants in Bilbao, but not many.

There are some iconic Basque dishes which are served in almost every restaurant, most of which include fish:

·      Top of the list is ‘bacalao al pil-pil’, which is salted cod served in a thick buttery sauce made with the slightly gelatinous juices taken from the cooking of the fish.

·      Another classic is ‘txipirones en su tinta’ – squid in its own ink (urgh!) – a disturbingly black dish.

·      And another is ‘Kokotxas en salsa verde’ – hake cheeks (!) in a parsley and garlic sauce. 

·      Another is a simple tuna stew called ‘Marmitako’.

And there are plenty of other options, with scrambled eggs (‘huevos revueltos’) of various kinds often an alternative to the meat and fish dishes. It’s sometimes VERY difficult to locate vegetarian options, though – and even when a dish is described as vegetarian, it’s quite likely to have ham in it, which the Spanish seem to treat more like a seasoning than an ingredient. But one good option is ‘minestra’, which is a delicious vegetable stew, a bit like a non-soup version of minestrone in Italy. Even then you’d have to be sure to ask for it ‘sin jamon’ (without ham).

For dessert, the Spanish basically only do desserts made out of some combination of cream and sugar and eggs – all delicious. These include:
·      the aforementioned trifle-like ‘gosua’ – cream, custard, caramel and sponge cake
·      ‘cuajada’ – a sort of creamy curdy thing with caramel
·      ‘natillas’ – custard and cinammon
·      ‘flan’ – crème caramel
·      ‘arroz con leche’ – rice pudding 
·      ‘crema Catalana’ – crème Brulee

A common alternative to creamy puddings is the wonderful ‘nueces, membrillo y idiazabal’ (walnuts, quince paste and sheep’s cheese).

For a light meal, there’s always the option of a ‘boccadillo’  - a sandwich made with baguette style bread (‘pan de barra’) – or a ‘sandwich’, usually made with sliced white bread ‘(pan de molde’). Note that these are generally bought and eaten fresh in cafes and bars, not taken away in pre-packed boxes in shops as in the UK.

Beyond meals, there’s the morning snack (‘merienda’) at 11.30 (between breakfast at 8.30 and lunch at 2.30) when the whole nation apparently eats ‘tortilla’ (Spanish omelette) often popping to the local bar or café for a quick slice and a coffee. Every café and bar has at least two or three different types of tortilla on display – some plain, some with vegetables and/or ham, some double-layered omelette sandwiches with a filling.

Next time - CAKES AND SWEETS!

A whole month since writing the last proper blog post! We've both been extremely busy with work, plus we've moved to a new flat and had several people to stay (which has been really enjoyable). But now back to serious blogging....

I have been putting off writing about our experience of food here just because there’s so much to write about! In fact, this is going to have to be split into several posts, and I'll write about various aspects of eating and drinking out (which is the Spanish National Pastime) in the next posts.

The Basque Country is of course famous for its gastronomy and passion for food It has an extraordinary number of very acclaimed restaurants that do posh food at very high standards, quite a lot of it awarded Michelin stars. Those in the know about these things say that the Basque Country is where it's all happening in terms of cutting edge gastronomy - and indeed it do all look very interesting. That’s all well and good, but we’re not really into (and in any case can't afford) the expensive haute cuisine thing. So this is mostly about the wonderful food that we find in the everyday shops and cafes and ‘tabernas’ and ‘restaurantes’ around the Casco Viejo and in other parts of Bilbao and the Basque country. The passion for food here is NOT just about eating at expensive restaurants: it's virtually impossible to find anywhere, including the very cheapest places, that doesn't serve wonderful, lovingly prepared food, even if it's dead simple. And the shops are full of great local produce, usually much cheaper than the UK, to eat at home.

The first thing to say is that shopping for food is a huge pleasure here. Within three minutes’ walk of our front door are half a dozen greengrocers ('fruterias'), half a dozen grocers and delis ('ultramarinos'), half a dozen bakers ('panaderias') and cake shops (‘pastelerias’), 3 or 4 butchers ('carnicerias' and 'charcuterias') and a fishmonger ('pescaderia'), and the largest indoor food market in Europe, as well as various other specialist food shops. Living in the Casco Viejo, we are a little spoilt for choice, and it’s all rather quainter than in many suburbs – but nevertheless the presence of small traditional food shops selling a lot of local produce is absolutely typical of the food economy here, and it’s pleasurable in all the ways that food shopping back home in Tesco-land is not. Of course many people shop in smaller supermarkets here, too, and big supermarkets are becoming more popular in the suburbs - but it’s much more of a mixed economy, and the little food shops here are full of local residents. People also come to the Casco Viejo from all over Bilbao to shop in the market and at the shops in the old streets.

After just a few weeks, we have got to know our local shops and shopkeepers, and been reminded of the humane nature of this kind of shopping, where both the shopkeeper and the shopper care about what they’re doing and the personal transactions that take place, and are part of a neighbourly community. And this is not just middle-class romanticism. The Casco Viejo is not quite typical, but here and in various other parts of town, and in other towns and cities too, we’ve seen many examples of the way in which small shops are at the heart of their communities. Knowing that when we buy our food here the money goes straight into the pockets of the shopkeepers and circulates in the local economy, rather than into the pockets of Terry Leahy makes it all the better. In addition to all that, most food is pretty cheap here for us, compared with back home, especially fruit and vegetables.

As well as stocking the usual items, grocer’s shops and delis (‘ultramarinos’ or 'almacenes', as well as 'charcuterias') here are distinguished by the presence of many or all of the following things, which are the staples of the Basque diet, and which everyone eats at home:

·      sacks of ‘alubias’ (dried beans) and lentils of various kinds – mostly grown locally – from which you help yourself with a little shovel, filling a little foil-strengthened paper bag with as much as you want

·      a counter-full of ‘bacalao’ (dry salted cod) – sold in grocer’s shops not fishmongers, note – which you have to rehydrate for 48 hours, changing the water three times to get rid of the salt, before you can cook it. (It's difficult to over-state the importance of bacalao here - it's deeply engrained in Basque culture and connected with their extraordinary seafaring history: they were fishing cod (and whales) in the North Atlantic and off the coast of America 1000 years ago - see Mark Kurlansky's books 'Cod' and 'The Basque History of the World').

·     hundreds of jars (everything comes in jars) of all kinds of locally produced stuff in oil and/or vinegar and/or water  - especially ‘atun’ (tuna), ‘guindillas’ (green chilli peppers), ‘pimientos del piquillo’ (sweet red peppers),  ‘fabes’ (broad beans), ’pepinos’  (little gherkins), ‘aceitas’ (olives), and ‘esparagos’ (asparagus).

·      hundreds of tins of tuna and sardines, in tins of all sizes, much of it much better quality than that found in tins in the UK

·      lots of the local Basque sheep’s cheese, Idiazabal, and maybe some cheeses from Cantabria and Asturias (further along the North coast) too

·      fresh or frozen ‘croquetas’ – like potato croquettes but made with thick béchamel rather than mashed potato, and containing pieces of cheese or fish or meat

·      many different varieties of ‘jamon’ (ham) and chorizo sausage (also sold in specialist ‘charcuteria’), sliced with special knives and slicing machines

In the drinks section, some more staples:

·      'vin blanco': the local young fruity white wine, ‘Txakoli’, the standard drink here

·      'vin tinto': various red wines from nearby Rioja

·      'sidra' ('sagardo' in Basque): bottles of local cider – massively popular in the north of Spain, apples apparently grown mainly around San Sebastian and Santander rather than Bilbao

·      the Basque ‘digestif’ spirit from Navarra, ‘Patxaran’ – similar to sloe gin but made with anisette instead of gin

·      ‘mosto’: bottled grape juice, a popular non-alcoholic alternative to wine

As in other southern European countries, one thing you will not easily find is fresh milk. I’ve never understood why this is, though perhaps it has something to do with the increased risk of the milk going off in the relatively warm climate. Anyway, generally only UHT in cartons is available.  Fortunately for us, there’s a little dairy shop nearby (‘La Casa del Yogur’) which sells produce from a dairy farm in Cantabria, just along the coast. They provide a bottle, which we take and fill up twice a week from the milk machine in the shop!

Greengrocers, as one might expect, are stocked with fantastic fruit and vegetables – but two local staples stand out to the foreigner particularly:

·      most greengrocers have boxes of fresh ‘nueces’ (walnuts), ‘avellanos’ (hazelnuts) and ‘almendras’ (almonds), (and now ‘castanos’ – Chestnuts – too) which you shovel into bags along with fruit and vegetables

·      there are sometimes a dozen different types of ‘pimientos’ (red and green peppers) –  of which most are still a bit of mystery to us – though we regularly cook a favourite Basque dish, ‘pimientos de Gernika’, tasty little green peppers (not hot) fried whole with garlic, olive oil and salt.

There are also many bunches of dried red 'chorizero' peppers - similar to paprika - which are what give 'chorizo' its red colour and flavour:

Also melons (which I love) are plentiful and cheap and very good indeed – in fact I virtually live off them. There are also lots of excellent plums (‘ciruelas’), including the ‘ciruela verde’, which is a sort of large greengage, very tasty – and  wonderful stewed. (We buy a kind of stewed ‘ciruela’ conserve – under the brand name ‘Mermefruta’ (a cross between ‘mermelada’ and ‘fruta’) which we have with our yogurt for breakfast each morning!) Now that winter is here, though, oranges and satsumas and apples have replaced the peaches and plums of the summer.

For fresh fish and meat one is best to go to the amazing indoor market, known as La Ribera (‘the riverside’.)

Built in 1929 on the medieval riverside market place at the bottom of our street, it has recently been beautifully modernised and people flock there to buy from the dozens of fishmongers {‘pescaderias’) and butchers (‘carnicerias’) there.

The most popular fish here are ‘txipirones’ (squid (urgh!)), ‘merluza‘ (hake) and ‘bonito del nord’ (tuna), but there’s a huge variety of other types available too. Buying fish is tricky: the first time we went, Pietro bought something whilst I went round writing down all the Spanish names so we could look them up and find out what they are in English! There are endless disgusting slimy things like octopus and squid and prawns and crabs and so on, many of them still alive on the stalls - which are massively popular here and a staple of the local diet, but the idea of which turns my stomach.  Fortunately there are lots of 'proper' fish too, which are also very popular. And it's cheap.

A particular local speciality is 'Kokotxas' - cod or hake cheeks:

On the meat front, the  very popular local speciality is ‘morcilla’, a kind of blood sausage (urgh!), and a mildly spicy sausage similar to the North African merguez called ‘txistorra’.

There are also one or two other types of stall. One of the best stalls on the market is the mushroom stall, which sells around half a dozen different types of ‘hongos’, of which the common or garden ‘champinon’ is just one.

All these things – plus eggs, bread and potatoes – make up the essential Basque diet, and it’s combinations of these ingredients that one finds in the many bars and restaurants around the city, almost all of which serve traditional Basque food…. And that will be the topic of the next post.

I leave you with a picture of the Christmas window of our local specialist croquette shop: