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Spain – Granada to Jaen (our last days) – Day 10 & 11

By dorothy stainbrook + on May 1, 2012 in Spain - travel & recipes

IMG 2525 1024x768 Spain Granada to Jaen (our last days) Day 10 & 11

One section of outdoor spice shop in Alcaceria

Our last full day in Granada was spent shopping and visiting sites that entailed the daily routines of our daughter’s 3-month study abroad life. After a lunch at Senora’s where we had the best gazpacho I’ve ever had, our daughter went back to her classes and Cris and I went back to the Alcaceria to find spices, scarves and other presents.

We walked the city all day observing, taking pictures and shopping.

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Price of tomatoes; varieties were all red and robust

Some lessons and observations of our final days:

While the cities are clean and the food is great, it seems “everyone” smokes in Spain. Cris was quite amazed when the 20-something girl with rings in her nose started rolling her own Lucky Strikes (something he hadn’t seen since way back in Eastern Oregon). Smoking seemed to be pretty ubiquitous throughout Spain.
3 Euros is way-y too much for a bowl of gazpacho, even if it is great gazpacho. The Senora (and locals) eat this regularly in the hot summer days and good tomatoes are pretty consistently available at a reasonable price. I have reconstructed her gazpacho back at home and will post recipes later.
Passionate art in Churches of Granada

It is a perfectly normal morning occurrence for a truck loaded with individual LP gas tanks to double park on the street, honk, and holler up to residents’ balconies to see if they want gas that day;
Food can be absolutely dripping in olive oil and the Spanish people are proud to tell you that the dish has “no fat”;
You must talk in a sing-song voice when describing a list of items or a series of things;
According to some of the Granada folks, the new President was trying to “fix Spain” after only 3 weeks in power. Part of this fixing now required people to pay one euro for their prescription drugs and requiring them to pay bus fare after 5 stops. They didn’t seem to mind the President, just didn’t think he could fix Spain very quickly or easily.
Human statue in Granada's Alcaceria

Do not ever engage with, or look a gypsy in the eye when they are talking to you or you will be given the hard sell at a minimum, and be man-handled and pick-pocketed at a maximum;
You can double park anywhere in Spain, for as long as your battery can support the emergency flashers;

Parents easily, and without intent, embarrass their kids no matter what country you are in.

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Tesla at her "service project" in outskirts of Granada

On our last day in Spain, Tesla took us to see the University where she is studying and then to a lower income area of Granada where she is doing a service project with children in a program similar to the U.S.’s Headstart program. The study abroad program in Granada was such a memorable, and perhaps life-changing, experience for Tesla. If you are a college student, or have a college student, I highly recommend that you try and take advantage of the college’s study abroad program.

Food enjoyed in Jaen on our last day:

We had our last Spanish meal at a lovely restaurant that was owned by a previous matador, Vicente. The walls were covered with signed photos of celebrity matadors and we watched bull-fighting on the big TV screen as we ate (we chose to eat in the tapas (less formal) part of the restaurant so we could watch the bullfighting. The meal was fantastic and bullfighting on TV was about as close as I really wanted to get to that activity. Vicente had stories to tell and seemed really interesting, but we had left our translator back in Granada and were now on our own with smiles and hand-signals. Our meal was:

Appetizer of olives, bread and this wonderful dip made with what we thought were garbanzo beans, but they may have been pigeon peas (?), scallions, tomatoes, garlic, etc.;
Lomo (pork loin) in a sweet and sour sauce with parsnips and vegetables;
Creamed spinach with balsamic vinegar and egg;
Morcilla (Cris)

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Cris and I at Cafe Vicente in Jaen

After saying goodbye to Vicente the old matador, we headed out to the airport in Madrid to make our way back home. Goodby to Spain and the sweet memories. I think we may just have to return someday and visit the western parts of Spain and the cities we didn’t get to. I’m an ardent admirer now, that’s for sure.

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Spain – Sierra Nevada Villages: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 9

By dorothy stainbrook + on April 27, 2012 in Spain - travel & recipes

IMG 2669 1024x768 Spain Sierra Nevada Villages: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed Day 9

Typical village in Sierra Nevada's

Today was an excursion into the beautiful villages nestled in the Sierra Nevada’s, as well as an up-close and personal look into the daily life of the Andalusian people within these villages. My daughter’s Senora (the “mom” she lives with in Granada during her study-abroad program) grew up in a small village in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Senora decided we should go visit her village, and while we were there we should visit her brother, her cousins, her nieces, her sister-in-laws and perhaps some of the neighbors. You don’t really go against what Senora says, and lucky for us we didn’t even try. It was one of the best days of our trip and we got to know a part of Spain that would have been elusive to us at best.

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Village in Sierra Nevada

The mountains were beautiful, at times reminding us strongly of the Oregon Coast or the Columbia Gorge (without the water). I don’t know much about the geology of the region, but based on the type of rock and gorges I would say there was some serious tectonics going on at some point in time. The villages were regularly spaced pockets of white. There wasn’t much flat land, so they must have been located in areas that received some water. All of the homes and buildings were bright white, inside and out, and the inside of the homes were tiled and hard surfaces. I assume this was to regulate heat in the summer, but it also gave everything a very clean feel.

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Naturally carbonated spring water of the Sierra Nevada's

On our steep way up the mountains to the higher villages (where the cousins lived), we made several stops along the way. Senora came prepared with bags of empty bottles so we could gather some of the healthy, renowned carbonated spring water flowing out of the mountain at an area where five springs come together.

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Local vendor selling honey, marmalades, bee pollen, etc.

Taking advantage of a flat area where people would stop on their way to the villages were some local vendors selling their wares. I bought some bee pollen and green tomato marmalade from one, and then had a lengthy conversation with a very earthy Spanish guy about the medicinal qualities of his “hemp” products. He was quite a salesman, even though I understood very little of what he was saying. My conversation with him was eventually cut off by a very nervous daughter and her senora. He did flash me the peace sign for a picture however, and gave me a slip of paper that served as his “card”.

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Hemp vendor in Sierra Nevada's

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Local vendor selling hemp products

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Daily work in the streets of Trevelez

On to Trevelez for lunch and wine and Jamon tastings. Trevelez seems to be one of the premier Jamon regions in Andalusia and it was clearly a village whose identity was focused on the Jamon.

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Typical store and offerings in Trevelez

By this time of our trip we were getting a little burnt out on Jamon and were pleasantly surprised to taste the quality of the wine and see some of the rugs and pottery which were also a significant part of the village’s economy.

Lunch was interesting. For most of the trip I had been looking for some offerings of gazpacho in the restaurants, but I understand now that it is usually not on the menu during the colder months of winter and spring. So, when we found a restaurant in Trevelez that was offering gazpacho I was ready to jump on it. Well…..Senora had another thought about that when she saw how much they were going to charge for it. Two euros per glass! This was a “barbaridad” (barbarity?) to senora because she could make 5 liters for 2 euros. And make it she did, the very next day for our lunch (it was great and I will include a recipe later).

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Morcilla, other sausages, Jamon, Potatoes & Egg (Protein anyone?)

As far as that restaurant went however, we were out of there. We ate at a great place that Senora took us to and tried:

Cris had the blood pudding, or blood sausage again. He found it quite different from the one he had earlier in the trip, more moist with a taste of some wine in it.
Tesla and I had fried vegetables;
We all shared a wonderful ceramic carafe of wine;
Natilla for dessert (becoming one of my favorite desserts)

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Fried Vegetables for Tesla and I

Well fed, we started back up the steep roads of the Sierra Nevada’s to Senora’s villages in the Alpujarra. Had we realized how much food every visit to every relative would entail, we would have skipped lunch altogether. The Spanish people don’t really take it well if you don’t eat and drink the food they offer you, and by the end of the day we were so full of hospitality we were about to burst!

The visits with the relatives in their own homes, in their own villages, drinking wine from their own vineyards was right up there with the best parts of our trip.

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Lowering the house keys for a visit in Alpujarra

At the Senora’s brother’s house, we were greeted outside with a key on a long string dropped down to us from the balcony. We did a lot of nodding and smiling as they enthusiastically talked our ears off, we had blackberry drinks and grapes, and we left with presents of squash seeds and some mysterious seeds that will ward off mosquitos. Perfect.

At the cousins’ house and village we had the best red wine I have in a long time. They bottle and sell the Rose from their vineyard, but the “tinto” wine is just for themselves (and guests).

More visits, more “conversations”, and more food with a variety of relatives before we headed back down the mountain to Granada, where Senora fixed us dinner back at the house. My God, these people eat a lot.

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Senora, her brother and sister-in-law on visit to Alpujarra

It’s interesting because my daughter has actually lost weight since she has lived with Senora, even though she eats well and often. It’s all about how much she has to walk. She averages walking about 2 hours a day because she walks to school, walks to events, walks to shopping, and essentially walks all the time. Remember the book “French Women Don’t Get Fat”? I think the whole premise is around this walking the Europeans do within their villages and cities. The parking and narrowness of the streets in Spain certainly makes driving everywhere a lot less attractive, and a lot less efficient than just walking.

IMG 2653 300x225 Spain Sierra Nevada Villages: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed Day 9

Senora, Tesla and Cris: Carbonated Spring Water in Sierra Nevada's

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Spain: Holy Week in Granada: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 8

By dorothy stainbrook + on April 25, 2012 in Spain - travel & recipes

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“Christ of the Judgement” float, depicting sentencing of Jesus

It has been Holy Week in Spain since we arrived and today (Sunday, April 8th) marks the end of a series of “procesions” happening daily in the villages and cities throughout Spain. Seville, in the Andalusia province, seems to be the epicenter of the Easter processions, but as we cannot make it there on Sunday, we will watch several processions in Granada where my daughter is living. *note: if you call these processions “parades” many of the Spanish people will not understand you.

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“Christ of the Judgement” float showing acting out of sentencing

While they celebrate the passion of the final events surrounding Jesus Christ’s life (especially the betrayal, the crucifixion, and the resurrection), it is not a light, frivolous type of parade celebration, but rather a respectful, somber remembering. The raucous, lighter celebration in Seville comes later, at the end of April. This is know as the April Fair and is apparently a very merry celebration with plenty of eating and drinking revelry.

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Float of the Virgin Mary

The processions start at the churches and end at the church, and there is usually only one float per procession. The float itself is artistically intricate and is comprised of pieces of artwork that reside in the church itself all year long.

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Men carrying float of Virgin Mary on backs

One of the astounding things to me is the floats are carried on the backs of people (men), all adding to the pain and suffering that surrounds the Easter events. The men bear the floats on their head and necks and carry the floats in 20-minutes shifts. The floats can weigh up to 2 tons, and it is said that some men carry the float until they collapse.

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Penitentes getting ready for Procesion

The hooded penitents, talked about in an earlier post, lead the procession, swinging incense and setting the serious tone. The penitents are often followed by a band with beating drums or wailing singers… introducing the float. The finale on Sunday is typically a float of the Virgin Mary, representing the hope of resurrection.

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Alhambra from the top of the Albaycin

After the processions and lunch back at Senora’s house, we took the cab up to the Albaycin to view the Alhambra. The Alhambra is noted in all the travel books as a sight not to miss, and I’m sure it is spectacular. Based on our own individual interests and time constraints, we chose to view the Alhambra from afar (the top of the Albaycin) and not take a tour of the inside.

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Harpist at the Albaycin

The Albaycin area itself was such a throwback to the 70′s for Cris and I. It seemed to be a utopian mecca of hippies enjoying themselves in the same way they did back in our own college days in Eugene, Oregon.

The first person we came across was the harpist with dreadlocks, and as the smell of marijuana increased, so did the number of dogs and smiling hippies (not to be confused with hipsters). The similarities of the Albaycin to Eugene in the 70′s were remarkable: juggling, marijuana, lots of dogs, long hair (though dreadlocks had not come in at that time), love/peace/community, and the need of hot showers.

The things we noticed that had changed were: the dogs did not have scarves on their necks, there weren’t as many nursing moms and babies, and there were a lot more tatoos. Ah, love that some things remain the same even in the new world of technology.

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Spain – Avila, Toledo & Granada: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 7

By dorothy stainbrook + on April 22, 2012 in Spain - travel & recipes

IMG 2472 Avila closeup 1024x645 Spain Avila, Toledo & Granada: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed Day 7

Walls around Avila

Avila was our starting place this morning, with Toledo in mind as the place we would spend most of the day, then ending up back in Granada at my daughter’s study abroad home (with her “other mom” as she calls her).

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Avila, encircled by medieval walls

Avila, a national landmark, is an ancient city completely encircled by perfectly preserved medieval walls. Unfortunately we missed the treat of eating the Yemas. Yemas are pastries made by the local nuns that are likened to soft-boiled egg yolks that have been cooled and sugared. Sounds like something I could get in to….next time I guess.

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Tesla & Cris with Cervantes (Don Quixote)

Most of our day was spent in Toledo, and it is a day we will never forget! Cris’s shirt has permanent sweat stains, and we’re talking that cold sweat that comes from unmitigated fear. Seeing Spain by car allowed us to set our own schedule and get into places the buses would not go, but in Toledo we got sucked into a maze of very narrow, steep, cobblestone streets where no car should ever go. Add to that the gawkers and tourists in the streets and you have the perfect storm of “what not to do while in Spain”. This is one of those times when we should have read our touring book, where it noted: “…streets barely wide enough for a man and his donkey, let alone an automobile.” It was a nightmare of a maze and it took us forever to get out of it. We were definitely ready for a few bottles of that touted Spanish sherry when we got out!

Food enjoyed in Toledo:

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vino de Jerez finos

We ate at one of the more expensive places listed in the travel books we had with us, Asador Adolfo, and while it was good, it didn’t live up to the words in the book.

The Spanish sherry, vino de Jerez, we had heard so much about was wonderful; we had finos, the dry one;
Tesla had a squid dish that was really good
I provided the laughs by hoarding the dessert and scowling if their forks came near it (and it wasn’t even mine – it came with Cris’s meal…oh well). I’m not sure what it was, but it was great! Some sort of layered tiramisu-type dish.

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Squid at Adolfos in Toledo

Dessert at Adolfos

Lessons Learned:

Spanish women can walk on cobblestone and everywhere else with stiletto heels; tennis shoes with crew socks and capris are a true “tell” that you’re a tourist, probably American.
Spain is very aware of water and energy use. You order water in restaurants if you want it, there are signs in every hotel asking you not to let the water run, lights in many areas are timed or motion-sensitive, very few dryers in residences, you pay 2 cents at the grocery store if you want a plastic bag, and there are many, many smart cars on the road.
If you visit Toledo by car, park your car, get out and walk!!! Even smart cars will have trouble driving in these streets.

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Spain – Santander to Segovia: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 6

By dorothy stainbrook + on April 21, 2012 in Spain - travel & recipes

Bay of Biscay to Segovia to Madrid

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Jamon Sampling Setup in Santander

We got up early to do some shopping and sightseeing in Santander and Santilliano del Mar along the northern coast (or Bay of Biscay). Shopping was focused around food and wine, and we visited many of the gourmet deli shops. Most of them offered samples of quality olive oils, cheeses, wines and, of course, Jamon. The sampling set-up for the Jamon was efficient, but looked a little barbaric if you are not a meat-eater.

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Shopping in Santander

We bought some wonderful olive oil, a box of membrillo and some balsamic vinegar. We asked everywhere about the ability to bring Jamon Seranno back on the plane, as the customs booklet was not very clear on the requirements. Everyone had a different opinion. We decided to try to bring back only a vacuum-packed chorizo package rather than an expensive type of Jamon. Fortunately we went this route because even the vacuum-packed meat was taken from us in customs. They said a man came through last week with some expensive Jamon, which they confiscated, and then they fined him $300.00 on top of that for not declaring it on his customs sheet. I told the customs officials it was not clear on their website what was allowed and they got rather defensive, pulled out their customs booklet, started to read it…..and then just stopped and moved us on. Hm-m-m.

On to Burgos:

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Morcilla in window of shop

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Gothic Cathedral in Burgos

Food enjoyed in Burgos:

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Garbanzo Bean Soup in Burgos

We stopped for lunch in a small (two-table plus bar) restaurant on the Plaza de Santa Maria by the elaborate Cathedral de Santa Maria in Burgos. The family running this restaurant was having soup from a big cauldron. It was not on the menu but it looked good, with garbanzo beans, greens, Bacalao and eggs. We asked if we could have some of that stew/soup and they were delighted to serve us family style. Tesla didn’t feel well so she wasn’t eating as much as the restaurant family thought she should and they started to worry that she didn’t like the soup. When they found out her stomach hurt, the home remedies started coming out quickly. She was served some great mint tea for her stomach and given a lot of advice. Advice flowed freely at this restaurant…between the family, to the customers, and anyone else that happened to be within earshot (see lessons learned below).

They ended our meal with a french toast type of dessert that was also served family style with them. I think we became part of their American family by liking their food, asking questions, and having a sick child. It was a great meal!

Lessons Learned on this leg of trip:

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Finally a "to go" coffee from McDonalds - "Large"

Coffee comes in small, strong units, even when ordered as “Americano” and even when ordered from McDonalds. Cris had a hard time with this and although he loved the Jamon, he was happy to get back to his large mug of weak American coffee.
Most restaurants are family owned and the smaller ones will often treat you like family; we started quite an animated, argument amongst the family members and customers in Burgos when we asked if we could bring Jamon back to the states on the plane. Mom, dad, grandpa, the aunts and all the customers got into a debate on what was the correct answer and what their “friends’ experiences were. They completely forgot about us during the heated debate and the question never did get answered.
Mint tea will be offered if you don’t eat their food enthusiastically. Vinegar and oil will be rubbed around your nose if you are stuffed up.

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Spain – Granada to Jaen (our last days) – Day 10 & 11

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Spain – Sierra Nevada Villages: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 9

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Spain: Holy Week in Granada: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 8

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Spain – Avila, Toledo & Granada: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 7

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Spain – Santander to Segovia: Lessons Learned and Food Enjoyed – Day 6

Bay of Biscay to Segovia to Madrid

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