And to end this report on a happier note...more food!!!!
Saturday night a couple of friends invited me for dinner on one of many spanish food restaurants in the city. With the high influx of immigrants from Spain (and Italy and Portugal), you'll find that many of these restaurants will have food as good as what you could get in Spain.
We decided to go with "tapas" or appetizers instead of a regular entree. We had fried spanish peppers (they aren't hot at all, in fact, their flavor is a little on the sweet side),
"chistorras", a variety of sausages,
...and "pulpo a la gallega": octopus with potatoes seasoned with paprika:
The octopus was cooked to perfection, which is not an easy feat, too much or too little cooking time and you end up with a chewie mess with suckers. But this one was outstanding. We had a few brewskies to wash it all down. Salud!
On sunday we were invited for lunch by some good friends of the family. As some of my posts may have hinted, my parents are spanish immigrants, and so are most of their friends. When I knew I was going over there for the holidays I kinda hinted (ok, I asked) I wanted this particular lady to cook me some particular spanish dish, since she makes a mean "cocido gallego".
When we got there she was finishing preparing "empanada gallega" with the most traditional filling, cod fish:
The "cocido" is like a stew, in which you cook veggies and meats in a huge pot. On the veggie side: mustard or collard greens, cabagge, chickpeas and potatoes:
The meats are usually beef, pork ribs, bacon and other pork bits....like snout, ears, tongue... The bacon and ribs on this dish are not the regular bacon and ribs you buy at any store. These are salted, cured pork ribs and bacon, that are de-salted before cooked. I imagine this goes back to the days when most people didn't have power, let alone a fridge, and had to figure other ways to preserve meat.
This dish is usally served with "filloas", or crepes,
..and then eaten in the company of family and friends
After this artery-clogging, yet delicious lunch (followed by some empanada by mid-afternoon) I went home, but not before stopping to get a pciture of the "Cruz del Avila", a huge cross on the side of the mountain that is lighted every year during the holiday season, and can be seen pretty much everywhere in the city
This brings to conclusion my trip report. I got back to TX a couple of days ago. It was a great visit with the family and the old stomping grounds, but I'm also glad to be back in the USA. Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed it!