This week’s book was: The Book of Tapas by Simone and Ines Ortega, and Jose Andres. It pretty much does what it says on the tin and has every kind of tapas you can imagine. Sunday lunch was a tapas feast. We started with Jamon Iberico, olives and bread. Next up were ham croquettes, garlic shrimp (gambas aijo), then hake in green sauce, tortilla, Roasted Mixed Vegetables, Potatoes with Chorizo, Pork Skewers – this was a Sam and Sam Clark recipe (of Morro fame). Lunch finished up with Rice Pudding – a recipe by Jose Pizarro (of Brindisa fame). All washed down with Manzanilla sherry, San Miguel and a fine Rioja from the Wine Society. This was a lot of work, but we set up our breakfast area as a tapas bar, so the family sat on that side, and I produced most of the recipes from the kitchen. Mrs B did some fine work on the barbecue for the pork skewers. All the dishes were good, with the croquettes, garlic shrimp, and tortilla being excellent.
The rice pudding was the most outstanding dish we cooked and will be my new go-to recipe for rice pudding. It had a similar consistency to a well known tinned rice pudding but with lemon and orange zest and cinnamon with some other spices—all in all, a fantastic way to spend a few hours as a family. Later in the week, we did Rice with Chicken and Green Beans. Think of what a Spanish Biryani might be like, and you’ll be there. It was a straightforward, delicious weeknight dinner. All in all, The Book of Tapas was pretty good, and the tapas lunch was fab. Next week is the first week in Advent, so we have gone out of sequence for the first time to a festive cookbook: Scandinavian Christmas.