Sun, Spain And Anchovies

By Urvashi Rowe

“I have a Friday and Monday off,” he said. “What? How come?” I said absentmindedly, still cleaning something or other in the kitchen. Or maybe I was on Instagram? More than likely the latter.

“School’s closed on Friday and Monday. I don’t have to go in at all,” he replied. I stopped doing whatever it was I was doing and went in search of the iPad. In the 10 or so years that my husband has been teaching we have never been able to take advantage of an impromptu long weekend. Neverrrr! Teachers do not get to take a day off during term time and before you even think that they have the ‘whole summer off’ let me give you a very hard Paddington stare.

Anyway, within the seconds it took to find said iPad I had already ruled out anywhere really cold but then Twitter put that back on the list with recommendations for Stockholm and St Petersburg. Portugal was proving a popular suggestion as were the Eastern European countries. We settled on Spain. He wanted Barcelona but I’ve been. Seville? Fully booked. Valencia? Same. San Sebastián? Hmmm bit cold. We wouldn’t be able to take advantage of the outdoor bar crawling. After about 30 minutes of searches and ‘umms’ and ‘aaahs’ we settled on Madrid. Literally in the middle of Spain. Sunny and warmish.

It was a much-needed long weekend of doing little other than eating and drinking. Talking. Properly. Reconnecting and reflecting on all things. But mostly eating. And drinking Albarino. Lots of Albarino!

We ate the rainbow in terms of fruit and vegetables. Spain however has the biggest tomatoes I have ever seen. Oh my how do the Spaniards grow the best tomatoes? I remember visiting the farms in Almeria and Murcia years ago and I don’t think I’ve ever had tomatoes better than these. Red, orange, yellow and green ones.

We also ate a lot of fish. All varieties but my favourite are anchovies. Not the salty things that get crammed into a tiny jar and then onto pizza. No. We had boquerones. These are flash frozen when caught and then marinated in olive oil and vinegar.

Perfect perfect!

And of course, everywhere we went there was local olive oil. EVOO to be precise and the Spanish varieties are well up there with the Italians and Greeks. I drenched everything in EVOO. Perfect perfect perfect! So here is my tribute to these three simple but mighty ingredients.

Anchovies, Tomatoes and Olive Oil

Ingredients: 2 to 3 large tomatoes roughly chopped in chunks of your preferred size 100g pack of boquerones which you really can find in most supermarkets now or online Extra virgin olive oil – about 4 tablespoons Coarsely ground black pepper Flat leaf parsley roughly chopped Edible flowers for decoration Bread for scooping

Method: There really isn’t much to this. Lay the tomatoes over the plate, add the boquerones. I chop them up to make them easier to pick up with the bread. Pour over the olive oil and then sprinkle on the parsley and black pepper. Toss lightly and adorn with edible flowers. Serve, scoop and savour!