Cuisines of Spain

empanada in progress

Two nights ago I started cooking from The Cuisines of Spain by Teresa Barrenechea, which I chose because . . .  because I was spending too much time thinking about which Spanish cookbook to use and just had to pick one. Plus Cuisines has to go back to the library soon. It's a large, handsome hardcover with lots of Saveur-style photographs and a library warning on the cover that says "Do not check in until checked for damage" which means I can't use it as a cutting board.

Sunday I made Barrenechea's marmitako, a Basque tuna soup. Have you bought a pound of fresh tuna lately? I won't be doing that again any time soon. The expensive soup that resulted from the tuna, green peppers and tablespoon of paprika managed to be both watery and oily. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't exactly good. Did I do something wrong? Is this the nature of marmitako? Or is this the nature of Barrenachea's marmitako? It would help if I had eaten marmitako before.

I'm very excited about all the Spanish custard desserts in Barrenechea's book, because this spring we are being crushed beneath an avalanche of backyard eggs and drowned in a river of goat's milk. (Alright, it's a slight exaggeration about the goat's milk, but not the eggs.) The first eggy dessert I tried: crema catalana, which is just like creme brulee, except in Spain they use milk rather than cream, and they cook the custard on the stovetop rather than baking it in a water bath. 

Thank you hens, thank you Natalie.

Flavored with cinnamon and lemon, this was lovely and a very bright yellow, but it wasn't as silky as creme brulee. Possible reasons:

a. cooking custard on the stove results in a less silky product than baking
b. milk yields a less silky product than cream
c. goat's milk yields a less silky product than cow's milk
d. Barrenechea's recipe is off in some way

I think the answer is b, but would be able to assess better if I had ever eaten crema catalana before.

Thanks again for the torch, Dad.

What I have eaten before is empanada. We ate lots and lots of empanada on our trip to Galicia and I can say with confidence that Barrenechea's scallop empanada, which I made last night, is a very correct empanada. Delicious!

There wasn't enough dough for decorations.

On another subject, we have a new milking stand.

It's a huge improvement, although I wish it had a metal floor instead of rug-like matting, which collects leaves and clumps of filth like lint. We moved the milking operations away from the other goats, which has made the process easier, but the stand is now in full view of the street and you feel like you're milking on a stage.

You can see why we needed a new one.