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Etles – a taste of Northern China in Walthamstow

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My previous visit to Bang Bang Food Hall in Colindale opened my eyes to the massive variety within regional Chinese cuisine and left me curious to try more. Luckily, on a recent trip to Walthamstow I was able to further explore at Etles, a restaurant which specialises in Uyghur food from Northern China. A fascinating mixture of all the influences along the Silk Road (smoky, burnt aubergines, cumin flavoured meat skewers and hand-pulled noodles), Uyghur cuisine is a wonderful mash up of many flavours you probably wouldn’t think were traditionally “Chinese” at all.

When presented with the menu, the inclusion of pictures is extremely useful, as every dish was very new and unfamiliar. This may well be your experience on visiting too, given that Etles was the first Ughur restaurant in London (there’s now one more in Finsbury Park). But don’t worry- the helpful staff are more than happy to give recommendations and make suggestions.

Sharing between three, we chose the Hong Shou Yu (marinated seabass with mixed fresh herbs), the Lagman (handpulled noodles with stir-fried fresh beef and vegetables) and Liang Ban Niu Rou (beef marinated in fresh herbs and spices served with bell pepper and vinegar sauce). The menu is also very offal heavy, so we felt inclined to throw some kidney kebabs in there too.

The lagman (below) is recommended as a must-try on the menu, and it was definitely the stand out dish of the night. The hand-pulled noodles were cooked al dente and made the perfect, carby base for the mix of beef and veggies in a rich, cumin-spiked tomato-y sauce. Ginger and garlic stood out as strong flavours that tied the soft beef together with the various vegetables in the dish.

Lagman: beef with vegetables and hand-pulled noodles

As an offal enthusiast, the beef kidney kebabs were right up my street. Sprinkled with a cumin salt, these were rich in flavor with a pleasantly chewy texture. The seabass, just peaking through in the left corner in the photo below, came in a thick sweet and sour sauce which I really liked, however overall this dish lost points due to the bone-meat ratio of the fish. Lots of small bones and not enough fish = frustrated diners.

The second beef dish with the herby, vinegar-y sauce was good but lacked the delicious hand-pulled noodles and rich sauce of the lagman. 

Top left is the Liang Ban Niu Rou, with the seabass just peeking through on the right. Kidney kebabs and Lagman noodles too.

All these new and exciting plates brought about familiar flavors but combined in a way I’ve never tried before. It’s not just unlike any Chinese meal I’ve ever had but actually unlike any other cuisine; the melting pot of cultural influences on this region make for a great cusine.

All this, and I’ve not even mentioned one of the restaurant’s main draw…it’s BYOB! So don’t delay any further. Pick up your favourite bottle of wine, head on to the end (or beginning?) of the Victoria line and have a meal at Etles. This is Chinese cuisine unlike you’ve ever eaten, and well worth trying.

El Obrero & Pizzería Güerrin – two Buenos Aires institutions

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The food scene in Buenos Aires has changed dramatically since I lived there in 2013. While Asian food was once limited to sushi with cream cheese (ew) and the only beer available was a watery Quilmes, it’s now not hard to get a good bowl of Ramen and a delicious pint of craft beer.

Despite the new flavours and trends that have worked their way into Buenos Aires, the real charm of the city’s restaurants lies in the ones that have been around long enough to witness the country’s history, from dictatorships to economic crashes and whatever else gets thrown at it.

Two Buenos Aires restaurants that have an impressive 150 years of business between them are Pizzería Güerrin and El Obrero. Always on my “must visit” list, I finally got the chance to try them out in my most recent trip to Argentina’s capital.

Pizza arrived in Argentina along with Italian immigration, and from the late 1800s, pizza argentina was born. Pizza al molde is the most common pizza you’ll find over here – expect a thick, doughy base with an otherworldly amount of cheese on top. Pizzería Güerrin specialises in al molde, so it was time to carb and cheese myself up. 

Pizza Argentina in all its beauty @ Pizzería Güerrin 

My boyfriend and I ordered two very Argentine pizza toppings; jamón y morrón (ham and red pepper) and fugazetta, basically an onion pizza with extraordinary amounts of cheese on top.

No room for tomato here. In order to eat our porciones like proper porteños, we chose to add on two pieces of fainá, a chickpea bread made to sit on top on your porción de pizza, in the unlikely event that your mammoth cheese tower on top of dough doesn’t fill you up.

Fainá is weird: spongy and oily with quite a non-distinctive taste. Still, I always order myself one. If I’m going to eat the odd beast that is pizza a la argie, I’m going to do it properly.

Pizzeria Güerrin

You should definitely visit a classic Pizzería when in Buenos Aires – they’re a slice (excuse the pun) of history and a way to sample one of the countries most loved traditions; prop yourself up on a stool, chow down on a porción and watch the city go by.

As it’s near enough impossible to write a blog post about Argentina and not touch on a least a bit of beef, I feel it’d be rude not to mention the meal I had at El Obrero, an old-school bodegón with waiters who may well have worked there since its opening in 1954. El Obrero is next to the port of La Boca, which explains the fish dishes on its menu, a rare sight in cow-crazy BsAs. While the various fish dishes looked appealing four days into a meat marathon around the city, the smell of the barbecue whispered my name, and thus my meal was chosen.

El Obrero – La Boca, Buenos Aires

I ordered an entraña (skirt steak in English), a cut that comes from next to the cow’s chest and is long and thin in shape – best cooked fast and hot to seal in all the flavour. My boyfriend showed his racial origins as he opted for a Milanesa a la Neapolitana – a veal schnitzel with cheese, ham and tomato on top. Meat on meat, which some cheese and veg to soften the blow. You can take the boy out of Buenos Aires…

Argentina…I love you.

I nip to the loo and am met with a look of horror on my boyfriends face when I return…then I see the portions. Really, really, bloody gigantic portions. We could have easily fed a family of five. Never people to be defeated by a meal, we cracked on and chowed down. The meat was excellent and cooked extremely rare, just as I had ordered it, but surprisingly not how many Argentines like their meat – it’s pretty much well done, always. While I’ll never order a milanesa to myself, preferring to deal with the proper meaty bits rather than breadcrumbed and cheese coated, this milanesa was by far one of the best I’ve ever tried.

Washed down with house red and soda water (so good, you should try it), we eventually, miraculously, managed to finish the meal.

Making headway on the ginourmous lunch…

Despite its humble beginnings, El Obrero is now in every guidebook, and while it retains its proper porteño charm, the prices definitely reflect its popularity amongst tourists. Still, I recommend you go and try some traditional Argentine dishes and soak up the ambience of the place, as it doesn’t get more Argentine than this. 

Bidmead in Berlin (again) – German Cheesecake recipe

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BidmeadBites visited Berlin back in 2015 and ate a bit of everything; from the classic Currywurst to Peruvian ceviche. Revisiting recently with my mum and sister, food highlights included some terrific Taiwanese dishes at Lon Men’s Noodle House and traditional frikadellen (meatball-esque German beef patties) back at Markthalle Neun, the cities funnest food market. But what I want to focus on in this post is cake. Oh, do the Germans know a bit about cake.

Cheesecake, to be specific.

German cheesecakes have a soft shortcrust pastry base and a filling which replaces the cream cheese used in typical New York cheesecakes with quark,  a sort of strained cottage cheese which is then mixed in with butter, sugar and whipped egg white. Below are three different slices I tried, with a pastry base/a pastry base and crust/filled with gooseberries. All in the name of recipe research…

Cheesecake no. 1: @ Oliv Caf, Mitte

Cheesecake no. 2: @ Markthalle Neun, Kreuzberg

Cheesecake no. 3: Gooseberry filled at KaDaWe Foodhall

Looking to recreate this recipe at home, I took inspiration from a cheesecake recipe in a wonderfully old retro cookbook named “The Sainsburys Book of Puddings & Desserts” (published in 1980, and still one of my favourite baking books). The use of semolina and ground almonds adds richness to the quark, which is often sold in a very low-fat version. While the traditional pastry bottom in the German cheesecake is definitely a welcome addition, the labour intensive descriptions of handling this dough are less appealing. I anglicised the German recipe to include a traditional digestive base, because biscuits mixed with truck loads of butter is never a bad thing.

Find my tweaked German (ish) recipe below! I slightly overcooked mine, so I recommend keeping a beady eye of for the browning of your cake on the top. Once cooked, do try to wait until it’s fully chilled to eat – the wait is worth it I promise.

Retro German/English cheesecake

Use a 9 inch (23 cm) cake tin.

For biscuit base:

  • 200 grams digestive biscuits
  • 100 grams butter

For cake:

  • 100 grams butter
  • 150 grams caster sugar
  • Grated rind and juice of one lemon
  • 400 grams quark
  • 3 eggs, seperated
  • 75 grams ground almonds
  • 50 grams semolina (if you don’t have this to hand, you can just sub in the same amount of ground almonds)

Method

Before you start….Preheat open to 180 degrees. Line cake tin.

  1. Firstly make your base. Either put biscuits in a big sandwich bag and bash with a rolling pin until you have fine crumbs, or put in a food processor to crush them up. Melt butter completely and mix in with biscuits, then press biscuits into base of tin until you have a nice compact biscuit base. Pop into warm oven for 10 minutes to cook, then remove.
  2. Now for the filling. Cream the butter, sugar and lemon rind together until light and fluffy. Beat in quark gradually, then mix in the egg yolks and beat thoroughly. Add the almonds, semolina and lemon juice and mix well. Whisk the eggs whites until stiff and carefully fold into the cheese mixture.
  3. Spoon into your lined cake line and bake for 50-60 minutes. Turn off oven and leave until cold (if you can manage to wait!).

An English/German lovechild take on the cheesecake

Bidmead back in Barranquilla – Feb 2018

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Nearly three years have passed since I left Barranquilla, where I lived for 12 months while working as a British Council language assistant. As London’s bitter winter intensified, my thoughts wandered to the sun, salsa and downright lovely locura that is my beloved Barranquilla. It was high time I headed back.

Arriving just as carnival was about to commence, I danced, drunk and shook my stuff with the rest of the city, while also revisiting all my favourite Colombian foods.

I’ve published various Barranquilla posts while living there (fried ear and salsa dancing here, how to make your own ajiaco here – just search “Barranquilla” on the home page for more), and in fear of repetition I’ll keep this one brief. Here’s a snappy rundown of my top Barranquilla bites.

First stop was La Immaculada, one of the cities top fruteras, around since 1982. A frutera is the place to head for fresh juices and fried goodies (aptly named fritos).

Frutera Immaculada

Fruit juice and fried goods

What did I eat? A carimañola (meat filed pastry with dough made from yucca) and a dedito (cheesy finger), alongside nispero and mandarin juice, plus the obligatory ají (chilli) sauce.

Mondongo is one of my favourite typical soups and a perfect embodiment of the nose-to-tail approach within Colombian cuisine whereby no meat is left to waste. Made mainly from tripe, the slow cooking of the stomach breaks it down from chewy to smooth, with a rich meaty flavour. Accompanied by yucca, potato and plantain, the flavour is picked up by a sprinkling of coriander and a squeeze of lime.

Mmmm…Mondongo, I’ve missed you (please note my fantastic nails too)

Returning to Barranquilla I realised how things we might consider as exotic at home (huge avocados, fresh coconuts and exotic fruits) are really just everyday alimentation for the costeños. Just look at this coconut lolly I had on route back from the beach – homemade and bought from someone’s front garden, this beats a pre-packaged Twister any day.

Beach life = eating coconut lollies

Or how about this lovely lady, serving half or whole avocados to accompany people’s fish lunches by the river? The sweetness and intense flavour of this avocado has thoroughly ruined any future avo-on-toast I may be tempted to buy while out for overpriced brunches back home.

Best avocados EVER

Want to stop to quench your thirst in the mid-day sun? Why not grab an ice-cold coconut, sold on the side of the road. Sit down, sip the juice, and then ask your coconut vendor to machete open the shell for you in order to enjoy the sweet and creamy flesh.

Casual coco frio on the side of the street

Being back in Barranquilla, I slipped straight into my old routines and felt quite quickly that I’d never want to leave. But as my ten days flew by, London and it’s grey but homely skies were calling. I’ll always have a bit of my heart tied to Colombia’s coast, and now will aim to head back more often. In the meantime, I’ll be looking to recreate some Barranquillero recipes in my Brixton kitchen, so stay posted!

“Quien lo vive es quien lo goza” – offical phrase of Barranquilla carnival

Bidmead Bites in Barcelona

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Whether it’s fried squid in the south or a cooked suckling pig in Madrid, Spain and its cuisine have long been an interest of mine. Escaping London for the New Year, my boyfriend and I headed off for four days holiday in Barcelona, where I had more than ample opportunity to eat and drink the cities edible offerings.

No sooner had we stepped off the airport bus than we were already chowing down on some churros. Expertly fried to be crunchy rather than greasy and generously filled with creme patisserie, this street snack was just a small amuse bouche for the great things to come.

Sugar coated, deep fried things of beauty – Churros

Whoever coined the phrase less is more must have been a fan of pan con tomate, or pa amb tomaquet as it’s known in Catalan. This simple snack is my favourite Spanish breakfast and consists of, as the name might imply, bread with tomato. The addition of olive oil, salt and sometimes garlic bring it together, but all in all this dish is a simple as it gets.

Breakfasting at the beautiful cafe Mauri in the Eixample neighbourhood, I had all the pan con tomate my heart desired (three pieces no less). Washed down with a cafe cortado, I was set to start the day.

Pan con tomate at Cafe Mauri

While the Spaniards love a caña (a little less than half a pint of beer, drunk at pretty much any hour of the day), they’re also partial to a bit of  vermouth. A sweet and aromatic fortified wine which was once the drink of elderly gentlemen, it’s now become extremely popular, with trendy new vermuterias popping up all over the city.

Far from modern (it’s positively ancient), you have Bar Montse, tucked away in the Barrio Gótico. Barrels of homemade vermouth sit opposite walls of spirits and liqueurs covered in cobwebs. Not so appetising to eat in, but wonderfully atmospheric for a quick drink to quench the sightseeing induced thirst, here we enjoyed a little vermouth sat on one of the tables outside.

Barrels of homemade vermouth at Bar Monste

For lunch, we headed to Bar Celta, a small pulpería in Barceloneta which specialises in, you guessed it, pulpo (squid en inglés).

Fish and seafood make up the majority of the menu, but tempting meat options such as my favourite blood sausage morcilla serve to please the fish-fearing customer amongst us. Ignoring the meat (minus some delightful ham croquettes to start with), we honed in on the seafood; grilled prawns, steamed razor clams and of course, squid.

Squid as the starring member of lunch at Bar Celta

Normally served on a bed of potatoes, at Bar Celta this came carb-free, meaning with the focus on the tender squid itself. A dusting of paprika on top served to boost its smoky flavour. The prawns and razor clams both came steamed and then grilled, topped with buttery parsley sauce. Again – sometimes, simple is best. Visit here for some fresh Spanish food and service with a smile.

Steamed razor clams (navajas) and squid at Bar Celta

Race for the squid!

Located in the San Antoni neighbourhood is vermouth bar and all round top snack joint Quimet & Quimet. Don’t expect to find a seat – this is prop yourself up on the bar and eat with your hands kind of venue, serving small tapas and high quality montaditos – rusky rounds of crunchy bread come topped with meat, fish, and often both together (you’ll find veggie options too…if you look hard enough).

Vermouth in hand, I was ready to eat.

Munching montaditos at Quimet + Quimet

The tangy artichoke mixed with the creamy cheese, sweet tomato and intensely savoury caviar was a well-thought out combination of flavours. This savoury and sweet mixture also featured in the meat montadito; a rich pâté with smoked mushrooms, drizzled with a honey dressing.

For when the midday meal calls for something more substantial, a menú del día is the perfect option. Three courses and a drink normally come in at around 10-13 euros, and if you seek them out these can be some of the best meals around.

One such restaurant offering a brilliant menu is Transatlantico restaurant. First dishes varied from traditional Catalan meat and potato soup (escudella) to cauliflower cheese; the options for the second dish range from cod right through to horse.

Eschewing all things equestrian and sticking to more familiar foods, I chose a stuffed aubergine for starter, but quickly got food envy of all the paella that was coming out of the kitchen. Wondering how greedy it’d be to convert my three-course lunch into a four plate affair, I asked about the option of adding on an extra paella. It’d cost me all of 4 euros… I was sold.

Beef ribs & chips, paella and cod and ratatouille

My boyfriend chose beef ribs and chips (because too much seafood is against an Argentine’s DNA), while I had cod with pisto, basically a Spanish ratatouille. Pudding was a wonderfully retro affair, with a flan and a sweet cheese mousse, which was so good it made me think it was probably just pure Philadelphia cheese and whipped cream. Bliss.

Sweet cheese mousse and flan to finish off our menu del dia

During our time in the city, we ate and drink like royalty for just a fraction of the price we would have in London, and were left hungry for more. My love affair with Spain will continue, which is just as well…I’m not full yet, and I’ll be back.

Da Maria, Notting Hill

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Disclaimer: As a North Londoner who’s moved South and rarely visits West, I did not stumble upon this post’s restaurant perchance; it was the review of the great Jay Rayner that led me there. Read his review here.

Italian food is hard to dislike. Pizza, pasta, flavoursome tomatoes and gelato galore, this is a cuisine which can tempt even the pickiest of eaters. It’s seen a bit of a revival of late, moving away from the sea of soulless Bella Italia-esque chain options and into the kitchens of many exciting and trendy small-plate serving central London restaurants (see: Bocca Di Lupo, Polpetto).

Neither a fancy mini-plate affair or part of any kind of chain, Da Maria in Notting Hill offers up Italian food untouched by trends or franchises.

Proper, home-cooked Italian meals made by someone’s Nonna (called Maria, you’ll be surprised to hear) are served on red and white wipe-down table cloths, in a tiny narrow restaurant that seats about 25 people max. The food is inexpensive (the most costly dish is a chicken Milanese at £13, with most main dishes between £6-£9) and the service is full of smiles, strong Italian accents and real Neapolitan spirit.

Eating with a group of Argentines, who if they had it their way would have supper at midnight on a school night, we sat down slightly later to eat. A 9:30pm start meant we had missed the arancini and had to divide the last remaining potato croquette in five. But oh, what a fifth it was! Whipped mashed potato mixed with cheese and coated in a crispy breadcrumb, this starter embodies carbohydrates done right. 

Potato croquette and Aubergine parmigiana

We accompanied this with a aubergine parmigiana to share, which was equally well received; the aubergine was silky soft without being oily, topped with fragrant tomato basil sauce which mixed perfectly with the layers of cheese.

Main courses on offer include Neapolitan pizzas, pasta plates and bakes, with meaty options such a chicken cacciatore and meatballs with roast potatoes. Clearly fans of cheesy pasta bakes, my partner and I shared a lasagna and cannelloni between us. I expected bechamel sauce in my lasagna (and would have been positively upset if it didn’t feature), but was surprised to see it on top of the spinach and ricotta filled cannelloni. Combined with the already rich filling, I though the cannelloni would have benefited more from a slightly lighter sauce. The lasagna, rich but rightfully so, was therefore the preferred dish; glorious, meaty oil oozed out of its layers and mixed into the bechamel sauce (no complaints about its presence here).

Spinach & ricotta cannelloni and beef lasagna

For pudding, sadly the Neapolitan cheesecake had run out (another reason to arrive earlier!), but we were amply substituted with a selection of lemon cake, Caprese cake (chocolate and almond) and tiramisu. The lemon cake was sweet with a counter citric twang, and the chocolate cake, with bashed up amaretti biscuits inside, had a great flavour but crumbly texture, which could have benefited from some cream on the side to smooth it altogether.

Trio of puds: Caprese cake, Tiramisu + Lemon cake

The star of the show was the tiramisu, constructed with delicate lady finger biscuits that held their structure despite the drenching of coffee and booze. Sandwiched together with a mascarpone cream, this was the perhaps the best I’ve ever had. All these puddings were topped off perfectly with complimentary servings of limoncello. This is the kind of hospitality that keeps their customers coming back… along with the outstanding lasagna and tiramisu. And really, why would you go to an Italian restaurant to eat anything else?

Da Maria
87 Notting Hill Gate, Kensington, London W11 3JZ

Bang Bang Oriental Food Hall – the gem of Colindale

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Oriental City, Colindale’s very own China Town in a shopping centre, shut down in 2008, taking with it not only the games arcade where I became a dance-dance machine champion but also its much-loved food court.

While Colindale may seem like an unlikely home to one of London’s newest and most exciting food markets, in what was once Oriental City’s place now stands a newly rebuilt and re-branded food hall – Bang Bang Oriental food hall.

Hosting 33 stalls from all over the Asian continent, Bang Bang is a far cry from its run-down but well-loved predecesor. This newly rebuilt food court is impeccably clean and well laid out, with all the food stalls set on the edge of a large hall.

Buzzing Bang Bang

The variety of stalls include Vietnamese, Malaysian, Korean and a huge mix of regional Chinese cuisine. Visiting for the first time with my family, everyone had a preference: a plate of roast duck for mum, some seafood noodle dumplings for my sister and a beef cutlet katsu for my dad. My requests for chicken feet and tripe noodle soup were sadly rejected, but you can’t blame an offal enthusiast for trying.

As you order from different stalls, you receive a buzzer, which eagerly vibrates once your food is ready. Hold onto your receipt for each purchase, as you trade this in along with your buzzer when you go to collect your plate. The nature of having different vendors means receiving all dishes at once is unlikely, but it’s actually quite nice to go trying each plate as it comes and spreading out the meal.

Squid skewers and beef katsu

My dad felt a little disappointed with his katsu, as the sauce came separately and was more breaded beef fillet than curry. I thought the batter was nicely crispy and not too oily, although the meat was tough.  We ordered cuttlefish skewers which had a wonderfully smokey flavor, but they needed to be eaten quickly before the squid turned rubbery.

Noodle dumplings and deep-fried wontons

These hand pulled noodle dumplings where a success; they had a smooth, gelatinous texture with a fresh and light prawn filling. The fried seafood dumplings were like an oriental-flavored onion bhaji, so had very little about them to not love.  I’d give the star plate badge to the roast duck – deliciously rich with a thick layer of soft fat nuzzled under the crispy skin, this was by far my favorite dish.

Hong Kong style duck from the Four Seasons stand

While all these plates sated our savory hunger, of course we still had our dessert stomachs to fill. My sister and I set off to explore and were lured in by the Wonderful Patisserie stall, which smelled like baked cookies and bread – not a taro or bean curd bun in sight.

We went for a Taiwanese bubble tea, which I insisted we ordered with custard rather than the traditional tapioca balls. My moment of madness paid off, as the chunks of custard went surprisingly well against the creamy yet not overly sweet black tea beverage.

Japanese style cheesecake

Doubting that our parents would share our enthusiasm for this cold, textured tea, we took a chance with a Japanese cheesecake. I’d watched videos of these being made with whisked egg whites to create a cake which is now much loved the world over, so thought it’d be something to try.

With no biscuit base, this spongy, light cake was a perfect end to such a rich and varied meal. Although it was structurally rather sound with minimal wobble, the smooth and airy texture was a welcome change from the heavy and rich traditional cheesecake, and between four this was a perfect pudding.

Given that Bang Bang Food Hall is now a 50 minute commute from my new Clapham North home, the fact I’m keen to soon return is testament to its attraction. If you’ve never had a reason to visit this Edgware-bound end of the Northern Line, you’re in for a treat. So venture into Zone 3 and arrive hungry, and preferably in a large group. Order everything and don’t skip the duck. You can even visit the RAF museum after (and who says Colindale isn’t great?).

Granada, where free food dreams really do come true

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A quick disclaimer: BidmeadBites has not ceased to eat or exist, although I’m aware the increasing length of time in between each post gives that impression. I’ve clearly been far too busy eating and cooking to actually write about it, but I correct that here with a new post on a recent trip to Granada.

Home to the almighty Alhambra palace and Spain’s Moorish past, Granada is also at the very heart of the great Spanish tradition of tapas. Renowned for its plentiful portions which come complimentary with each drink, Granada outshines any other Spanish city in the tapas stakes.

Complimentary…what, like, don’t have to pay for it? That’s correct. As someone who loves to bag a bargain, finding good food on the cheap is a real hobby of mine. Do you know what’s better than cheap? Completely free food.

Los diamantes, founded in 1942, is a cornerstone in the tapas scene of Granada, with three branches in the city centre. As you wiggle your way through the crowds and wade through the used napkins strewn around the floor, you place your drinks order and wait. Fight the urge to look at the menu, and don’t you dare even think about ordering food. The whole fun here is seeing what food your drink will bring – a fresh plate of beautiful tomatoes, coated in olive oil and sprinkled with chunky salt maybe? Or some freshly cooked prawns, practically still swimming on your plate with head, tail and eyes intact?

Tomato tapas at Los Diamantes

Once you’ve had a couple of drinks and reveled in the sheer thrill of free, random but most importantly tasty plates, you are then welcome (and encouraged) to look at a menu. Doing so, the offal lover in me rejoiced. Morcilla (the very best kind of black pudding), mollejas (sweetbreads…just good old glands) and sesos (these, my friends, are brains) jumped out at me. Black sausage was just a bit boring, while brains were slightly too hannibal-esque. The sweetbreads suited me perfectly. Ordering an enormous plate that claimed to be half a portion, I dug into these rich, creamy and smoky grilled glands.

Girl meets glands, Granada 2017

While I’m an outright offal lover, my pescatarian sister is (quite obviously) not. In order to balance of the vast quantity of animal glands on the table, we also ordered a plate of navajas – razor clams, soaked in a buttery garlic and parsley sauce. These were a happy memory of ours from family holidays to the Costa del Sol, and Granada’s version did not disappoint.

Navajas con limón

Another highly recommend tapas spot is La Taña. Owned by a sommelier, this small bar’s walls are adorned with hundreds of bottles of wine. We enjoyed a couple of glasses of red and sampled their homemade vermouth, which although sweeter than I’m used to, was just the thing to go with the little montaditos (slices of french bread with savory toppings) that came out with each drink.

Tapeando at La Taña

I highly recommend La Taña for a taste of tapas culture and great wine – a lot of  tapas is based on drinking cañas (small beers, a little less than a half pint), but for when you don’t fancy beer this wine bar makes a great alternative.

Beer, wine, vermouth…what about something distinctly summery, almost so sweet it verges into the realms of alchopops? Have a tinto de verano with your tapas! This fine concoction of red wine and lemonade is just the tipple to kick off a long night of food and drink. When you order your tinto, you’ll be asked “con blanca o de limón?”. Blanca is a natural, less sweet soda, while limón refers to something more like a lemon Fanta. Go for blanca and enjoy the smoothness of this chilled beverage without a sugar overload.

We enjoyed many a tinto and a free tapas with it at Bar Casa Julio, another iconic city centre bar. Here the tapas were plentiful and filling, and my favorite was this plate of boquerones, little fried anchovy-like fish.

Quality fish tapas at Bar Casa Julio

Ordering off the menu, we opted to try berenjena frita con miel de caña (deep-fried pieces of aubergine drizzled with thick and dark sugar cane molasses). An Andalusian specialty, the contrast of the full-bodied sweetest of the molasses against the savory fried aubergine is at first an unexpected combination of flavors, but by the second slice you’re hooked.

Berenjena frita con miel de caña

Despite the fact you could quite easily spend your entire time in Granada eating like King Felipe himself without placing any food orders whatsoever, it is worth veering away from the free tapas on occasion:  such as when visiting Bodegas Castañeda.

Deciding what to order here was difficult, and not just because we’d become so quickly accustomed to free food rolling out after us; everything on this menu tempts. From mixed cold plates consisting of various montaditos, or hot fried fish platters, it all sounded wonderful. 

The one meal we actually paid for, lunching at Bodegas Castañeda

After much deliberation, we went for a retro classic and Bidmead family favorite – ensalada rusa, which wins awards for the least salad like salad around: potatoes, eggs, and more mayo than you can shake a stick at. Along with this we went for the house special, a cold plate with an odd-sounding but great tasting mix of oranges, salted cod, olives, tomatoes and capers. Other than this there was some refreshing gazpacho and a tuna empanada (Spanish-style pasty). Together it was a perfect pre-Alhambra lunch, giving us all the fuerza we needed to conquer the castle.

Leaving Granada, my only real regret was not having visited sooner. To think I’ve lived 25 years and spent various holidays in Spain, without making it to this magical city, where food is not only delicious but completely free…oh what a fool! But now I share this knowledge with you all in the hope you don’t waste any more time going any where else. Granada, I’ll be seeing you very soon.

Bidmeads in Bratislava – stag-dos, schnitzels and stodge

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Bratislava is a popular stag-do destination, famous for its cheap booze and party atmosphere. While the allure of strip bars and gaggles of drunk British males is debatable, bargainous beer and the attraction of an entirely new country is not. Looking for a change of scenery, Bratislava seemed like the perfect destination for a weekend away with my mum and sister.

We arrived in the city shortly after lunch and headed off in search of a menu del día, Slovak style. Following a Lonely Planet recommendation we tracked down Gastro u Jakuba in the city centre for a spot of lunch.

A little rusty on our Slovak, it was a challenge to work out what was on offer. While one woman enthusiastically shouted ‘chicken!’ while pointing at each dish, we were able to decipher the difference between pork meatballs, beef stew, sausages and roast chicken. The overall conclusion? Slovak food is big on meat, and seemingly little else.

While my mum opted for the huge pork meatball, my sister was less enthused with her veggie dish, a sort-of vegetable risotto in which the rice had condensed into one large starchy mass. Understanding that any hopes of great veggie mains where perhaps better pushed aside, she was able to eat the filling and flavorsome caraway spiced potato soup, which came included in the lunch.

Pork meatball with sauteed veg and boiled potatoes

The pork meatball was like a large chunk of meatloaf, sauteed with vegetables and served with some incomprehensibly buttery and soft potatoes.  Arriving hungry and on a rainy day, this was just the kind of meal we needed to perk us up and fuel us for some sight-seeing. Gastro U Jakuba is a good stop for anyone (vegetarians, you not so much) looking for a proper local lunch, for less than the price of a pint (£3.90 for the soup and meal).

From low-cost canteen lunches to fancy five o’clock high tea, we paid a visit to Cafe Meyer, one of Bratislava’s classiest cafes. Lavishly decorated with dark wood and red and gold colors, the cakes are beautiful creations with intricate chocolate decorations and fancy fondant icing.

Cafe Meyer, Bratislava

A popular cake in Slovakia and its surroundings is the Esterházy torte; layers of nutty meringue sponge filled with a hazelnut buttercream. A proper British bake off technical challenge and super complex and fiddly to make, I would never dream of making this at home, but out in a cake shop it’s my first choice. The layers of nutty sponge added just a tiny bit of crunch to the cake, with the buttercream filling merging the whole thing together beautifully.

Esterházy cake

While Cafe Mayer earned top patisserie points, it was on a day trip to Vienna that we’d really find our cakey nirvana. Just an hour away from Bratislava by train, our first stop in the city was Cafe Central, where we would sample the height of Viennese patisserie.

Cafe Central, Vienna

Cafe central opened in 1876 and is steeped in history. The famous Viennese journalist Alfred Pogar once said “Central is not a coffeehouse like any other – it’s a philosophy”. A philosophy based on coffee and cakes? Now there’s a subject I’d like to study.

I choose a rhubarb and cream cake in which layers of flaky pastry served as construction shelves for lashings of patisserie creme streaked with rhubarb coulis. My mum chose the cheese strudel and my sister the pear cheesecake – together it was a veritable sweet creamy cheese fiesta.

Creamy cheese delight @ Cafe Central

After much sight-seeing and museum visiting, we stopped off at Naschmarkt, a food-cum-flea market where you can browse for second hand furniture and then dine on anything you fancy, from Schnitzels to salads and everything in between. There’s a clear middle eastern influence at this market, with the majority of food stalls offering up mezze style bites to nibble as you go.

Mezze madness at Naschmarkt

For a modern middle eastern meal with a twist, in a trendy spot with seats and table service, head to Neni right on the main strip of the market. The restaurant was swarming with a mix of locals and tourists with an attractive menu made up mainly of small plates to share. We ate homemade pillowy pitta bread accompanied by silky smooth hummus (some of the best I have ever eaten), marinated artichoke and muhamarra, a red pepper dip I had tried previously using an Ottolenghi recipe. Neni’s muhamarra was made with red peppers grown in their very own farm, blended up with walnuts to create a sweet, smoky and nutty dip.

Back in Brat for dinner, it felt time to try some more typically Slovak food. Following the number 2 top rated restaurant in Bratislava we chose to go to Zeleny Rodrigez, which despite sounding like some kind of Slovak-Spanish hybrid, turned out to be a very nice restaurant serving modern Slovakian meals (some of which even turned out to be vegetarian, hurrah!).

While my mum kind of copped out of the Slovakian dining and just went for the steak, I chose a typical dish – beef with sautéed paprika vegetables served in a potato pancake. I liked it; the beef had a soft texture due to its slow cooking, and although the pancake was a nice accompaniment after having been sat on top of the stew for some time it disintegrated into a sludge, which was less delicious.

Slow cooked beef with potato pancake

My sister’s vegetarian dish was essentially made of up pasta, cream and cheese; sheep’s cheese dumplings topped with a creamy dill sauce. The sweet licorice flavor of the dill complimented the salty sheep’s cheese very well, and it was this combo of sweet and savory that added depth to what could potentially have been an overly rich dish.

Cream on cheese with a lot of dill

I’ve not written about how cheap the beer was in order to swerve the conclusion that all we did was drink beer for three days, but…it really is very, very cheap. The craft beer scene is gaining popularity, with a couple of really cool breweries in the city centre.

Craft beer bar in the city centre

Bratislava is a long way from winning any culinary capital awards, but I enjoyed everything I tried during my time there. The old city centre is filled with beautiful buildings and it makes for a lovely weekend away, while the cities proximity to Vienna makes it a great base for exploring into Austria, where perhaps for a keen sight-seer there is a little more on offer. In short, as mini-breaks go, don’t come to Bratislava expecting the buzz of Berlin or museums and art galleries of New York. But do visit, enjoy the relaxed vibe all around the city, eat a lot of meat, get drunk on one pound pints and tick another country off your bucket list.

Munching in Madrid

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Smoky grilled squid, saffron spiked paella and jugs of dangerously drinkable sangria evoke very happy memories of my summers spent in Spain, mainly on the Andalusian coast where my grandparents retired.  

Moving away from the coast and onto the cities capital, I’ve recently spent a lot of time in Madrid. In between working over there and visiting friends, I have eaten and drunk my way around the city, and should you be planning a trip to the Spanish capital, these are my culinary must-sees.

Tucked away in a side street in Chueca, Madrid’s go-to destination for gay culture and nightlife, you’ll find El Bierzo. Despite the constant trends entering and influencing this hip and happening area of the city, as far es El Bierzo is concerned, everything could well be frozen in the 1970s. Retro decor, old school waiters and a menu so Spanish it could be used as a dictionary reference for typical Madrileño cooking. 

Big white fava beans cooked with fatty and flavorsome cuts of meat, fillets of white  fish served with just a slice of lemon, right over to rich and creamy cooked innards (think kidneys and liver) in thick and boozy sauces; this is proper home-cooked comida casera. The time to visit is lunch, where a menu del día involves three courses and a beer or glass of wine for €11-13 euros, depending on your choice of main. 

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Artichoke and jamón entrada at El Bierzo

For my most recent trip, I started with sauteed artichokes with ham, cooked up with a portion of garlic that’d keep Dracula at bay for many centuries. I picked a tuna steak in tomato sauce for mains, and topped off this three-course delight with the ultimate classic in Spanish puddings – flan. 

The artichokes were meltingly soft and thanks to the fried garlic,they held their own against the strong, salty influence of the jamón. The tuna in tomato sauce was less exciting, as the sauce element left the fish far more cooked than I normally would have liked. Still, it was perfectly passable and all was redeemed with the oh-so-old school flan, beautifully creamy with a sharp caramel sauce.

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Flan, a pudding for queens

If you find yourself in Madrid on a Sunday, despite any post Saturday night hangover you may be suffering, hitting the tapas bars in La Latina is un must. A bar crawl with less booze and lots of food, this is the perfect way to sample various dishes and soak up all the different flavours Spanish cuisine has to offer.

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Crab and aubergine montaditos in txirimiri

Start with a taste of Basque tapas in Txirmiri, where montaditos (little tapas on top of slices of white bread) are served to be nibbled down with a caña, the equivalent of a quarter pint of beer. 

Moving onto a slightly larger dish, the pulpo a la gallega at La Perejila is not to be missed. Rather than served on a bed of thinly sliced potato as I have tried it before, here the pulpo (squid) came with a cloudy, creamy mash. I welcomed the change and enjoyed this dish immensely. The thin slices of meaty squid topped with crunchy grains of rock salt and sprinkled with warm, sweet and tangy pimentón pepper was a dream mix of textures and flavours. 

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Pulpo a la gallega at perejila, La Latina

Walking away from La Latina and into Las Huertas, the literary district of Madrid, we stopped off at El Diario de Las Huertas; a full to the brim Spanish tapas bar, with a sit down restaurant at the back. As we ordered some glasses of vino tinto, before even glancing the menu, a morcilla mondadito caught my eye. 

Different from the English black pudding, the Spanish equivalent morcilla often contains rice and slightly richer spices, and in certain parts of the country it can be found with raisins and nuts inside too. Here at La Taberna we tried it smashed across a slice of French baguette and sprinkled with sesame seeds. 

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Morcilla…mi primer amor

Fearing we had perhaps not been getting our five a day (unless potato does really count as a vegetable), we also ordered some pimientos de padrón. A futile attempt to eat veg, really, as these little green peppers come deep fried and covered in rock salt – and they’re all the better for it. Supposedly every one in ten is spicy, although I’ve never come by one that bites. A great finger food to nibble on, using bread to mop up the salty oil left behind is a right of passage. 

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Some nice fresh greens?

As well as the La Latina taps crawl in the day, a bustling street to sample more Spanish food in the evening is Calle de la Cruz. Given that this street leads directly onto the main square of the city, the Plaza del Sol, you may well pass some downright dodgy looking tourist traps. If anyone offers you paella for dinner, run for the hills, or better still, head directly to Casa Toni, where you’ll be in for a truly traditional taps experience.

Truly traditional = guts and all. For an offal enthusiast like myself, this place is a dream – famous for their fried tripe, here in one sitting I managed to consume sweet breads, tripe and blood sausage. The tripe, albeit it slightly greasy, was actually surprisingly soft to eat, with an creamy texture and smoky flavor. 

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Zarajo – braided sheep’s intestines rolled on a vine branch and fried. Not for the faint-hearted

The mollejas (sweetbreads) were some of the best I’ve ever eaten, and having lived in Argentina where these are quite a delicacy, that’s saying something. The morcilla was also a great success: served in small chunks on cocktail sticks, it converted even the non-offal lovers of the group.

Compared to London, almost anywhere else in the world seems cheap, but if you want to do Madrid in a particularly thrifty fashion, I’ll let you in on a secret: you can have dinner without ordering any food. Ir de tapas is to order small plates at various different bars, however…if you can hold off ordering food upon arrival, with just a drink you might just be fed a delicious plate of tapas at no extra cost.

Not every bar will offer these, and even when they do it can be small olives, or sad bits of hardened bread and dry tortilla. Head to El Riazor though, an unassuming bar next to the Plaza Mayor, and you can sample everything from fried anchovies to their creamy paella, all for the price of a drink (a very reasonable €1.50). Go hungry, leave drunk and full, without having bought a meal. Prop yourself up at the bar and try their vermouth al grifo (on tap) or even revel in your secret desire to openly drink alchopops and go for a tinto de verano – red wine mixed with lemonade.

Rounding off all that savory with a touch of sweet, anyone visiting Madrid for the first time should make a mandatory tea break at Chocolatería San Ginés. Churros and chocolate is a traditional Spanish treat, although here I must confess: I’m not actually a huge fan. I find churros rather unexciting, as fried sweet batter just doesn’t rock my world. 

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Chocolate y churros

They do, however, make the perfect dipping vessel when accompanied with the thick, dark hot chocolate that comes alongside them. Whether your keen on churros themselves or not, a hot cup of cocoa such as this turns them into something really quite special. 

From fried tripe to chocolate-dipped churros, Madrid is a brilliant place to sample some real comida española. Flights can be as cheap as £12 one-way with Ryanair, so if you’ve never been and fancy a trip a away I urge you to munch your way through Madrid.