Category: Spain

Spanish food is sublime. We love it so much, in fact, that we’ve dedicated our latest project to learning how to really Eat Like a Local in Spain. With a little help from some of the UK’s best cookery schools, we’ve covered the ins and outs of the countries cuisine in a series of recipe posts. Next, we’ve got Fat Hen Cookery School…

Established in 2007, Fat Hen Cookery School combines founder Caroline Davey’s two great loves – food and nature. As well as teaching budding chefs how to cook and prepare regional delicacies from around the world, the school offers children’s cookery classes.

If you want to learn to Eat Like a Local in Spain with Fat Hen Cookery School, though, you can do no wrong by digging into this chosen dish – crispy squid with garlic aioli. Squid is a Spanish staple and the aioli dipping sauce is often seen alongside it. Whip up a bowl before chopping and frying some of the squid before enjoying a truly appetizing starter.

Crispy squid with wild garlic aioli

Crispy squid – ingredients

Vegetable oil, for deep frying
250g plain flour
½ tsp cayenne pepper
½ tsp smoked Spanish paprika
½ tsp salt
500g squid cut into 5mm rings
1 egg beaten

Method – crispy squid

1. Put enough oil in a saucepan or deep fat fryer to come halfway up the pan and place over a medium heat.  If you’re using a deep fat fryer (or have a thermometer), heat the oil to 180˚C.  If not, to check the oil is at the right temperature you can drop a 2-3cm cube of bread into the hot oil. It should become golden and crispy in one minute.
2. While the oil is heating, place the flour, cayenne, paprika and salt in a large sandwich bag.  Drop in the squid and shake around to coat evenly.  This may need to be done in two batches, depending on the size of the bag.
3. Dip the floured squid into the beaten egg and then carefully drop into the hot oil.  Fry for 2-3 minutes until golden brown.  Remove from the oil and briefly drain on kitchen paper before serving with the garlic aioli.

Wild garlic aioli – ingredients

2 egg yolks (by hand) or 1 egg (liquidizer)
300ml/7fl oz olive oil
2 tsps white wine vinegar
½ tsp salt
Good handful of washed and finely chopped wild garlic

Method – garlic aioli

1. Before starting, make sure all the ingredients are at room temperature. Put the egg yolks, vinegar and salt into a mixing bowl, resting it on a cloth to stop it from slipping. Lightly whisk to break the yolks.
2. Using a wire whisk, beat the boil into the egg mixture a few drops at a time. Once you have added the same volume of oil as the original mixture of yolks and vinegar, you can add the oil a little quicker.

To make the mayonnaise in a machine:

1. Put the whole egg, vinegar and salt into a liquidiser. Turn on the machine and slowly add the oil through the hole in the lid until you have a thick emulsion.

The aioli will keep for a round one week – serve the dip and squid together for lunch, adding a glass of Albarino to really help you live like a local.

Keep up to date with Fat Hen on the school’s website, or browse our villas in Spain and set your holiday plans in motion.

Located in the heart of the Cotswolds, Foodworks Cookery School is a high-end school running both day and evening courses. The building it’s housed in is worth visiting for alone – think large windows, herb gardens and a barbeque area ripe for lazy and indulgent summer evenings. With a Spanish twist on these scenes in mind, the school picked seafood paella as one of its favourite dishes from the country.

Tucking into at least one seafood paella is essential for anyone visiting Spain. This one is made up of squid, prawns, clams and mussels, amongst a bunch of other ingredients. Depending on which part of Spain you visit, you’ll encounter plenty of markets perfect for picking up fresh seafood which you can make into a delightful paella of your own.

Seafood paella – ingredients

300g prepared medium-sized squid, cut into 3cm pieces
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
100g onion shallots, finely chopped
1 red pepper, seeded and chopped into 1cm pieces
1 green pepper, seeded and chopped into 1cm pieces
1 teaspoon pimentón picante (smoked hot Spanish paprika)
200g large raw peeled prawns
300g small clams, such as carpet shell, washed
400g short-grain paella rice, such as Calasparra
1 heaped teaspoon loosely packed saffron strands
1 litre fish stock
150g large mussels, cleaned
6–8 unpeeled cooked crevettes
Salt

Method

1. Dry the squid well on kitchen paper, season with salt and set to one side. Place a 40–50cm paella pan over 2 burners on a medium heat. Add the oil and garlic. As soon as the garlic begins to sizzle, add the shallot and fry for five minutes until soft and sweet, turning the pan every few minutes so everything cooks evenly. Do this throughout the cooking process.
2. Add the red and green peppers with the pimentón and fry for 5 minutes until the peppers are just softened. Stir in the squid and fry for 3–4 minutes until it becomes white and opaque.
3. Scatter the prawns and clams around the pan, add the rice and saffron and stir everything together well. Add the stock and two and a half teaspoons of salt and bring to the boil, stirring briefly to redistribute the ingredients around the pan.
4. Leave to simmer for 6 minutes over a medium-to-high heat. Don’t stir anymore, but remember to give the pan a turn every 2 minutes. Reduce the heat.
5. Arrange the mussels and crevettes evenly around the pan and push them down slightly into the rice. Leave to cook for a further 14 minutes, again without stirring. At this time, all the liquid will have been absorbed and the surface of the rice should be pitted with small holes.
6. Turn off the heat, cover the pan with a clean tea towel and leave to rest for five minutes before serving. Serve warm straight from the pan.

Visit The Foodworks Cookery School’s website for more foodie inspiration, or look at our rentals in Spain and take the first steps to planning your next holiday.

As part of our Eat Like a Local series, we’ve been speaking to some of the UK’s best cookery schools and finding out just what makes Spanish food so unbelievably tasty. Next up, we’ve got Claremont Farm.

This family-run cookery school champions local produce – a lot of which is from the farm itself. Teaching chefs everything from the art of foraging to masterclasses in tapas cookery, the school is well versed in making food which is not only healthy, but delicious.

Such an ethos is evident in the choice of dish here – vegetable tortilla. Packing in protein, vitamins and other vital nutrients, vegetable tortilla is easy to make and will keep you feeling fresh and well-nourished throughout the day.

Vegetable tortilla – ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 red onion, sliced
2 garlic cloves, sliced
½ butternut squash, roasted
Handful of Kale
8 beaten eggs
½ pack of feta cheese
Salt and pepper

Method

1. Peel the butternut squash and cut into cubes. Put on a tray and drizzle with olive oil, then sprinkle with salt and pepper before cooking on a medium heat until they turn soft and mildly brown.
2. While cooking, break all eggs into a bowl. Whisk and set aside.
3. Add the onion and garlic into a good, non-stick frying pan and cook until soft. Throw in the kale and keep cooking until it wilts.
4. Mix in the cooked butternut squash until all ingredients are combined.
5. Now add all the eggs and slowly mix until they start to cook. Turn the heat right down.
6. Crumble the feta cheese on top, pushing it into the egg.
7. Now for the tricky part – add a plate on top of the pan with a tea towel on top. Flip over onto plate then slide the tortilla back into the pan to cook the other side.
8. Leave on a medium heat for a few minutes until all ingredients are cooked through.
9. Flip back out on to a plate and serve with a crisp local salad.

For more dishes like this, check out the Claremont Farm website. Otherwise, look at our holiday villas in Spain for more travel inspiration.

Spanish food is world famous. It draws in hundreds upon thousands of holidaymakers every year, each one in search of local dishes made to delight. For part of our Eat Like a Local series, we’ve decided to look at the simple charms of Spain’s cuisine in more depth.

Some of the UK’s finest cookery schools have been drafted in to help give us an insight into flavours and aromas synonymous with Spain. Each school tells us about one recipe they associate with the country, along with key ingredients essential to the dish itself. First off, though, we’ve got Ashburton Cookery School.

Offering over 40 cookery courses, Ashburn Cookery School is an established favourite amongst beginner, intermediate and advanced cooks. Based in Dartmoor, the school teaches many different culinary styles. When it comes to Spanish food, though, it’s a huge fan of a simple (yet tantalisingly tasty) dish which combines two national favourites – chorizo and squid.

The dish centralises around chorizo, squid, clams and spicy pork meatballs. Topped with a little parsley, this makes for a sure-fire way to capture Spain’s flavours.

Albondigas with chorizo, squid and clams – ingredients

Meatballs

2 small diced onion shallots
½ teaspoon paprika
2 crushed cloves of garlic
1 tablespoon of sherry vinegar
25g breadcrumbs
150g pork mince
1 egg yolk

Sauce

2 medium sized chorizo sausages
150g squid (cut or slice it into rings)
50ml white wine
150g chopped tomatoes (tinned)
150g clams
1 finely sliced garlic clove
2 tablespoons flat leaf parsley (chopped)

Method

1. Sweat the shallots in olive oil until soft, throw in the paprika and continue to sweat for a few seconds. Add the crushed garlic along with the sherry vinegar and cook over a low heat for one minute.
2. Add in the shallots with the breadcrumbs. Allow to cool for one minute.
3. Mix in the pork mince and egg yolk to the breadcrumb mixture. Season with a little salt and pepper.
4. Mold the pork mixture into nine individual meatballs.
5. Pan fry the pork balls in olive oil on a low heat until they turn golden brown. Remove from the pan and put to one side.
6. In the same pan, sweat the chorizo with sliced garlic for around one minute. Add the squid and cook on a high heat for 30 seconds, then proceed to add the white wine and de-glaze using a wooden spoon. Leave on the heat and reduce the wine by around half.
7. Put the tomatoes in with the mixture and bring to a simmer. Stir in the fresh clams and cover until they’re fully open (get rid of any unopened clams).
8. Season, then place on a serving dish and sprinkle with parsley.

You can stay up to date with Ashburton via the school’s website.

Ready to make your Spanish food fantasies a reality? Look at Villa Plus properties in the country.