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FEATURE

Ten delicious Spanish dishes you must try before you die

If you thought Spanish food was all paella and pinchos then think again. Get ready as The Local Spain takes you on a mouth-watering tour of some of the country's lesser known but equally fabulous culinary highlights.

Published: 9 May 2019 17:18 CEST
Updated: 19 April 2021 10:09 CEST
Ten delicious Spanish dishes you must try before you die
Photo: Edu1971/Depositphotos
 
Percebes 
 

Photo: Fotero/Flickr 
 
Barnacle collectors in Galicia brave the crashing waves of the Atlantic in winter months and risk their lives to pick these alien-looking crustaceans from the rocks. They’re hard to harvest, outrageously expensive (sometimes almost €300 ($374) per kilo), incredibly ugly… and unbelievably delicious.
 
Calçots
 

Photo: Joan Grifols/Flickr
 
Eating onions may not sound exotic but the Catalan calçotada feast is a unique food experience. The sweet onions are first grilled over flames, stripped of their charred outer layers and dipped into salbitxada, a rich variety of romesco sauce with nuts, peppers, garlic and tomatoes. You’ll need a plastic bib and a big appetite to get through this messy, unmissable meal.
 
 
 
Coques de llardons (Pork and sugar flatbreads) 
 

Photo: Slastic/Wikimedia  
Meat and sugar? This unlikely combination is a traditional favourite in Catalonia and once you try it you’ll be a believer too. Crispy flatbreads are topped with pine nuts and fried cubes of pork fat or crackling then sprinkled with sugar to make a high-calorie but mouth-watering combination.
 
Cochinillo
 

Photo: LWYang/Flickr   
The sight of dead baby pigs (from two – to six -weeks old) in market stalls or rotating on spits in Castille-Leon has turned more than one person to vegetarianism but the taste of the finished dish is a meaty treat of tender flesh and perfect, crispy skin flavoured with smoke from traditional wood-fired ovens.
 
Bacalao (Salt cod) 
 

Photo: Mover el Bigote/Flickr   
Salt cod is not, despite its name, salty. Preserving the fish in salt gives it a meat-like texture but the taste is (or should be) washed out in the preparation process. Basques are masters of salt-cod cooking: try the classic bacalao al pil pil, served with a garlic and olive oil emulsion.
 
 
Cocido (Stewed meat and vegetables) 
 

Photo: Salvatore G2/Flickr   
Different regions of Spain put their own stamp on this staple by varying the included meats. The Catalan escudella y carn d’olla adds chicken and a type of meatball to the standard pigs’ trotters, ears, belly pork, blood sausages and beef, often served over two courses. It sounds unappealing but there are few better belly-busting dishes to get you through a cold winter’s day.
 
Pimientos de Piquillo 
 

Photo: Juan Mejuto/Wikimedia   
The farmers of Navarre are perhaps the most green-fingered in Spain and the region is well-known for its excellent vegetable dishes. Sweet red piquillo peppers from Lodosa even have D.O (Denominación de Origen) status and are commonly served stuffed with a creamy salt-cod brandade.
 
Polbo á Feira 
 

Photo: Olonnais/Wikimedia  
Sometimes seen on menus in Spanish as polbo a feira, this Galician dish of sliced tentacles does not always appeal to the unwary. You’d be a sucker not to try it though: despite its rubbery reputation, well-cooked Galician octopus sprinkled with paprika and sea salt is tender and delicious.
 
Callos a la Madrileña (Madrid-style tripe) 

Photo: Javier Lastras/Flickr   
Many tourists retch at the thought of eating tripe but in-the-know locals happily tuck into this spicy delicacy, which combines the unctuous softness of the offal with paprika, tender beef cheek and chorizo.
 
Mojama
 

Photo: Santa Pola/Flickr   
Andalusians have continued the Arab tradition of curing fresh tuna in the hot, dry air of Spain’s southwest coast for generations. The result, mojama, may look like a dog chew from a pet shop but is actually wonderful when sliced very thinly and marinated in olive oil. Try some with almonds and a glass of manzanilla sherry.
 
By Steve Tallantyre 

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SPANISH HISTORY

Who are the historical figures that dominate Spanish street names?

Once you get to know your town or city in Spain better, you may start to wonder who the people that feature so often in street signs actually were. It's a window into Spanish society and history, and the historical figures that Spaniards value.

Published: 5 March 2024 12:09 CET
Who are the historical figures that dominate Spanish street names?

Whenever you take a stroll through a new place, whether in Spain or abroad, whether on holiday or in a new city you’re making home, noticing (and learning) some of the street names is one of the first things you do.

And though they can be very useful in terms of directions and getting a feel for a place, street names can also tell us quite a bit about a place — the history, the society and culture, its key historical figures.

This is true in most countries, of course. If you were to take a stroll through any town or city in the UK, you’d likely come across a London Rd., High St., or Market St. before long. If you’re looking out for historical figures, it’d be King. St or Charles St. or even something a little more obscure like Bob Marley Way.

In France, you’d no doubt see many a Rue de Charles de Gaulle, or Victor Hugo, two of the three most common historically inspired street names found in France.

READ ALSO: Which French figure has the most streets named after them?

But what about Spain? What are the most common street names in Spain, and which historical figures are most often used?

A research project at Pablo de Olavide University has revealed the most common street names in Spain, and they tell us quite a lot about Spanish history, society and culture. “Street names are not random, but reflect the social, cultural and historical values of a population,” says Daniel Oto-Peralías, Professor at Pablo de Olavide, who led the project. 

The project studied the street names in 8,131 municipalities across Spain through textual analysis techniques. It also has a great search engine tool, which you can find here, so you can search for different street names across Spain.

Mercado (Market) is a common name for streets and squares in Spain, but not as common as ‘iglesia’ (church). Photo: Zeynep Sümer/Unsplash
 

Of course, not all streets are named after great historical figures. Often they are fairly generic and geographically derived — think Church St. or Mill Lane in English.

According to the analysis done by Pablo de Olavide, in Spain the most common name in street names overall was iglesia (church) with 4,767 across the country, though this isn’t particularly surprising in a Catholic country.

Next was mayor (main) with 3,762; followed by fuente (fountain) with 2,544; constitución (constitution) with 2,439; real (royal) with 2,208; and finally eras with 2,063 streets around Spain.

READ ALSO: Why does Madrid have a plaza named after Margaret Thatcher?

Historical figures

The presence of historical figures is also significant in Spanish street names. The most renowned is the writer Miguel de Cervantes, the author of arguably the most famous novel of all time, Don Quixote, who appears in 1,940 streets across the country.

He is followed by Nobel Prize winning scientist Santiago Ramón y Cajal, the man dubbed the father of modern neuroscience, with 1,383 streets, and Granada poet Federico García Lorca (shot by Franco’s fascists for being a homosexual), who has more than a thousand.

Alexander Fleming, the Scottish scientist who discovered penicillin, is in fact the seventh most common Spanish street moniker named after a male historical figure.

Pope John XXIII and El Greco, the Greek painter and sculptor who played a significant role in the Spanish Renaissance and died in Toledo, are also very popular street names all over the country.

There are hundreds of streets named after Spanish conquistadors Hernán Cortés and Francisco Pizarro and of course Cristobal Colón (Christopher Columbus), as well Spanish painters Velázquez (who painted ‘Las Meninas’) and Francisco de Goya (‘La Maja Desnuda’) and as could be expected plenty of Picasso Streets. The lesser-known 17th century Spanish artist Murillo also gives his name to many streets.

Additionally, poets Antonio Machado, Juan Ramón Jiménez and Miguel Hernández feature in lots of calles across Spain, as does the scandal-hit emeritus king Juan Carlos I.

Gender gap

However, the study also revealed that just 12.7 percent of the streets named after people in Spain are named after women.

Republican lawyer and politician Clara Campoamor, widely considered the mother of Spain’s feminist movement, is the woman most commemorated. She spearheaded the push for universal suffrage and achieved Spanish women’s right to vote in 1931.

Campoamor is followed by 19th century Galician poet and novelist Rosalía de Castro and 20th century philosopher and essayist María Zambrano.

Catholic Queen Isabel I, who together with King Ferdinand led the Reconquista against the Moors and united ‘modern Spain’, is also widely featured, as is the mother of current King Felipe VI, Reina Sofía.

Other Spanish women whose names are emblazoned across Spanish street plaques were usually ahead of their time in patriarchal Spain, including Concepción Arenal (considered the precursor of social work in Spain) and 19th century María Pineda (a liberal who faced the guillotine for defying the absolute monarchy of Fernando VII). 

Religious streets

Of course, historical figures aside, Spain unsurprisingly has a huge number of streets with religious names. Research from Pablo de Olavide also revealed just how many streets in Spain have religious names — 12 percent overall.

In provinces such as Burgos, Navarra and Cuenca there are religious references in more than 15 percent of the streets, but perhaps the most striking example is the case of the Triana-Los Remedios neighbourhood in Seville, one of the traditional hotbeds of Semana Santa activity, which has 41 streets dedicated to ‘virgins’ alone.

READ HISTORY: Why are there so many Irish street names in Spain’s Canary Islands?

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