Surf & Turf In Southern Spain

 

When you arrive at Spain's effervescent Mercado Central de Cádiz you know you're near a serious seafood port. The stately white, block-long market building, whose 19th century arched windows brighten several aisles of food stalls, has recently been refurbished. The Spanish government is on a campaign to support traditional markets, many of which are of historical importance, by restoring them and promoting their accessibility; the side benefit of this trend is to encourage old-fashioned ways of purveying foodstuffs. Old markets are busier than ever, as demanding European shoppers seek out the best, freshest ingredients from local farmers and fishermen.

With its winding, crooked streets, inviting, well-preserved plazas, cool bars and peña clubs (where Flamenco is performed on weekends), the Cádiz is a port city that looks inward. As a traveler, you don't get to the essence of a place until you see what the residents eat and where they shop. Cádiz is, without a doubt, a fish town.

I visited the central market, a teeming agora of gastronomic activity, on a crisp November morning. Stands proffered typical Mediterranean fruits and vegetables in tall, exuberant formations. Regal, gleaming, purple eggplants were piled next to crisp, frilly fennel and ruby colored tomatoes, which practically burst through their skins. Citrus of every size perfumed the air.

A curious curly green vegetable called tagarninas, related to the artichoke, was featured, its fleeting season in full force.  I learned, you have to be invited to someone's home to sample this exotic delicacy—it doesn't seem to show up on restaurant menus, being considered a 'low-class' vegetable. Sra. Gómez was a stout, austerely dressed shopper who seemed straight out of a Garcia Lorca play and knew the recipe. I pleaded with her to have me over, provoking gales of laughter, but I didn't snag the invite. My consolation was some early dessert at one of the churro stands that line one wall outside the market building.

Andalucía, unlike northern Spain, Valencia and Catalonia, does not abound in highly sophisticated or elaborate culinary traditions. A lot of fried fish and seafood –expertly prepared – is consumed. And several of the 'greatest hits' of Spanish cuisine come from the area: gazpacho, in its various manifestations – the pale, refreshing emulsified version, nothing like the chopped salad that usually passes for gazpacho overseas, or thick and red (salmorejo), or white and bolstered with almonds (ajo blanco).

Sangria and vino de Jeréz, known to the world as sherry come from the region. Some influence of the now remote Moorish occupation remains in the cooking. In Sevilla, for example, I sampled a stew sweetened with dried fruits and perfumed with cumin and other North African spices. I ate a simple salad of bacalao (salt cod), orange slices and perfect green olive oil. The orange/oil combination reminded me of something I had tasted in Tangier, with the addition of the mildly salty cod, an ingredient the Spanish know how to use better than anybody. Desserts of dried fruit and nuts sweetened with honey recall the Magreb. Because the region is highly saturated with tourism, it is harder to find good restaurants than in less visited places like Galicia and the Basque country. Tourist traps, almost always mediocre in Granada, Sevilla and Córdoba, offer the Spanish cliché package of gazpacho/paella/sangria/flan. The visitor has to look hard to find the 'real thing'. But it's there.

And in Cádiz, it was that fried fish that got me. Pescadito frito a mixed plate of small fish, calamari and other seafood can be the best in the world. Cazón en adobo, morsels of shark done in a cuminy batter is irresistible. Especially when washed down with a hearty local crianza  (young wine aged in oak for a year).

Which brings me back to the market.  It was the fish purveyors that blew me away. An incredible bounty of glistening seafood attracts throngs of shoppers of all ages and classes. Navajas (razor clams) slither daringly in and out of their shells to peek at the customers. They are eaten all over Spain, usually sautéed or broiled in olive oil and garlic. There are several sizes of round clams and fish, from tiny sardines to huge merluzas (hake) so fresh they seem to shimmy like belly dancers. Each variety of the squid family has its own name: tiny chiperones, mid-size calamar, huge sepia. The variety of the catch makes this one of the most visually exciting markets in Europe, an inspiration to any chef, pro or amateur. And then there are the vendors themselves: many of them hunky, swarthy guys, fishmonger versions of Antonio Banderas.

It was all a reminder of why I love markets. They're the heart and soul of a place. I could have stayed all day, listening to the ebullient hawking and haggling. But my stomach got the best of me and I decided to do something I like even more: go eat lunch.