An Evening in Valencia

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I think I've mentioned before that my wife Helen studied Modern Languages at University and spent 12 months living in France and Germany studying. Some of her best friends were learning Spanish rather than German and at the end of their time abroad they all met up and spent the summer in Valencia. She was due to fly to Valencia on Monday 25th May 2020 for a reunion with her University pals. Obviously that hasn't been possible, so we are doing the next best thing and pretending that we're on holiday in Spain.

Here's what we selected from the Tapas Bar on our first imaginery evening. I like to serve things one at a time, but the rest of the family prefer to have it all in one go.

Artichoke Hearts
We keep a tin or two of artichokes hearts in the cupboard. They make a very easy and quite unusual starter. Just drain, rinse and dress with olive oil and finely chopped garlic.

Olives
These olives are stuffed with anchovies. No preperation, just open and place in a dish, job done!
Bruschetta
There's millions of versions of this recipe. Mine is very simple. Chop the tomatoes finely add some olive oil and garlic to taste. Lightly toast some ciabatta on both sides, top with the tomato and finish off the toasting with the tomato on top. My family all like it slightly different, so we put the salt, pepper and olive oil on the table and finish our own.
 
Prawns in Garlic (I posted this recipe earlier in the blog)

Click on the link in the title for the recipe.


Chorizo
Peel and slice the chorizo. Dress with olive oil and garlic and then place in an oven proof dish. Cook at 200 degrees for 20ish minutes. Serve with some nice bread to mop up the delicious combination of chorizo juice and olive oil - be warned it can cause indegestion!

Patatas a Lo Pobre
Peel and slice the potatoes to about 1/2cm thick. Put plenty of olive oil in a pan and gently fry the potatoes, without disturbing them. Add three crushed garlic cloves right at the beginning - cook for about 30 minutes and then add slices of green pepper and cook for a further 20 minutes. We just used potatoes, garlic and green peppers this evening, but onions and different colours of peppers are great too. Patatas a Lo Pobre means Poor Man's Potatoes, so what ever you're trying to use up will be fine!
 

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