Catalonia · Recipes
Escalivada: soft roasted peppers and aubergines
The oven does most of the work. Roast the vegetables until soft inside, then remove their skins. Arrange what remains in broad strips on a platter with olive oil.
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At the table
Catalonia · Recipes
Pa amb tomàquet: rub the tomato into the bread
The tomato does not sit in slices on top of this bread. Rub the flesh of half a ripe tomato into the cut surface. A little oil and salt are enough; eat immediately before the crisp edges soften.
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Catalonia · Recipes
Crema catalana with a thin, crisp sugar crust
Make the pale custard on the hob. Only once it is cold does it get its layer of caramelised sugar. One spoonful brings the contrast: a crisp top, then soft custard with cinnamon and lemon.
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Auvergne · Recipes
Truffade: potatoes under a blanket of cheese
The potatoes must be cooked first. Only then do you add the fresh tome: gentle heat and careful folding turn separate slices into a panful of soft, stretchy cheese.
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Auvergne · Recipes
Lentil salad with Bleu d’Auvergne and tarragon
Keep the lentils whole and the cheese recognisable. In this salad, small cubes of Bleu d’Auvergne, finely chopped shallot and tarragon each bring something different to a simple bowl of lentils.
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Auvergne · Recipes
Pompe aux pommes: apple between two layers of pastry
This apple pastry has a layer of dough on top too. Cut a few slits in it: steam can escape while the apple softens and the puff pastry browns.
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Portugal · At the table
Pastel de nata: how a pastry from Belém became a world traveller
A small pastry with a big story. It has been sold in Belem since 1837; various stories circulate about its origins in the monastery.
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Austria · At the table
Sachertorte: two houses, a lawsuit, and the question of how many layers
Vienna has two cakes that both claim to be the real one. The dispute dragged on for almost thirty years, and the ruling ended up finding for each of them on a different point.
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Italy · At the table
Ribollita: the soup that only starts on the second day
The name means reboiled. That is not a nickname but the method, and it explains why this dish belongs on a Friday.
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Poland · At the table
Pierogi: the word comes from feast, not from poverty
Filled dumplings are thought of as plain fare. The name says otherwise, and the Christmas Eve table bears it out.
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Spain · At the table
Paella: why a Valencian will not discuss chorizo
Spain's best-known dish comes from marshland near Valencia and contains no chorizo. What does belong in it is a shorter list than you would think.
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Griekenland · At the table
Moussaka: the dish is older than its most famous layer
The white sauce on top was added only in the 1920s, by one cook with a mission. What lies beneath is far older and far more widespread.
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Hongarije · At the table
Gulyas: the word means cattle herder, not stew
Outside Hungary goulash is a thick stew in paprika sauce. In Hungary it is soup, and the name is not about the food but about who made it.
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France · At the table
Bouillabaisse: the soup made from the fish nobody would buy
What now appears on the priciest menus in Marseille began as what the fishermen could not sell. The name gives away how it is supposed to be made.
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Germany · At the table
Brezel: why this bread takes a bath first
The brown, almost black sheen of a pretzel does not come from the oven but from a tub of liquid before it. Without that bath it is just a roll tied in a knot.
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Denmark · At the table
Smorrebrod: an open sandwich with an order
It is an open sandwich, and that is about the only simple thing about it. There are rules for what goes on, the order in which you eat, and why there is no lid.
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