In a hopefully successful revival of this portion of iddream.com, I’m going to incorporate a running critique of the food I make at home. I’ll post pictures of my glorious and not-so-glorious plates, write out basically what I did and then leave the rest up to you! So, in hopes of a continuing future…

Over the last year, I’ve started to initially dabble and then obsess over Iberian food. Having made only one Portuguese dish and, count ‘em, zero Spanish dishes in my lifetime, I felt that it was time to break into a cuisine that seems so right up my alley with all the bold flavors and rustic techniques. I’ve learned only through reading and some observation as well as very limited tastings. To tell the truth, aside from eating safe (read: foods close to American as possible because I was a scaredy cat…) in the Azores, and inhaling what was set in front of me in Portugalia (read the recent review here) the only time I’ve ever had a chance to eat any cuisine from the Iberian peninsula was at Lauro, in Portland, OR. Lauro opened my eyes to what was exactly possible with fresh, seasonal food based on recipes from throughout all of the Mediterranean, but primarily in Portugal and Spain. I still think that the best dish I’ve ever eaten in my entire life was their Pork and Clams Alentejo. The minute the pork and clams (the first time I’d ever eaten them from the shell) passed over my tongue, my concept of heavenly, simple food changed forever. When I think about it quietly, it can still bring a shudder to my spine. This is how real, honest-to-goodness food should feel when we consume it. It shouldn’t feel like we’ve just eaten a pile of tasteless slop and, as a consequence, we’re super-full and uncomfortable from it. Huge portion sizes denote fair to crap food. When the flavor is spot-on, the portion size need not be mountainous because the food, not the size of the food, speaks for itself.

So began my amateurish studies in the food of the Iberian peninsula. I’ve only made a few attempts at making certain dishes over the last year, but this is intentional. My style is to experience the food over and over again to achieve a near perfect flavor (or the flavor that should be coming from the food, which isn’t always the case in experimentation). A combination of these dishes is what I made last night for dinner.

Spanish Tortilla and Rice

The base of the dish is a saffron rice basically made up of paella rice, Spanish Rias Baixas wine, vegetable stock, leeks, carrots, peas, tomatoes, and, of course, saffron. The Spanish tortilla (an egg-based tapas favorite) is basically a slowly cooked batch of eggs with onions and diced potatoes. The vegetarian platters were then topped with shavings of Manchego cheese and flash sautéed french cut beans and garlic. The other platters were topped with julienned strips of jamón serrano and then dressed with the Manchego and garlic sautéed beans.

The photo isn’t the best (especially regarding the colors…) considering the lighting and the fact that I used my phone’s camera. Someday I’ll have to get around to getting a decent digital 35mm…..

Cheers!