This is the first of what I hope will be a series highlighting the best of Iberian produce. I will be focusing on one ingredient, product or brand, some well-known, others less famous and some hardly heard of! Hope you like this one and check back regularly for more. I aim to write one a week, but I may be getting ahead of myself there.
This time, I am spotlighting pimentón, the smoked paprika that lends so much flavour to so many Spanish recipes and products. It’s an absolute mainstay in our larder and really versatile for pepping up huge range of dishes.
Most people will have tried chorizo - the most famous sausage of Spain - but may not be aware that the main flavour comes from the inclusion of this smoky powder. It is one of the most used spices in Spanish cookery and is right up there with saffron as an evocation of important periods of Spanish history. Peppers were introduced to Spain from the New World, but it wasn’t until the 17th century that use of their smoked and ground product became widespread in the cuisine.
The best quality comes from the area of La Vera in Extremadura, its geography making it the perfect place to grow the peppers required. A ‘DOP’ certification shows how highly prized the product is and even the amount of oak required to smoke the peppers is regulated. I am a bit of a bugger for chucking pimentón into all sorts of things! It just gives everything that little Spanish kick. Just in the last week - I used it in a marinade, mixed it into spuds to roast them in and sprinkled over a quick salad. Personally, I refer the ‘dulce’ (sweet) version rather than the ‘picante’ for most things, as it’s the smokiness rather the heat that interests me most. The amount of spiciness is merely down to the heat of the pepper grown, but there is ‘agrodulce’ bitter or sour/sweet version which is also worth having in your cupboard! The colour it gives to everything is mouthwatering too.
Any trip to a Spanish food shop will give you an idea of the amount and variety of produce that is infused with this powder. Undoubtedly you will come across many varieties of chorizo, spicy and not, sliced for eating, stubby and fatty for cooking. Then there is the lean ‘lomo embuchado’ - pork loin cured and dried for two months after being rubbed with pimentón and garlic. As with any Spanish pork product, the most flavourful and highest quality will be made with Iberico pork, but I better not start on that or I will get waylaid! There are an array of cheeses rind washed or coated with it too and I especially like a semi-cured 'cabra' goats cheese flavoured this way.
Some of my favourite things to pop pimentón in -
Tortilla. Yes I know any Spaniard would berate me for this (probably after berating for including onions!) but it adds a subtle depth to what is – let's face it – quite a bland dish, especially if it is be eaten as a main course. Marinades for meat. Mixed it in olive oil with garlic and maybe other spices like cumin, or herbs like thyme or oregano. This makes a super tasty marinade for just about any meat, perfect for cooking on the barbeque or a griddle pan. It will give a lovely smoky taste. In this potato dish from BBC good food, https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/spanish-potatoes which is becoming one of our favourite potato dishes. It kind of evokes patatas bravas, kind of, but is honestly delicious and really easy. Give it a try! Sprinkled on a salad – especially a mayonnaise based one. Last week I did a quick salad of artichokes from a tin with tiny dice of preserved lemon, olive oil and a dusting of ‘agrodulce’. Perfecto. Keep your pimenton – usually in a cute tin – in a cupboard and out of sunlight. You can find the brand that I prefer ‘La Chinata’ on Amazon by clicking the image link below.
23 Comments
|
AuthorAlex Gonnord-Luty, chef, aspiring good blog writer, Hispanophile, lives currently in France & Spain. Archives
September 2020
Categories |