Friday 4 June 2010

Gazetteer: Mercado de San Miguel, Madrid







Mercado de San Miguel is a real foodie haven in the middle of Madrid, and was a real find. A historic Art Nouveau covered market that dates back from 1911, the Mercado is now teeming with sellers, purveyors and food stalls selling hot squid ink and salt cod croquettas, oysters from the Atlantic coast and a dizzying array of delicious pintxos served with glasses of bubbling Cava. There are also specialist stores selling Jamon, Bread and pastries, wine fruits and vegetables (including Cacao pods) and a fishmonger selling the famous Percebes from Galicia, as well as all sorts of sea urchins, crustacea and flat fish.
Well worth checking out if you are in Madrid, it gets very busy at the weekend and at lunchtimes.

Thursday 3 June 2010

Blogspotting and falling behind


For those of you that follow my erratic blogging, I have to apologise for not updating the stream of colour and food porn voyeurism that I so love to engage myself with. I'm conscious it's been a while, but work demands and a birthday that has come and gone have kept me way from writing and posting up photos. I have added a few posts from a trip to Madrid, and have more to come. And not just travel stuff, recipes too...
I hope you like what I post, or continue to post.. feel free to say hi!
Steven

Thomas Schutte at Museo Reina Sofia





Tapas at La Casa del Abuelo





Wednesday 2 June 2010

Tapas at La Casa del Abuelo






I found this place near to my hotel in Madrid, it was around 10.30pm and my friend Sebastian and I decided to stop, take a look inside and have tapas here. It was packed, and we waited ages for a table - pressed tantalisingly against the counter, watching plate after plate of delicious morsels be assembled, and waft past our eyes. After a long wait we sat hungry and light-headed from the Rose wine, and greedily ordered lots of dishes from the menu.
From peering over the counter, I could see so many delicious treats, all lined up in dishes ready to be eaten: plump prawns in their raincoats, fresh seasonal asparagus, crab claws, oily chorizo, pink prawns from the Mediterranean, squid, Iberico ham, and plates of crisply fried Patatas Bravas.

CaixaForum - Madrid




This is the stunning CaixaForum building in Madrid, built by the architects Herzog & DeMeuron.