Cooking: Olla Gitana

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Recommended: Spanish tapas history

I made a three course meal consisting of Olla Gitana, Patatas Bravas, and Crema de Chocolate. Olla Gitana, in English, is also known as gypsy pot. The olla is thin legume stew, also called potaje. In Spain, it is usually served as a main dish for lunch. The stew is inspired by vegetable cooking in the Murcia and Alicante regions of Spain. The stew is referred to as gitana because it’s ingredients are, for a lack of a better word, anarchic (Bremzen). This dish served as the entree. The side dish were the patatas bravas. Patatas bravas are a typical tapas dish served in Spain. Theories surround the exact creation of tapas in Spain. Spaniards speculate that tapas were the invention of King Alfonso X, who drank wine with small portions of food between meals. Although, common thought remains that tapas originated by way of farmers who would eat snacks, so to say, during a long interval between breakfast and lunch (Panero). In Spain, contrary to foreign thought, tapas is supposed to be a light pre-meal filler, which would explain why many tapas are composed of cold meat, cheeses, and assortments of pickled vegetables (Panero). Contrary to their traditional function, many tapas bars abroad serve tapas to constitute a meal in succession of small dishes. Patatas bravas, a popular tapa in inland Spain, are wedges of deep fried potatoes smothered in a combination of a pimentón salt, spicy marinara sauce, and ailoli. Ailoli is made of olive oil, slowly whipped into a creamy paste of garlic and salt. Alioli is often compared to a garlic mayonnaise, except the traditional version of alioli contains no egg. The Catalonia region of Spain region claims credit for alioli sauce. In Spain, alioli compliments any dish, including meat, fish, vegetable...

... middle of paper ...

...hile we ate a tasty meal together.

Works Cited

Bremzen, Anya Von, and Susan Goldman. The New Spanish Table. New York: Workman Pub., 2005. Print.

Panero, Javier. "Tapas: The Essential Guide to Bar Food in Spain." Lonely Planet. N.p., 6 June 2013. Web. 11 May 2014. .

"Pimentón De La Vera." Denominación De Origen Protegida. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 May 2014. .

Said, Olivier, James Mellgren, and Maggie Pond. César: Recipes from a Tapas Bar. Berkeley: Ten Speed, 2003. Print.

Sierra, Lisa, and Tony Sierra. "The History of Chocolate in Spain." Spanish Food. About.com, n.d. Web. 11 May 2014. .

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