Sun Family in Spain

Eating and cooking in Spain is a great adventure. The Spanish eat more fish per capita than any other country other than Japan. They probably rank pretty high for pork too. Learning the rhythms of eating is a little difficult and complicated by living in an area with a lot of tourists and foreigners. Where we live the cafes and restaurants always seem to be full of people drinking coffee, having a small beer or eating large meals. When we venture further into the old parts of town away from the beach the rhythm is more decisively Spanish.

If you show up for lunch at 1:30 a restaurant might be empty but by 2:00 it is full but it closes by 6:00 which is when restaurants in the US are usually getting busy. In the early morning many people eat a small breakfast of toast or cereal, then at 11:00 or so they may have a coffee and a sandwich or bread with tomato. 2:00 to about 4:00 is the main event, Lunch is the biggest meal of the day you might have some soup, a main course and a little desert. Wine or Beer is often consumed as is coffee. The Spanish take eating seriously and slowly. Don’t expect to grab a quick take out meal and eat between meetings. No rushing to shovel a salad in while doing some work. You must stop, rarely do you see a cell phone on a table, often people are in groups. Eating is to be shared and enjoyed. In the evenings the streets are full of people having a small beer, coffee or a cocktail, often the small beer is accompanied by a tapa or a small bite, usually free with each drink ordered. While on a walk with a Spanish couple they told un in the north they have extra small beers, small beers and pints of beer. They told us most people order the extra small beer because you get a tapa with every beer and its small enough that it doesn’t get warm before you finish it. If you order three or four its not a lot of alcohol and you get three or four tapas, which when served with bread can be a meal.

Our family hasn’t adapted to Spanish hours very well. We have exercise classes in the morning and everyone is hungry for lunch by 1:00 and dinner by 6:00 or seven. When we go out we are either having coffee and maybe a toast or croissant in the morning or going for a long lunch but we rarely go out to dinner. We went to the small village of Benahavis for dinner one night and got the earliest reservation they had at 8:00pm. We were the first people there but the tables started filling up after 8:30 or 9. After a wonderful of dinner with wine and duck I was happy, but had a very difficult time sleeping because I am not accustomed to eating so late.

Sol has started taking a siesta in the afternoon. I think he is better adapted to Spain’s hours and rhythms than I am.