Hey Feeder gang!
It is the time of year for picky bits in the garden, and whilst us Brits like to tout it as our thing, truly who does it better than the gorgeous people of Spain? So, I bring you the tapas edition.
A few holidays to Spain over the years have been the inspiration for this week’s recipes - some peppers I ate on a trip with Belazu to Cataluña a couple of years back, and an iconic tortilla at Bar Nestor in San Sebastian (me and Cam’s first holiday together, and still one we talk about incessantly).
In this week’s newsletter you will get the recipes for pimenton pork stuffed peppers, as well as a cheat’s tortilla, and suggestions for all the other things I would serve alongside them to bring you a stunning summer feast.
You’ll also get my recommendations for a book, a TV show and a new restaurant that I’m loving this week.
Enjoy!
Sophie x
The Recipes
On the menu today, we have:
Pork and pimenton stuffed peppers
Cheat’s tortilla
My additional serving suggestions for this feast would be as such:
Tomato and onion salad - good quality onions, cut into chunks, salted and left to sit in a sieve for 30 minutes. Add your tomatoes to a plate, and drizzle over a good few tbsp of good olive oil, and 1 tbsp sherry vinegar. Use a veg peeler to shave off thin slices of white onion (a method I adopted in bad Air BnB kitchens when the knives are no good), and top the tomatoes with this.
Boquerones - something fresh and pickled to cut through the richness of the tortilla and pork is a good shout, and anchovies marinated in vinegar is a good way to go about it. If you aren’t an anchovy gal, and also aren’t pregnant, then some cured meats never go amiss either.
Manchego - because a nice hunk of cheese is a welcome addition to any table.
Olives - a picky bits tea is just not really complete without them. Plump green ones work best in this instance.
Good crusty bread - essential for mopping up tortilla goo/pepper juices/tomato juices/hunks of cheese.
Pimenton Pork Stuffed Peppers
The version I had of these in Cataluña was pork mince stuffed into teeny weeny whole peppers, and I have done this before, but if I’m being honest it is a faff, and doing it in big halves of roasted pepper is much more relaxing. This one can easily be prepped ahead of time (up to the end of step 5), and popped in the oven to finish off.
Serves 2 as a main, 4 as part of a spread
2 romano peppers
400g pork mince
2 cloves of garlic
1 tbsp tomato puree
1 heaped tbsp sweet smoked paprika
100ml double cream, plus 2 tbsp
a grating of fresh nutmeg
1 tbsp chopped parsley
salt and olive oil
Heat your oven to 200°C fan. Halve your romano peppers lengthways, and cut out any pith and seeds.
Place your peppers on a baking tray, and drizzle with a little olive oil and salt. Rub this into the peppers, then roast cut side up for 20 minutes.
Heat a large frying pan over a high heat with 1 tbsp olive oil. Salt your pork mince, then add it to the pan, and fry it until golden all over, breaking it down into chunks with the side of your wooden spoon.
Make a well in the centre of the pan, and turn down the heat to medium. Add 1 tbsp olive oil, and grate your garlic into the centre. Add the tomato puree, and mix into the oil, cooking for a minute until fragrant, before mixing it in with the rest of the mince.
Add the paprika, cream and a good grating of nutmeg to the pan, and give it a mix. Gently simmer the mixture for 10 minutes, then season to taste with salt.
Remove the peppers from the oven, and spoon the pork mixture into the centres. Bake for another 15 minutes.
Drizzle with the remaining tbsps of cream and a sprinkle of parsley, then serve it up.
Cheat’s Tortilla
Spanish tortillas are without a doubt one of my favourite forms of egg, no doubt due to the contribution of my friends olive oil and potato. Frying the potatoes can be an arduous task, but a good cheat I learnt many years ago is that you can skip this step and use crisps! Ferran Adrià pioneered this technique many years back, and it works so well that I feel like I have to keep spreading the good work. I cooked a tortilla this way when hosting a show called Corner Shop Challenge when I worked at Twisted back in the first pandemic lockdown of 2020, and it is still a method I use all the time.
The original version uses a classic salted crisp, but I love the tang of vinegar you get in lots of Spanish cooking, so I think a salt and vinegar crisp lends itself well here.
Serves 4-6