Of course not everything in the Spanish world of cured meats is ham. But a lot of it is still pork. Since the Moorish conquest the eating of pork has been a Christian credential. It was a public proclamation that even the inarticulate could make. After the reconquista, converted Jews and Muslims took it out onto the streets to eat on Muslim and Jewish Sabbaths (Friday and Saturday) to let all the world see their fealty to their new faith. Many were expelled anyway, but that’s grist for another kind of mill.
The Spanish may lust for seafood. They may chase after meals of fried sardines, and pursue dishes of tuna with single-minded devotion. But nothing holds a place in the Spanish heart, soul and belly like dry salted bacalao (cod). Even those who rarely eat bacalao still revere it, and this has been so for centuries. So much of Spanish history is bound up in it, fuelled by it. As an Englishman might never see a football game yet he knows Manchester United well, the Spaniard is intensely aware of bacalao, even if it is seldom found on the table. Bacalao is at the forefront of Spanish culinary consciousness
Ham is the great culinary constant. This is what unites the Spanish. They speak different languages and belong to different political parties. Some revere the crown and others would abolish it. Some are Celts, some are Iberians, others are Gypsies, Basques or Catalans. But 99.9% of them are eaters of cured ham. Strapped into a cradle-like frame called a jamónera, every bar, restaurant and tasca in the Kingdom of’ Spain has at least one ham a’ carving it any given time. More often the establishment has several hams, the skins and hooves still attached, hanging form the walls or ceilings. Stuck into the bottom of each ham is a little plastic cup resembling an upside-down umbrella to catch the slow drippings. Even your average Spanish home has a jamónera in the kitchen. It might not have a cookie jar, but a Spanish kid can always have ham.
In the days of sailing ships American seamen were fed a diet consisting, largely of salt pork. Dry and hard stuff, they derisively called it ‘old horse’. At the same time in Spain it really was, literally, old horse. When a draught animal reached the end of its working life it was slaughtered, salted, smoked and air dried following a recipe for cured ham laid down 2000 years ago by no less a personage than Cato the Elder in his De Res Rustica. The finished product was called cecina, after the Latin siccina (cured meat). One wonders what the noble Roman would have thought of his Epicurean recipe being tuned horseward.
Paella, paella, paella. Blast paella! At least for now. Banish it from your thoughts until we have broadened your mind with the wide universe of Spanish rice recipes. Long before paella was put in a pan the people of the Iberian peninsula were preparing rice dishes of ethereal quality and gustatory delight. Pilavs with almonds, raisins or dates; rice stews of slurp-it-up goodness such as arroz marinera (rice with seafood); baked casseroles of rice and legumes made fragrant with garlic, enriched with potatoes and blessed with the tang of ripe tomatoes; rice and black beans combined to make the holiday dish, Moros y Cristianos (Moors & Christians); dishes for Lent and dishes that would nourish and please a vegetarian; rice for holidays and rice for work days; and rice for dessert. In the vaulting firmament of Spanish rice dishes, paella is simply its most visible star.
Perhaps the most admired feathered food is the codorniz (quail). But pichón (pigeon) and perdiz (partridge) are popular too. You will find them roasted, braised, stewed and stuffed. Pato (duck) is a good dish to try. In Atlantic Spain they enjoy it roasted with nabos (turnips). Along the Mediterranean look for it with higos (figs). The most fomous preparation for duck would be a la sevillana, with bitter oranges in the style of Sevilla. Some French claim this dish as theirs, but they are not suffered to enter the city of Sevilla. The genius of this dish is that the acidity and bitterness of Sevilla oranges, and the tang of Andalucían olives cuts through the fat of the fowl, or at least makes it taste better.
It is hard to speak of the ‘cuisine’ of Spain, for Spanish cuisine has no single form. There are many threads of tradition and influence running through the Spanish kitchen. Romans, Moors, Aztecs, French and Italians have all woven themselves into the tapestry of culinary Spain. In certain corners the colours are predominantly Moorish, in others Roman. The shapes shift in the picture as you change your angle of view, the American here, the Latin there. And each time you look at it a different weave reveals itself. The vision will never be captured, so there is no `final shape’ of Spain’s cuisine. The Iberian kitchen gods are full of mischief. They surely have names like Puck, Eros and Coyote.
But even if we cannot fully grip this beautiful trickster, there arc certain traits that we can tease out. Spanish cooking is straightforward. There is never any mistaking what you are eating. ‘It should taste of what it is’ goes the mantra. To disguise a food or to hide its true nature is sacrilege. Herbs and spices are used sparingly. The cook will seldom alter, mash, puree or mould a food beyond recognition, for it must also look of what it is. To these ends simplicity is prized. And simplicity can be a very difficult thing to achieve. It takes concentration and kitchen alchemy to draw out a delicate flavour by means of fire and oil and little else. It is an easy thing, on the other hand, to destroy it. A dish of Spain is generous. You will never have to lift up a sprig of parsley to find your portion of meat. And Spanish cookery is unpretentious. Your food will not be tarred up and made to look cute, or grand, or are and costly, or more colourful. There is no over-reliance on sauces. There is too confusion of tastes.
So much for what it is not. Now take a seat at any table in Spain. Almost without exception you will face what we call the Holy Trinity of Spanish cuisine: bread, oil and wine. This triumvirate is the cornerstone of Spain’s culinary history.
The legacy of Rome is both gastronomic and religious. And it was Rome that gave Spain the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Ghost; and the Trinity of Wheat, Olive and the Vine. All three have been cultivated here for at least as long as records have been kept, and that goes back to Phoenician times. But it was under the influence of Rome that we first see them coalescing into a culinary tradition in which bread, oil and wine are not sufficient unto themselves, but rather the three parts of the larger whole. A meal without these three is mere feeding. When all are present we cross from simple sustenance into the art of cuisine, an essential of the art of living.
Other cultures rely to greater or lesser degree on bread, oil and wine, but none, we think, as much as Spain. To this Holy Trinity we add a trio of touchstones. We know when we are at the Spanish table there will be garlic, religion and conviviality. Spanish fare has been described by better writers to be `thick with garlic and religion’. And indeed garlic is infused in almost everything. We have garlic soup, bread rubbed with raw garlic and garlic sauces such as alioli (garlic mayonnaise). The list goes on and on. And as for conviviality, the very purpose of Spanish dining is to nourish the soul as well as the body. The Latin verb, convivire (to live together) is the only essential sauce at the Spanish table. Dining is the time to strengthen ties between family, community and religion. So many recipes have been brought into being by religious observance or proscription: tarta de Santiago (Saint James’ cake), huessos santos (saint’s bones), to name just two. When the Spanish take communion in church, and consume the body and blood of Christ, they really mean it. When they lift their glass to you and say `Salud’, they really mean it.