Cycling around wineries in the Empordà
Writes about what there is to see and do around Girona/Costa Brava- one of the best travel destinations in the world!
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olive oil
Olive oil-the oldest industry in Catalonia
Olives and olive oil is what brought the Greeks and Romans to the Iberian peninsula some 3,500 yrs ago and it has been a crucial commodity ever since. The south of Spain produces the quantity with thousands of hectares cultivated in the poorest soils where nothing else will survive the extreme weather, but around Lleida in the western part of Catalonia there are also extensive plantations.
The main variety is the arbequina olive which although small in size has one of the lowest levels of acidity and some even go as far as to say it produces "sweet" olive oil in contrast to the more "picante" southern varieties.
Outside the town of Les Borges Blanques, some 35kms from Lleida, just off the main road, is a museum/theme park devoted to explaining the cultivation, processing and selling of olive oil through history.
Outside the gardens are full of huge gnarled olive trees that date back to when the Romans were in the area some 2,000 yrs ago. One amazing tree is said to have been carbon dated as 2,700 yrs old!
The process of extraction got increasingly sophisticated as the presses on display show until today it is a high tech enterprise where the temperature is controlled and the quality has improved beyond belief with the resulting oil giving an organoleptic experience like a good wine.
Now there are hundreds of different oils on the market, some from olives picked early making the oil a green colour to blends of different varieties or organically produced, whichever way with some bread to drizzle on it is still one of the best Mediterranean customs!
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arbequina
Greeks
Iberian peninsula
Les Borges Blanques
Lleida
Mediterranean
olive oil
olives
Romans
Spain
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Priorato cooking demonstration
As part of the wine festival there are also olive oil tastings and cooking demonstrations throughout the weekend. This one was held in the main square of Falset and everyone had the same accessories of either a butane camping gas stove or a small charcoal grill on which to prepare their dishes.
All the important ingredients of the area were being shown off in spectacular and imaginative style from wild herbs, pine nuts and almonds, olives and olive oil, wine, vinegar to season wild boar, hare, rabbit and some juicy pork products.
What cannot be passed on through the pictures is the amazing smells and of course the taste, next year you will have to come to sample for yourselves!
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almonds
cooking demonstration
Falset
olive oil
olives
pine nuts
priorat
Priorato
wild herbs
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Traditional Catalan meal Part 2
So, to continue the preparation for my Catalan meal with 90 year old couple Sion and Lluis from La Pera which is about 20kms from Girona.
So far we have the onions baking in the fireplace, the sausages are being grilled on the fire and now it is time to toast the bread in the flames. Once this is done we are ready to get the onions out (1.5 hrs in the fire) and peel the burnt outside layers off until we have the soft and moist interiors perfectly cooked. Olive oil an salt are added and we take the broad beans off the cooker too and take everything to the table.
So we start with cutting a whole garlic clove in two and rubbing it on the toasted bread followed by specially grown juicy tomatoes which also get spread on the bread along with olive oil and a little salt and then you can add some of the dry sausage or cheese on top. This is called "pa amb tomàquet" and forms the base (or starter) for many Catalan dishes and is perfectly acceptable as a meal in itself.
The wine I brought as my contribution is served from the bottle although Sion prefers her own from the barrell they keep in the cellar and she drinks from a "porró" which is easier to see and understand in a photo (see photos attached). The cauliflower salad is also on the table being one that Sion had made a few weeks ago with red wine vinegar and consequently looks red and tastes great.
Sausages with a garlic sauce "alioli" and the broad beans follows and by this time we are feeling not only replete but very merry and after dessert of walnuts, hazelnuts and fresh fruit we need a walk around the village to let it all settle.
This meal was not quick at some 3 hours but will certainly be one of the more memorable for the quality of the ingredients and company! Thank you Sion and Lluis.
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alioli
broad beans
Catalan
garlic
La Pera
olive oil
pa amb tomaquet
pork
porro
sausages
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Olive harvest in Girona province
Today's scene is being repeated all over Catalonia where nights are cold and days are clear and sunny allowing people to harvest their small parcels of olive trees dotted around the countryside. Like most traditional activities here, the picking of olives becomes an outing with friends and family where much chatting goes on while the trees are being stripped. The old method involves sticks, buckets and nets; the sticks to beat the branches to dislodge the ripe fruit (olives), the nets spread on the ground below to catch the falling olives and buckets to fill up and then dump in a bigger container.
The harvest for most people only takes a few days since in Girona province most trees are on small parcels bordering fields or vines and really only produce enough olive oil for a family to use the following year. Once picked then the olives are taken to one of the co-operative crushers and they can either sell their olives for cash or take the equivalent weight/quality in olive oil once pressed and bottled.
Then the eating and drinking begins either under the very trees or in some of the small villages where they have proper olive oil festivals. The main varieties found are the slightly sweet arbequina, full bodied argudell and aromatic picual as well as the imported Greek variety koroniki in some of the larger commercial estates.
Just like with grapes there are many different organoleptic qualities to appreciate in olive oil and whether they are picked slightly green or when fully ripe will affect the final colour as well as aroma and taste. My favourite is the early harvested green olive oil from the first pressing-this is delicious poured on bread with tomato rubbed on and a slice of cheese or sausage on top...
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