Murcia: A Gourmet Safari
Most visitors to Murcia head straight for the mega resorts of the Mar Menor. But foodies should venture inland to the Spanish region’s pretty hilltowns and its tapas loving capital, says Sterling editor Gemma Elwin Harris
words by Gemma Elwin Harris
photography by Helen Cathcart
Chef Firo Vázquez has a daily show on the Murcia region’s channel 7, but he is more widely known for a stunt involving squid ink and a small mountain of rice paper. A Cervantes fan, Vázquez decided to mark the 500th anniversary of Don Quixote’s publication, in 2006, by creating an edible copy of the first edition. The pages were painstakingly printed on communion wafer and flavoured with anchovy, garlic and paprika, then ceremoniously eaten at anniversary dinners across the globe.
“It started with a few doodles on rice paper to see how it would work,” explains Vázquez at his restaurant El Olivar in Moratalla. “Then I had the idea of feeding squid ink into a little ink-jet printer and after many more tests, we began to recreate the pages. Before I know it, they’re eating Don Quixote in London, Paris and Tokyo.” There is something so charmingly crackpot about the feat, I am sure Don Quixote would approve.
Vázquez passes us a platter with two delicate, miniature pages covered in flowery 17th-century script. Sterling photographer Helen and I each take one and let it melt against our tongues. Anchovy flavoured, this is the wafer-thin start to our eight-course feast.
“I guess I’m a little like Don Quixote myself, out here in the middle of nowhere” says the chef, gesticulating. “The crazy man of Moratalla!”
True, this tiny hilltown in the north-east corner of Murcia is hardly the place you’d expect to find a TV chef, originally from Madrid. But Vázquez and his family suit the rural life. So much so that he now insists the TV crew makes the journey to him. You can see the appeal – it’s peaceful out here in the foothills of the Sierra de los Alamos, surrounded by almond and olive trees. We have driven two hours through swathes of pink and white apricot and nectarine blossom to get here from Murcia city.
Moratalla may be in the middle of nowhere but hick cooking this is not. “We use the basic Murcian ingredients and take them one step further,” says Vázquez, who recently won best Spanish language entry in the Gourmand World CookBook Awards for his El Olivar recipe book.
Produce at the restaurant is proudly local: Vázquez knows where the pigs come from for his pork-shoulder confit, immersed in olive oil and cooked on low for seven hours until the meat melts. Chato murciano pigs, a comic snub-nose breed, grow fat on alfalfa and sweet on the figs that ripen so well in the sunny scrublands of Murcia’s interior.
Calasparra, home of the gourmet DOC rice used here, is the next town just across the plain, surrounded by rice paddies. The prized rice turns up in a duo of creamy black and green olive risottos, and again at the end of the meal as a heavenly rice pudding spilling from a deep-fried pastry case, with maple syrup and a dusting of cinnamon.
Murcia al vino, a hard goat’s cheese which we have just seen bobbing in tubs of red Jumilla wine at the Villavieja dairy outside Calasparra, comes creamed with Monastrell wine, local Marconas almonds and shavings of earthy black truffle. And a distinctive, peppery house olive oil produced by one of Vázquez’s mates is used in almost every dish on the menu: from the starters, drizzled over mini spoonfuls of fresh tuna and egg salad, to the puddings where it makes a surprise appearance in a pale green extra virgin ice cream with sweet tomato jam.
El Olivar’s eight-course menu is full of surprises, but most surprising of all was the bill: €50 a head, including two glasses of wine. We leave, wallets almost as full as our bellies, and vow to rein in our greed.
OK, so we don’t try very hard… Back at our Murcia city base the next morning, we whet ever-increasing appetites with a tour of the fantastic covered foodmarket Mercado de Verónicas, buying kitschy tins of smoked paprika and honey-scented saffron by the gram, wandering past fish slabs heaving with bream, crayfish, razor clams and live crabs parcelled in paper cones, before heading into the cool of the cathedral. We have barely finished a lazy latte and apricot pastry in the shadow of the baroque façade when midday tapas hour kicks in.
The cathedral
church of Santa
Maria in Murcia city
Despite being the region’s capital, Murcia runs at a slower pace to Spain’s more international cities. There are precious few foreigners to disrupt old customs, and businesses tend to observe siesta time. Which, judging by the packed bars of Plaza la Flores and Plaza Santa Catalina, is more about scoffing battered fish and drinking Estrella Levante in the sun than getting a power kip. The beer barrel tables outside El Bolito are littered with stubby caña beer glasses. Waiters in waistcoats deliver a stream of tapas from the open doors: tortas de camarones (shrimp and parsley fritters), tigres (hot puréed mussels baked with béchamel in the half shell) and marinera – a Russian salad mash of mayo, tuna and vegetables piled on a breadstick and topped with an anchovy that you’ll find in every tapería in town.
Next we duck into the shade of Bodega Pepico del Tio Ginés, a tiled joint full of old men who look like they’ve been clinging to the bar since it opened in 1935. We point to the menu for cholesterol-tastic Mallorcan sobrasada – essentially pig fat with paprika fried on bread – adding some healthier fresh broad beans which come in a higgledy bundle straight off the stalk. Broad beans are a staple here and Murcians shell them like peanuts, unzipping the gnarly pods as they natter. One of the old guys recommends we try a matrimonio, which turns out to be a salted anchovy bound in holy matrimony with a soft pickled one; a fine match.
a diner
enjoys the menú
gastronómico
The afternoon is spent wandering narrow medieval streets, and stopping for iced coffees in jacaranda-shaded squares where Moorish and Spanish architecture meet.
After nightfall, the tapas bars are doing a roaring trade once more. We plump for La Taberna de Perela, a jostling, cosy corridor of a place where the counter is laden with fresh ceps, grilled peppers and – just out of the oven – a whole roasted suckling pig. A generous pile of chargrilled veg and cochinillo so tender it could have been eaten with a spoon come to a mere €20 each, a bottle of red and nightcap included.
Before leaving Murcia, we make one more foodie pilgrimage. Restaurante Palacete Rural la Seda lies a 15-minute cab ride north-east out of town, in the belt of orchards, orange and lemon groves that surround Murcia city. Built in the 1600s by a family of silk merchants, the palacete is as much of a treat for the historic Moorish-influenced villa and antiques as it is for the food. After aperitifs in the well stocked cellar, the owner takes guests on a tour of lavish rooms and a private chapel decorated with medieval icons, dark 16th-century oils and contemporary sculptures.
Finally we’re ushered into the dining room, another gilt-and-brocade eyeful. The restaurant’s chef, José Carlos Fuentes, trained with famous Catalan Carme Ruscalleda at her three-Michelin starred restaurant in Sant Pol de Mar, and his highly wrought concoctions bear the stamp of Ferran Adrià and his nueva cocina gang. Among the eight courses that made up the menú gastronómico (€80), several were extroardinarily good – like the seared red mullet, from Aguilas on the coast, with royal jelly sauce and saffron, or the delicate white conger eel served in a rich fish fumé. Others had us guessing. We took a while to realise that the strange paprika-flavoured gelato with dark chocolate sauce was in fact chorizo ice cream. And one or two were acquired tastes – though you’d be pushed to aquire a taste for cold oysters with basil in passion fruit sauce.
Back on the plane after our mammoth gastro tour, we feel paler and somewhat tubbier than our fellow passengers who look like they’ve been making the most of the sun and sports on the Mar Menor. Still, they can keep their tans. Because we’ve got the scent of saffron in our luggage and a strange and wonderful aftertaste of chorizo and chocolate.
address book
el olivar de moratalla
Calle Caravaca 50, Moratalla, +34 968 724 054,
web.mac.com/firovazquez. Closed Mondays
el bolito
Plaza Santa Catalina 1, Murcia city
bodega pepico del tio ginés
Calle Rui Perez 4, Murcia city
mercado de verónicas
Plano de San Francisco, Murcia city. Open 6am to 3pm daily
la taberna de perela
Calle Rui Perez 6, Murcia city
restaurante palacete rural la seda
Calle Vereda Catalán, (Santa Cruz) outskirts of Murcia,
+34 968 873 391, www.laseda.restaurantesok.com
Closed Sundays
more murcian specialities
pies and sweets at…
pastelería bonache, murcia city
A fixture since 1828, famed for its Murcian meat
pies with beef, egg and chorizo. Sweets are good
too, such as the tocino de cielo (literally ‘bacon
from heaven’) a rich flan of egg and sugar.
Plaza de Las Flores 8, Murcia, +34 968 212 083,
www.pasteleriabonache.com
marzipan at…
pastelería sonia, moratalla
Worth it for the sight of gingham-print trays
full of pretty strawberry, cream and sponge
creations, doughnuts and chocolate cakes.
Husband and wife Bruno and Isabel’s cake
shop (pictured), named after their daughter,
is famed for their handmade marzipan.
Plaza Baena, Moratalla, +34 968 660 871
caldero murciano at…
casa del
reloj, san pedro del pinatar
Head to the small town of San Pedro del Pinatar
for a walk along the shore and a posher-thanusual
caldero in this turn-of-the-century villa.
Garlic and saffron-flavoured fish stew is served
with Calasparra rice cooked in the stew’s liquor.
Topped with garlicky mayonnaise and sprinkled
with fresh lemon, it’s a Murcian classic.
Ctra. Nacional 332, S. P. del Pinatar,
+34 968 182 406 406
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