Spain for Christmas

I went to Spain for Christmas, and, being me, I took pictures of, almost exclusively, food. I did have some great food there; I think I gained a stone, but I didn't look!

I thought I would share some Spanish culinary goodness with you all.

Churros y Cafe

Churros: Eating churros is like eating hot, crispy oil - delicious, hot, crispy oil. They are really wonderful, but I didn't need lip balm for the rest of the day. We had them at the famous Chocolatería de San Ginés Restaurant in Madrid. This picture sadly doesn't feature the coffee cup full of melted chocolate in which to submerge your fried tasties.

Montaditos

Montaditos: Spain has about a thousand names for sandwiches, depending on what size they are. Montaditos are these little guys; they're a good three bites. We ate them at the conveniently named Cerveceria 100 Montaditos (so named because they have 100 different kinds to choose from). If you go on Wednesday, they are all 1 Euro - pretty sweet deal.

12 Grapes

Grapes: You can't see all 12, but I swear I ate them. You're supposed to eat 12 grapes on New Year's Eve; well, as the clock strikes 12. I was in charge of getting the grapes, as I had been released into the green pastures of Carrefour for an hour to roam the isles in search of cheap olive oil and Nocilla (which is the Spanish [and better] version of Nutella) and seedless grapes. Fail. I mean, I found cheap olive oil and Nocilla (thank god), but I did not get seedless grapes. I even know the word for seed in Spanish. I just didn't see any. And these guys were little; they were American seedless grape size. Which brings us to a New Year's Eve anticipating crunching down on 12 seeded grapes with the hundreds of us that didn't make it to the center of the Plaza del Sol (bummer). I took it like a champ; my brother and sister-in-law weren't as enthusiastic. I figured I could use the fiber after a week of eating only ham, and, really they're not that hard to chew.

Spain was fun, but I'm glad I'm back state-side.

Mar's Ribbon Cake, part dieu

And you thought I was long gone...I'm back and just as sporadic as ever.

I have an update on the ribbon cake, and it's kind of sad. There was no ribbon cake this year! I was so disappointed. Of course this means I have to make a ribbon cake now, but I need a reason. I mean, you don't really need a reason to make a cake, but I will eat all of it if I don't have some means of getting rid of it. And that's repulsive. So. We'll see. Maybe I can make a pink - tan - pink ribbon cake for Valentine's Day?