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I had a wonderful time in Spain, eating and drinking and conferencing, but I have to admit defeat. Spanish cuisine is profoundly not oriented to vegetarians. I imagine it would be harder to find a variety of friendly foods in, say, the Mongolian diet, but truly the carnality was impressive. Ham and tuna are legion. Fortunately the tortilla is always with us, in wedges or better yet muscled into a loaf of bread along with some lettuce and tomatoes and piquillo peppers, and there is nothing wrong with bread and cheese, or bread and tomatoes, or a plate of marinated giant white asparagus (also surprisingly ubiquitous).
But still, this limited diet begins to pall, and soon we were sneaking off to Italian and Greek restaurants, because a giant white asparagus in marinade is only so much like a vegetable, and the cry of "quiero spinach" was to be heard far and wide. Fortunately the beloved green was to be found atop a tasty crackerlike pizza, along with raisins and pinenuts, at Logroņo's fine Pizza Lattino, which apparently even delivers (!) and employs a delightful waitress who is happy to illustrate the menu on her order pad, to assist the poor Americans who do not know that "berenjena" means eggplant.
Logroņo is a keen little city that you have never heard of. It is the capital of La Rioja, where they make a lot of nice wine, and is the site of the University of La Rioja, which you have also never heard of but which is apparently a friend of cognitive linguistics. We stayed in a dorm in the new part of town, which meant that at first we had a pretty poor impression of the city, but the old town turned out to be thoroughly pretty and packed full of tavernas, trees, and attractive public buildings. At 130,000 people or so, the city's big enough to have substance and small enough to walk across and run into the marauding linguists one was hoping to find. On our last night in town, we did just that, going off for dinner at the pizzeria and then wandering the streets until we happened upon people we liked. Drinking, merriment and letting down of hair ensued, and I discovered that I like sweet vermouth. Now I really want to buy a bottle of this stuff, which sounds positively delectable.
Next we headed off to Barcelona. More about that later.
Posted by redfox at July 31, 2003 10:06 AM (essays)all breads | breakfast | dinner reports | drink | eating out | essays | etcetera | lunch | news | recipes | salads | snacks | soups | sweets | tips | travel | vegetables | weekly meals |
