Cadiz Rick Stein's Long Weekends

A change is as good as a rest, they say.

So, a long weekend not too far away and not obvious like Paris or Rome.

A place where I can take in some local history, a bit of culture,

but of course it's the food that will always be the key.

So, if you like serious rice dishes with seafood,

mooching around old cities and great bars and maybe having a swim,

then this could be for you.

# Hey, Rick, where we going this weekend? #

Cadiz.

# Are we flying a few hours away

# For some delicious food, they say?

# So, Rick, make a booking

# And let's get cooking

# And get those taste buds going this weekend. #

"Like a scimitar curved on the bay and sparkling with African light" -

that's how Laurie Lee described Cadiz.

I have been here before and I really, really think that's

a fantastic description, because it is a low city and

beautifully situated low on the Atlantic Ocean,

especially in this summer weather.

But really what I am looking forward to is another

glass of cold Manzanilla, the sherry from Sanlucar de Barrameda,

just up the coast, and plenty of fish and shellfish.

That's what is bringing me back.

Nobody cooks seafood better than the Spanish.

I like hotels like this, stylish but not luxurious.

A place for holidays, not business.

And this is where mostly the Spanish come on holidays.

Oh, this is nice. Very summery, Spanish-style.

Hello, I've got a room for a few days, the name's Stein.

OK, I need your passport, please.

-OK, there you go.

-Thank you.

Staying on holiday?

No, no, we're making a film for the BBC about Cadiz, about the food,

and the sherry and all that sort of thing in Cadiz.

OK. Do you know special plates of Cadiz?

No, no. What do you recommend?

I recommend you tortuguita de camarones.

-Ah, little shrimp fritters?

-Yes.

-OK. And what else?

Pescadito frito.

Just fried little fish? Mwah!

I've had them before.

What a nice introduction to the local gastronomy!

For me, it makes all the difference to have someone to talk to about

the local food - not about towels for the pool or hire cars, but food!

Ah, this is very nice.

Very, very sunny.

Brilliant.

Look at that.

I love the Atlantic.

Nice little bit of surf.

Beautiful, lovely and warm - but a bit of a dilemma here.

Do I go for a walk on the beach? Do I go for a swim?

Or do I go for a beer?

-CREW:

-Beer!

Yeah.

Gosh, it is nice to be back in Spain.

Look at that. I mean, I just feel so relaxed.

I've been quite a lot of time in northern climes, watching the work

of cutting-edge chefs and being impressed or a bit confused,

but here, I know exactly what I'm going to eat,

I know exactly what I'm going to drink and I feel so relaxed.

I chose Cadiz simply by realising that not too many

British holiday-makers come here - and they should.

It's a bit difficult to get to, though, unless it's in the height

of summer, when you can fly to Jerez, about half an hour away.

But once you are here, it's a complete revelation,

I really think so.

I love this bar. I was here about a year ago

and I just remember it as being so wonderfully Spanish.

Well, what a stupid thing to say, but it is called El Manteca -

"the house of lard".

And talking of lard, here is some lovely pork belly, cured pork belly,

Chicharrones with lemon and pimenton, cumin seeds,

olive oil and garlic and a few fennel seeds, too.

Then left to go cold and thinly sliced.

I just love the way they send it out on grease-proof paper.

Very sensible. None of your fancy crockery here.

Fabulous! It tastes of Cadiz to me.

And, also, white anchovies.

Done locally, of course.

Just cured in lemon juice or vinegar.

WOMAN GRUNTS LOUDLY

Bloody hell!

'I'm told this is how one of the regulars greets new customers

'to Casa Manteca.

'Frightened the life out of me!

'But all good bars I know have their odd little quirks.'

The other thing I love about this bar, which is probably a bit non-PC,

is it's full of pictures of matadors. And I remember, when I was

a teenager, coming to Spain to Seville and a bit later going

to Mexico and making myself go to bullfights.

These days, no, it's like being a smoker.

But, I still like the company of people that still smoke

and it's the same with this.

It is a bygone era of male machoness that I like rather a lot.

I couldn't help but think I was on a small island where, in a week or so,

I'd know every bar and every restaurant in town.

Now, this is right up my street.

It's lovely eating outside in the warm air.

I think it's one of life's great pleasures.

This is grilled mackerel with pirinaca, the most simple salad of

tomato, green peppers, red peppers, onion and olive oil.

And basically, this is what Spain is all about, what the Spanish

are all about with seafood.

Keep it really simple.

In northern Spain, in Galicia, if you have a big crab,

it arrives just boiled in seawater. No lemon, no mayonnaise,

because they just say, if it is that good, you need nothing else with it.

And it's a bit like this with the mackerel.

Because what else do you need with a perfectly fresh mackerel like this?

Just a little bit of chopped tomato, green and red pepper and onion -

and that is it. That is perfection, and it just makes you realise,

it just brings back how great this mackerel is.

This is one of the reasons I run a restaurant, because a really good

time in a restaurant with a loved one creates a memory

that never goes away.

"Do you remember the time we had those really fresh grilled mackerel

"and drank sangria in that little backstreet in Cadiz

"and we lost our way home?"

Cadiz is one of the oldest cities in Europe.

It was founded by those trading masters of the sea,

those very clever and resourceful Phoenicians, who came from the

eastern Mediterranean.

There's a poem from school that I love, it's by John Masefield.

I used to think it was all about the Phoenician trading ships,

but it might well have been the Romans - they were here, too.

It fits a place like Cadiz.

"Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir,

"Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine,

"With a cargo of ivory,

"And apes and peacocks,

"Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine."

I've just discovered in Cadiz the perfect breakfast.

It's a cafe con leche,

a plate of churros, which is like a dough, deep-fried,

and a spicy cup of hot chocolate that's just got cinnamon in it.

I just sort of think this is what Cadiz is about on a

breakfast morning, but, when I'm back in England, I like to think,

"Oh, yeah, I would love a churros," but I never get round to it.

I'm always doing things like that,

bringing, sort of, ouzo from Greece or pastis from the Mediterranean

and I've got a cupboard full of bottles which I never, ever drink.

So true.

Over here, they're delicious, but back in Padstow at 8am,

what on earth are you doing eating doughnuts and chocolate

at this hour?!

I don't know what you feel about eating snails, but I do like them,

of course. But what I like about this stand is you have your snails,

your big ones and little ones and they're both the same price,

about 3 euros for a kilo, but you've got everything to cook

with the snails - garlic, bay leaves, some thyme-like herbs and

I was asking about these blackberries or tayberries,

but they cook them with those as well.

So, this is everything, this is snail central.

Every time I'm in a wonderful fish market like this, I think it's

about time I gave all this up.

I honestly think I've been in more fish markets as a chef

than anybody else possibly in this world.

So what can I say?

Well, I can still come to a fish market like this one in Cadiz

and just get incredibly excited.

I've been watching these palourdes, carpet shell clams, spitting at me.

They've been selling so fast. Those mussels from Galicia,

we've got these mantis shrimp, just so fresh.

Even these winkles are walking around, like a whole load of snails.

And these, I've only just had these. They're called murex.

And - ah - razor clams, I love them.

As a chef, this is inspirational for me.

VENDOR SPEAKS SPANISH

It's a moray eel, very good eating.

The Romans, if a slave wasn't doing his work properly,

he'd be thrown into a lake full of moray eels and eaten to death.

If I was going to buy anything here to cook,

then it would have to be this.

This seriously fresh, deep-red, juicy tuna.

They catch it coming into the Med from the Atlantic in May and June

when the tuna are still full of fat.

I was cheered to be told this fishery is sustainable.

It looks more like a butcher's shop than a fish shop.

Oh, so good!

It's too early for lunch and I can't think of anything better

than this for a real treat.

A very special elevenses tuna sashimi.

Three different cuts,

the palest and tastiest being the belly.

This is what the Japanese really revere.

This is the belly. It's the most expensive part, full of fat.

Lovely texture, lovely creamy taste to it.

You won't get better tuna than this in the Tsukiji market in Japan.

When I first saw that there was a Japanese sushi store here

in the market, I thought, "This is crazy. Why do Japanese food?"

But I started to think, if you think of the two greatest fish-loving

nations on Earth, it's the Japanese and Spanish,

so it's an absolute match.

And now it seems perfectly normal

and, actually, this is the best way - bar none - to eat tuna,

but I've just had a sip of this Manzanilla...

..and do you know what? It tastes a bit like sake to me.

It's got that same sort of fragrance and it just goes so well with this.

So, I'm absolutely in tuna heaven.

BELL TOLLS

But, I think I can hear what you're saying, and that is,

"I'm not going all the way to Cadiz to eat sushi.

"I want the real deal, a traditional Andalusian lunch.

And it's a great place just to mooch around following your nose.

This is the place in Cadiz famous for pescado frito,

simple, fried fish.

It's always packed lunch times.

The Italians call it frito misto.

I think this must be one of the oldest dishes in the world.

If you go back thousands of years, they had olive oil,

flour and salt and fish aplenty.

I think this is the secret

of the miracle of the loaves and fishes feeding the 5,000.

To me, though, this is the food of holidays.

This place is famous for its quickly fried fish.

I suppose it's the Spanish version of fish and chips.

It's frying on a big scale. Big fryers, lots of flour.

Special, grainy flour for fish like this.

So, this is from the market this morning, of course.

First of all, I've got some dogfish, cazon,

with a spicy batter. There's a lot of cumin in there.

It's really almost Indian in its spicing.

Next, I've got boquerones, those are little anchovies, again, just fried.

Boquerones, chipirones.

These are little, tiny squid and, like the boquerones,

the whole thing is fried.

And actually - excuse me speaking with my mouth full -

you can eat the whole of a squid

except for the little quill in it, which you can't taste in those

because they are so small.

A lovely lunch, nice cold glass of wine...

What more could you ask for?

This would be one of my top five dishes in the whole series.

It's simple, it's colourful and it is a perfect way to cook sea bream,

dorade.

The locals call it dorade a la Rota.

So, I'm just slicing some potatoes and dropping them into my lovely

circular roasting dish, which I brought back from Greece.

So, in they go.

Lots of sea salt and plenty of pepper and plenty of olive oil.

You have to cook the potatoes first before you add the fish,

otherwise they don't get cooked or the fish gets overcooked.

Great local dish from Rota, just near Cadiz.

I really liked it when I had it.

I particularly like the flavours of tomato, green pepper and sherry.

Really made the dish.

So, those go into a medium-to-hot oven for about 15 minutes.

The right amount of time to do what's next.

Well, that's olive oil into a hot pan

followed by sliced onions and green peppers.

This is the basis of the sauce.

Now, peeled and sliced tomatoes and just let that soften down.

As I said, if you cook this all together,

the sauce would be fantastic,

but the fish would be a burnt nightmare.

That's beginning to smell really nice.

I love the smell and taste of cooked peppers.

Not so keen on raw ones, actually. Er, capsicums, that's what I mean.

And a bay leaf, now.

Some water, that's to make a bit of sauce, and some salt and pepper.

About ten turns of the peppermill, I think.

There we go.

And I'm just going to put a lid on to this and leave it to cook

for about ten to 15 minutes.

Remembering to turn the heat down.

So, I've got garlic, parsley and rough sea salt in there.

I'm just pounding that together.

The Spanish call this preparation a picada and quite often they'll use

dried bread or nuts in it as well, lots of garlic, lots of olive oil.

The point is, you add it to a sauce or a dish just before the final

cooking and it just gives the dish a bit of thickness, the sauce,

and a burst of flavour.

I think the potatoes are probably done now.

Yeah, they're looking good.

So, I will put my fish on top of those.

There we go.

So, a quick season of the fish both inside and out,

and lay them in my nice round roasting tray.

And now the picada, that parsley, garlic and salt paste.

Just put that on top of the fish. That looks really nice.

For those with sharp eyes and expensive television sets,

the bream has been de-scaled, so it's lost its silvery sheen.

But it'll taste really good.

And now the sauce and that's cooked down really well.

It's smelling so lovely.

Just put that all around and a bit on top.

And now the juice of half a lemon, all over.

Now, the most important bit.

Sherry, about 60ml of oloroso sherry.

Beautiful smell, there.

A bit more olive oil.

Just a tad more water, the sauce looks a little bit dry.

And now straight into the oven with that.

It's amazing, cos baked fish dishes like this,

everybody loves, and yet you don't get them any more.

Everybody's too busy char-grilling everything.

Everybody wants that charcoal flavour, but, actually,

a lovely moist, baked, whole fish, you can't beat it.

I reckon, on a long weekend here,

you've got to go to the sherry triangle.

Very close, the towns of Sanlucar de Barrameda,

El Puerto de Santa Maria, and, of course, Jerez,

where the name sherry comes from.

I love sherry.

From my very first timid sip one far-off Christmas many years ago,

it's part of me.

Of course, there are many bodegas here - they're places where

they age the sherry for years.

Salud!

This, Bodegas Tradicion, came to my attention through a friend,

who said it's run by a brilliant chap called Lorenzo Garcia-Iglesias.

My friend said, "If a bottle of sherry could talk,

"it would be Lorenzo."

It is such a lovely space here. It's so, sort of, erm...

..almost holy.

Yeah, well, we call this the Cathedral of Sherry.

We have these environments,

specific environments where we need to talk quiet.

I don't feel like raising my voice.

No, actually the wine doesn't like much noise,

but this misty environment is necessary for the health of the

yeast that covers the wine.

The fino sherry is distilled wine and also the windows

we keep open, so the breeze from the sea comes in

and that brings also in the salinity that you taste in the wine

that makes it very specific and very personal.

Very typical from Cadiz, no sugar at all.

No residual sugar, it's very dry. Very dry.

The way you are talking about it now...

..I could hardly say I'm dry, but I am feeling...

Actually, the time is about... Yeah, the Pope has drunk already.

-The Pope has?

-Yeah, at 12.

-At 12?

-He drinks at 12. So, it's 12.20, I think we can have a glass.

-OK.

-Or two.

-Two.

Two, all right!

DOOR CREAKS

SHUTS HEAVILY

I'm going to introduce you to Pepe, Pepe Blandino, our foreman.

So, this is the way we taste wine.

Wow! Look at the skill of that.

Yeah, it's the first time he does this!

LAUGHTER

Well, Pepe's been in the wine trade in Cadiz for 53 years already.

-Good Lord.

-So, he is an expert doing this.

And it is a way of getting the air in the wine so you get that aromas.

You know, to freshen up the wine.

So, this is palo cortado from us.

-Cheers. Thank you, Pepe.

-Thank you.

This is palo cortado from Bodegas Tradicion,

and it is a wine over 30 years of age, very, erm...

-It tastes that it's over 30 years of age.

-Yeah.

It's nutty, it's terribly complex.

Every time I taste it, I taste something, sort of, more to it.

Yeah, it's quite a tricky wine.

On the nose, you get that caramel aroma, but also, it's fish market.

-But when you put it on your palate, the sweetness is gone...

-Yeah.

-..and the fish market comes alive, so you have...

-Fish market?

Yeah, all the seafood.

I can perceive the barnacles and clams and oysters and seaweed

that makes it so, erm, fantastic and fabulous.

Lorenzo, I hope you don't mind me saying this, but if I was thinking

of getting an actor to be the face of sherry,

or, indeed, the King of Spain,

-it would be you!

-Thank you, thank you very much.

No king of anywhere but...

You just look the part.

..I just love it, and...

-Do you love your sherry?

-Oh, yeah.

I do it with passion because I enjoy introducing friends to

and converting people to sherry.

So, it's a wine to enjoy, enjoy with food.

I agree, I agree!

On the way into the bodegas,

I noticed a couple of tiles on the wall

that looked like early Picassos.

And, of course, they were.

Lorenzo is as passionate about Spanish artists

as he is about sherry.

-Two Goyas.

-Two Goyas, back there.

I have to say, I felt quite a bit out of my depth here.

I'm a cook, not an art historian,

and I'm surrounded by all these paintings in a gallery next

to barrels of fino and amontillado.

It just gets better and better.

We try to show all the Spanish art movements from the 14th to the

19th century, so it is a family investment that we have here,

you know, as a value-added asset for the visitors

that come and visit here.

So, it's something unique for the wineries.

Just have a look at that one. Is that... Are those...?

Well, this is Joaquin Serolla. It's very, erm, Hispanic painting.

And this, specifically, is Extremadura, where the pata negra,

the black pig, is drawn.

He is a prospect of good ham.

-A prospect of good...

-Extremadura, prospect of the ham.

And this?

He's the guy who's guarding the neighbourhood.

It's kind of, you know, he's looking for a fight, actually.

He certainly looks as though he is. Is that a knife in his...

Yeah, that's a knife.

Looking at him, you can tell that he can rob you very easily.

-I would not want to go near him.

-No.

That's from a painter from Sevilla, he's called Jimenez Aranda.

Gosh.

And over here, you've got a Velazquez?

It's called El Almuerzo, the lunch, and it's a young Velazquez

and there is another copy of it in El Prado museum in Madrid

and another one in the Louvre in Paris.

We've got onions...

Yeah, we got onions...

..pomegranate, some bread.

And the fish, difficult to tell.

-I don't know what it is.

-Looks like it is cured.

Yeah. Not sure what it is.

What's that in his hand?

Well, he's eating his radish, I think, and what is in the glass,

we always hope, is sherry.

Of course it is!

So, El Greco.

Yeah, this is El Greco.

And it is very deep painting.

He lived in Spain most of his life and...

So this is an original El Greco?

-Yeah, of course. It is original.

-Of course.

Of course. Like everything here.

We are all originals.

And you see the depth.

So skinny and so pale,

the guy looks like he's almost dead.

So, you see the symbolism of life, safe on top of the death,

which is the crucifix and the skull

and is everything relying on the Bible, so it's a Catholic vision

of life and death.

And the technique used by El Greco was far ahead of

the people from his generation.

I think it is a masterpiece.

You can buy half of Andalusia with what you have got in here.

Yeah, but if we have half of Andalusia, we can't fit it in

this warehouse, you know.

This is a wine cellar, as it was in the past, and now is holding

-these paintings.

-Oh, this is lovely. This is...

-I'm happy you like it.

Well, this is art on a human scale.

The Louvre is too big.

This is what I like.

I always say, in essence, these programmes - my long weekends -

are about food, but this ancient city is quite lovely,

sharing an evening sky with Africa.

To me, this is one of the most romantic sights

I've seen on my travels so far.

And on my balcony,

sipping a cold and very agreeable glass of albarino,

sometimes you've just got to pinch yourself.

When you're a certain age,

I suggest reading glasses are essential to enjoy

the hotel's buffet breakfast.

One wrong move and you'll get a dollop of chocolate

in your cafe con leche.

I don't seem to have much luck in the machine department.

And calling all electrical engineers, tell me,

is there a toaster that toasts bread

till it's golden brown in a minute or so?

A toaster that doesn't tease you by having to have half a dozen goes

before you can see a change in colour,

before you eventually give up and have muesli instead?

But actually, I really like this hotel.

The staff are very nice, it's very well run

and I like the other people, they're very, sort of, everyday.

It's the sort of place I'd sort of think, "Yeah, that's good.

"It's right on the beach. I'll be back."

The city walls are worth a look.

In the old days, they would be bristling with cannon

and loads of troops.

Even Napoleon couldn't break the city, although he tried very hard,

holding it siege for two and a half years.

Beyond these walls is the old town with the precious ships,

the arsenals and the warehouses.

It's been described as an overcrowded ghetto,

virtually surrounded by the sea on three sides.

The writer, Laurie Lee,

came here just before the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s.

In his lovely book,

As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning,

he said this...

"I seem to meet up with no-one in Cadiz

"except the blind and the crippled, the diseased,

"the deaf and dumb, whose condition was so hopeless

"they scarcely bothered to complain,

"but treated it all as a twisted joke.

"They told me tittering tales of others

"even more wretched than themselves,

"the homeless who lived in the Arab drains,

"who lay down at night amongst the rats and excrement

"and were washed out to sea twice a year by the floods.

"They told me of families

"who scraped the tavern floors for shellfish

"and took it home to boil for soup."

Crikey!

I was just mooching around this cathedral

and noticed some of the building blocks.

It's like they've just been cut

straight out of the rock on the seashore

because if you look, there's just lots of shells in there.

Oysters, clamshells, almejas, I know that word.

Limpets. I mean, it's like a cathedral of the sea.

A seafood cathedral, if you like.

I am a romantic.

I was convinced these two old trees came from the Americas,

along with the gold, the chocolate and the topazes.

What stories they could tell.

I thought they were as old as the days when most of the Western world

considered potatoes poisonous and as for the tomatoes,

the fruit of the devil.

But actually, they're only 100 years old and came from Australia.

Oh, well. You can't win them all.

This is one of the latest tapas bars here,

and they've gone out of their way to attract young people.

It's minimalist, for sure.

No bulls' heads staring down at you and no pictures of toreadors,

but the dishes are still very much what I would call traditional.

The chef is Pancho Jimenez Yanez.

Today we have three kinds of stews.

The recipe of my mum, my grandmum as well.

Always, the chorizo in the top, it's the flavour.

-OK.

-Next.

-Second one is similar but the chorizo

is spicy, chorizo criollo, and we use sherry

and it's chickpeas with red beans

and the red beans, they give a different flavour. All right?

OK. That looks lovely.

And we have the last one,

this is really good, typical for the fishermen.

Stew with potatoes, dogfish.

-Dogfish?

-Dogfish? What's that in Spanish?

-Cazon.

-Cazon.

-It's typical in this zone.

And as well as coming with a little bit of the belly of the tuna.

We make it with sherry.

-Really nice.

-Aw. Fabulous.

Gosh, what should I drink with that, would you think?

All of them, we try to do always with sherry.

You can take one of them with dry sherry,

another one with sweet sherry.

-OK.

-So they have different flavours.

I'll do that.

I've cooked, and I've had chorizo with chickpeas

since I first started coming to Spain.

And I like this kind of tapas.

But the dogfish stew interested me.

To me, it's a first.

The dogfish.

We can't get dogfish any more in the UK.

I think it's a bit fished out,

so it's really nice to be trying it again.

It used to be very common in the '70s.

Dogfish, a member of the shark family, lots of flavour, very mild,

this one. Very, very nice.

And it's also got some tuna belly in it as well.

Now, the manzanilla to go with it.

Subtle, fragrant, perfection.

I love these long weekends.

Because the time's short,

you do much more, and, actually, I think I get better sussing out

good restaurants, cooking food the locals like.

Now, this is a pretty good example.

Instantly, I get a feeling of families really enjoying themselves.

I love this restaurant.

We come here all the time.

We always find a place,

me and the rest of the crew, which we call central headquarters.

It's where we always go to have our meals when we're not filming.

And this one is a fantastic seafood restaurant.

It's got great prawns,

with fantastic tuna, but what I really like,

and what they're famous for, is their rice dishes,

and this one that I am eating, arroz verde,

is just like a paella but it's so simple.

It's just rice and clams, almejas, and prawns and lots of garlic,

quite a lot of salt and lovely green herbs.

And it is just so subtle.

Whereas the crew, I have to say, have ordered up a sort of paella,

I think it is a paella which is so yellow,

that you'd actually have to wear sunglasses to eat it!

Yummy!

The crew preferred the paella, but looking round that restaurant,

I noticed that most of the locals were eating this one.

Arroz verde.

Arroz, rice. Verde, green.

I couldn't have enough of that arroz verde

which came from that restaurant

called La Marea, which means the tide.

It's just one of those restaurants

that you love to find in a place like Cadiz.

Right on the beach, really informal,

full of families all enjoying themselves, and great seafood.

So I'm just softening the shallots in this olive oil,

I've got the heat really quite turned down.

I don't want it to burn or catch at all.

And next, I'm going to put lots of garlic in.

I've got about 12 garlic cloves here.

I'm just going to chop them up.

I thought it was almost as much about the garlic and the olive oil

as the seafood.

I just love the smell of cooking olive oil and garlic.

It's the salt of the Mediterranean.

Whenever I think of the Mediterranean, that is the taste.

I know Cadiz is not on the Mediterranean before you write in,

but it is the same climate, basically.

So, now I'm just adding just over a litre of stock

and I'm just going to bring that to the boil and chop some parsley.

When I first went to Spain,

I thought the only rice dish in Spain was paella.

But in fact, there's loads of rice dishes and loads of seafood and

rice dishes and this is one of them.

I suppose you could say it is just a sort of simplified paella,

but I make it all the time just because of that,

because it's so easy.

First of all, we had a lot of garlic,

now we've got an awful lot of parsley,

but it is called arroz verde, so I need a lot of green in it.

I was just thinking that,

had this been 100 miles down the road in Portugal,

this would be coriander, not parsley.

So, I'm just sprinkling the rice into the boiling fish stock...

..and now for the enormous amount of parsley,

and some salt, about a teaspoon and a half.

And I'm just going to leave that to simmer gently for six minutes.

So, the rice has been cooking for about six minutes

and now I'm just going to put all these live clams

on the top of it all like that.

You might see them start to pop open in a minute.

Now the prawns, and I've actually cut the prawns lengthways.

I actually ordered slightly smaller prawns

and the truth of it is I got big ones.

Quite often I'll cut prawns half lengthways

just to make them go further.

Most people think paella is the national dish of Spain,

but, actually, it started life as a regional dish in Valencia

where there were rice fields.

I remember having it with snails that looked a bit like humbugs,

chunks of rabbit and pieces of chicken.

In fact, the rule of thumb would be to use what's available.

Here, loads of clams because they're plentiful, and the gambas.

So, there it is.

Cooked about 18, 20 minutes.

So easy, a couple of big spoonfuls on the plate.

And I always like to serve some alioli garlic mayonnaise with it.

It's not totally correct,

but I do notice quite a lot of Spanish people do it too.

I love the combination.

There it is.

Just outside Cadiz, there's a really good restaurant by a very busy road,

run by a famous chef, Jose Manuel Cordoba.

We have to take care because it's really hot.

OK, take care.

Fab.

His speciality is cooking a loin of tuna

which he's had marinating in red wine.

He sears the tuna, and he bakes it for five to seven minutes,

not very much.

And then he makes a sauce with the reduction of the red wine.

-OK.

-Can I try?

Yeah, you have to try, of course.

-That's lovely.

-Yes, a little bit of salt, just a little.

-Si.

-OK?

Now, this is a very quick restaurant dish to make.

Interestingly, Jose Manuel cooks it pink, which was lovely.

I think I have got too used to having it quite raw in the middle.

He dresses it with sauce, and it's the most popular dish on the menu,

because the fresh tuna is at its peak at the moment.

Very soft, very fresh.

Yes, it's too fresh.

-It is beautiful.

-Now is the season for the fresh tuna here in Cadiz.

It's such good tuna.

'So, if you come here between April and June, a good time to come,

'virtually every restaurant and bar

'has their own special way of cooking tuna.

'There's even a gastronomic route dedicated to it.

'But what really interests me is Cadiz's signature dish.

'The young receptionist at the hotel mentioned it when I arrived.

'Tortillitas de camarones. In short, it's shrimp pancakes.'

To make this really light batter, you need flour, a bit of salt,

very cold water, it has to be really cold...

..a little bit of chopped onion,

parsley, and seaweed.

That makes a real difference.

You get a bite of the sea and two types of shrimps, both very local.

They're so fresh, they've just been caught.

People rave about these fritters.

I'm nearly tempted to say

I've known grown men cry describing the taste.

All they need in the piping hot olive oil is just a minute or a

tad over and that's it.

Once tasted, never forgotten.

-Delicious.

-Thank you.

Everybody tries here for an appetiser.

'What does it taste like, Rick?'

This is the best fritter I've ever tasted.

The shrimps were jumping, I have to say this,

just before they were fried,

and this is the sort of Spanish seafood

that makes it so very special.

People say they are the best tortillitas de camarones

all over the world.

-I agree.

-People say, not me!

Would I disagree? Not at all.

Needless to say, with fritters like these,

no more filming could be done

until the crew had had a couple of platefuls.

This is fascinating.

We were just packing up,

and Jose Manuel's asked me to come down and have a look at this.

I mean, this inn was built in 1780,

that's 25 years before the Battle of Trafalgar,

and a lot of this stuff was in the walls, apparently.

I mean, I bet some of it was from Trafalgar.

These cannonballs and the shot, there,

I don't know about that jacket,

that might not be, but it doesn't matter

because when you think how old this building is,

it was here before Trafalgar.

It's just fascinating.

Actually, I quite like sitting here, having a nice bit of tuna and

sort of looking down at history.

One thing leads to another,

and so I had to have a look at Cape Trafalgar.

It's not far away from Cadiz.

I love soaking up history.

This is where the Spanish and French fleet met their doom

when Nelson's ships appeared over the horizon

perfectly in line at right angles to the flanks

of the French and Spanish ships, and went through Napoleon's fleet

like the proverbial hot knife through butter.

It was said to be the greatest naval battle in history,

but it was a bloody affair.

Nelson was shot by a sniper

and the French and the Spanish were mostly destroyed.

Church bells rang all over Britain and the ultimate hero's body

was brought back home in a barrel of brandy.

Looking at the scene now, you'd never know.

Another town in the Sherry Triangle

that you have to go to is San Lucar de Barrameda.

It's the only place where manzanilla is made.

It's also where Christopher Columbus

came back from the New World.

He sailed from Cadiz, but came back here.

However, it's where I had one of the best tapas dishes ever.

Well, I must say, I've just watched these patatas alinadas being made

and I was just thinking, here for lunch, what a perfect lunch dish.

I mean, the potatoes are so lovely and sweet, Spanish new potatoes,

the onion, again, is sweet and soft, you've got the sherry vinegar,

you've got this fantastic local olive oil

which is deep green and so, almost thick and slightly bitter,

and on top of it, you've got this fantastic tuna

which is more like bonito, I think, called melva tuna which is lovely.

It's such a great combination.

But talking of combinations, I mean,

it's got to be manzanilla to drink with this.

I mean, it's got this nuttiness that goes so well with it

and while I'm eating lunch,

I'm thinking about that little song from Carmen

where Carmen sings about going near the ramparts of Sevilla

to the house of her friend, Lillas Pastia,

and dance the seguidilla with a glass of manzanilla.

Not a great translation from the French,

I have to say, but you get the idea.

I was going back to Cadiz before it got dark,

but I heard there was a little fishing port here,

and the boats were coming in thick and fast.

I always like to see fishing boats unload.

And this looks like a pretty good catch to me.

It's not masses but very choice quality.

That's a pretty good-looking fish, don't you think?

It's called a corvina, a very good eating.

I've had them all over the world, actually.

It's really steaky, it's almost like meat from the sea,

it's that firm.

What a beautiful-looking fish.

What I'm thinking here is, watching all this being landed,

there is no shortage of fish here.

There's so many different species and so much of it.

Now, the man in charge of European fishing enterprises,

which includes Cornwall, was born and lives here.

He heard I was filming and wanted to meet up.

I was a bit worried about, you know,

talking about things like the Common Fisheries Policy etc,

but he turned out to be a really nice bloke who loves fish.

His name is Javier Garat.

We met at a restaurant here and Nando, short for Fernando,

cooks these freshly-landed prawns

just off the boats a few minutes ago.

He just boils them in seawater,

and when they've peaked into perfect pinkness,

he puts them into ice water, halting the cooking process

and keeping them moist, sweet, perfection.

As a restaurateur,

I have a little benchmark to see who is a real connoisseur

of seafood and it's this.

Who eats the head of a prawn. Do YOU?

This is the best part, the head.

I agree.

It's very tasty.

Maybe I shouldn't be saying this to you,

but I've been making these programmes,

a lot about fish, in the last 20 years.

Say ten, 15 years ago, if I said to a Cornishman

that I was coming to Spain to speak to a Spaniard

who is in charge of European Fisheries,

they'd say, "Well, that's a bit like a fox in a henhouse,"

because they so mistrusted the Spanish in those days.

I can understand you.

But, fortunately, things have changed radically.

The good thing is that we are doing things much better

than 20 years ago.

We are taking care of the stocks, because without the stocks,

we know that fishermen will never live,

and that is why we are taking so much care of the fish.

Talking of stocks,

I mean, gosh, I was in a fish market in Cadiz,

and what surprised me was how big the variety

of fish in there.

You are very lucky. I have to say this.

We are very, very lucky.

You have to take into account that in Spain are traded

around 500 different commercial species,

which is something completely different

from our neighbours from other countries.

Northern countries, mainly.

If you go to the UK, you can find cod, haddock, salmon, pangasius...

and not too many others.

No, not...actually, it's getting better.

In the market in Cornwall there's lots, there is,

there's John Dory, red mullet, there's hake,

lots of hake, good hake.

The Cornish used to say,

"The Spanish are taking all our hake," but...

No. It is true because we have more quota.

Our citizens, the consumers, love to eat fish.

It's very healthy, and that is why our population also...

..takes longer to die.

I used to argue, "OK, the Spanish have the hake,

"who eats hake around here?"

I'm glad I met up with Javier

because I love talking about fish,

and it's great to meet someone who knows more about it than I do.

Also, the prawns were the best.

It's my last night here,

and I had to get back to Cadiz for the flamenco.

FLAMENCO MUSIC PLAYS

SHE SINGS FLAMENCO

I have a friend who can't bear listening to flamenco.

He said it reminds him of when his mother

used to get very cross with him for coming in late.

But I love it.

I always have. I love the raw passion,

the handclaps, the stomping.

If music and dancing were a spice,

then flamenco would be the smokiest, spiciest pimenton.

Ole las guapas!

APPLAUSE

I'm coming to the end of my weekend,

but I feel I would have let myself down

if I didn't come and see some flamenco.

A lot of people might feel

that flamenco has just become a bit of a tourist thing,

but I have just seen the real deal,

the real duende which means when the dancer and the dance become as one.

What I was thinking when I was watching that

is this sense of wildness about it,

this sort of abandon,

this really aggressive wildness, but within the confines of a dance.

It is so moving.

FLAMENCO GUITAR PLAYS

Ole! Muchas gracias!

APPLAUSE

Now, if you come to Cadiz, I insist you have to come here.

Pena Flamenca La Perla, the House of Flamenco.

My trip certainly wouldn't be complete without it.

It's fabulous.

This is my last dish inspired by my last night in Cadiz.

Now, I call this dish Spain on a plate.

It has the colours of the Spanish flag - red and gold.

It comes from Andalusia and it's called Huevos a la Flamenca.

And it's delicious.

I've got some olive oil, chopped onion and chopped garlic.

And I slice up some Serrano ham, a good handful, I'd say.

And now we start with some of that flamenco element,

first of all, pimenton,

a good heaped teaspoon of hot pimenton.

It has to be hot and red.

And now some tomato puree, a good squeeze of that.

It's starting to look red and yellow and flamenco-ish already.

There we go, and now some chopped tomatoes.

Just skimmed them.

Lovely summery tomatoes,

in they go.

Stir, stir, stir.

Some salt, lovely, big, chunky rock salt.

It's a big dish, this,

and everything's big and generous and full of flavour.

There we go. Plenty of pepper, stir that in.

And now I'm just going to leave that to cook down

for about ten, 15 minutes

to get a lovely deep, deep pimenton smoky-flavoured sofrito.

Lid on.

Now, a slice of chorizo.

OK, about ten slices, again, this is really hot chorizo.

I want this dish to be extremely, extremely Andalusian.

And now slice up this roasted red pepper into long thin slices.

Now, let's have a look at the sauce.

Perfect!

Perfect deep red sauce.

And now I'm just going to add

some previously cooked haricot beans and peas.

You can put what you like in it.

Quite often, I put those lovely big Spanish butter beans in there,

sometimes some potatoes,

whatever vegetable you like.

But at the moment, it's summer, it's beans, it's peas.

And now to break four beautiful

Burford Brown eggs into there.

And I just hope I don't mess up any of the yolks.

That one's good.

That one's not so good.

That one's good.

That one's good. Fantastic.

Nearly there. Around the outside, now I put the chorizo.

And then finally, lovely, deep red slices of red peppers.

A bit of salt.

A bit of pepper.

Lid on, leave those eggs to cook.

Well, there it is. I mean, it just looks lovely.

It's easy to make.

It's a sort of a happy dish.

Somebody once said to me, "What is Spanish food, quickly?"

And I said, "The colours of the Spanish flag, red and yellow."

And there it is.

Red and yellow. It's just bursting with colour and flavour.

# Hey, Rick

# Where we going next weekend?

# Are we flying a few hours away

# For some delicious food, they say

# We can try dishes in Roma or Barcelona

# For something more exotic, though

# The spices of Morocco

# Yes, you can take your pick

# And even break the ice in Reykjavik

# So, Rick, make the booking

# Let's get cooking

# And get those taste buds going next weekend! #