Starry eyed

Eating is a bit of a thing in Spain. Not a bit of a thing like it is in South Sudan, not in the sense of needing to eat to avoid dying, but eating for pleasure. It's also a never exhausted topic of conversation. Lunch is the main meal of the day in Spain and cheap set meals, a few euros on each side of 10€, are available all over the place. I know that most Britons living here don't agree with me but I can't remember the last time I had a memorable set menu in that price range. They're fine, some are better than others, most are perfectly pleasant but few, none actually, come to mind as showing much flair. For a bit of cooked sea bass or steak the set menus are incredible value. The ones I enjoy most though are the restaurants that have set meals costing something like 25 to 35€. Its enough money for the restaurants to be creative but, when the bill comes, I don't wonder about the sanity of just having spent a new mobile phone's worth of cash on something that will be flowing down the drains a few hours later. This said one of the things that we've done a few times now, on Maggie's birthday, is to go in search of a restaurant with Michelin stars. 

It started years ago when a chef called Kiko Moya came to Pinoso as the "Godfather" of the annual celebration of traditional food in and of Pinoso called Mostra de la Cuina del Pinós. The chef was from a nearby town called Concentaina. His little speech at the opening ceremony for that food festival made me think that a posh meal in his Michelin starred restaurant and an overnight stay in a hotel would be a nice gift for Maggie's birthday.

Two stories stick out from that meal. The first is that the only thing either of us remember as being particularly nice was a savoury version of a normally sweet local Christmas treat called turrón. The second is that they served us a dish at one point which featured the mould that grows on corn cobs. For those of you old enough to remember it was amusing, in a Pseuds Corner sort of way. We wondered why mould had never caught on, unlike egg and chips for instance. Overall though it was a pleasant enough experience and the basic plot seemed sound - an overpriced meal each year as a bit o a birthday treat.

The second year we went to a place in Almansa. No overnight stay this time just the restaurant which meant evening. Usually, and for no obvious reason, evening meals are less enjoyable than lunchtime meals in Spain - a bit more formal, less lively, less Spanish. It was a bad experience. I usually compare it to the time that you're invited to an acquaintances house for dinner. They serve things that you don't like at all but which you can, just about, eat without vomiting. With grim British style determination you wade through each course. In this particular restaurant the tasting menu had at least eight courses. The one that took most effort was a tuna heart stuffed with something that made it look like an eyeball though I suspect eyeballs taste nicer than whatever it was we were given to eat. I was only just about able to control my gag response.

The restaurant we went to in Cuenca the next year was totally forgettable. It wasn't a bad experience; nice enough as I remember with good service and decent food but I cannot remember anything of the detail. What I do remember as being really disappointing were the digs. Cuenca is too far from home to pop over for an evening meal and get back home. So, I booked us in to the Parador hotel there. The Parador hotel chain has some impressive buildings and impressive locations. They often convert places like castles, monasteries and convents into hotels. The hotel in Cuenca is a converted convent set atop a river gorge. That's it in the photo with this post. It looks great outside and the communal spaces inside - the restaurant, the lounges, the bar - are all impressive as well. The room though was quite small, it crossed my mind that it may have been the size of the original nun's cell, and the décor and fittings were very ordinary. The hotel was also full of a wedding and loud wedding guests dominated the character of the hotel for we non wedding guests. And it was not cheap.

We went to a great restaurant with a Michelin star in La Nucia, el Xato. This time it wasn't Maggie's birthday but it was the birthday of one of our long-time friends so we went as two couples. It was splendid. Great service from really pleasant servers, good price, verging on cheap for a restaurant with Michelin stars, excellent food and with a little gastronomic journey from the Valencian shoreline to the interior of the region explained in food and drink. 

Last year I hunted around for another starred restaurant but the places that were on my possible list were prohibitively expensive. Going to eat Mexican in Madrid for instance with the train, hotel and meal was way beyond my wallet. The set meal, with accompanying matched wines, was a bit short of 200€ per cover. I reckon that with the train fare and the overnight stay In Madrid it would have been around 800€ and I just couldn't justify, or afford, that. We stayed locally instead and had a remarkably ordinary paella at a restaurant which should have done much, much better.

This year though there were lots of new restaurants with Michelin stars in the area and with reasonably (given the criteria) priced set meals. One in Calpe, a couple in Murcia and one in San Juan. All a bit fish based though and Maggie isn't big on fish. Eventually I settled on one in Ondara, near Denia, a short couple of hours from home. Maggie knew nothing about it till the last moment and she didn't know that I'd invited a couple of pals along too. The idea was that she would have company as she worked her way through the wine accompanying each course whilst I, nominated driver that I am, remained steadfastly boring and sober. Nice place, excellent service and the prices were fine except for the unnecessary graspingness of overcharging for things like water, beer and coffee. It was a strange failing because something I've noticed in most of the other posh restaurants we've been to is that they don't overcharge for the ordinary things. If a coffee costs 1.50€ in the local bar the posh restaurants usually limit themselves to doubling the price. Not so in Ondara. 

To be honest I've already forgotten what we ate; for me it's the experience that's the pleasure rather than the food. If I wanted to eat something I really liked I'd cook up a bacon sandwich and make a nice cup of tea but then I wouldn't have stories about eating mould, the feeling of dread as I forced myself to eat some supposed delicacy or the unpleasantness of handing over the credit card and contemplating the tip.