Form and substance

In the run up to Christmas we bought a couple of coca from the women running the Caritas stall outside the Parish Rooms in Pinoso. The coca were cooked as we watched and wrapped in silver paper. For two we paid one Euro. I like coca and I wolfed mine down. My companion was not so keen. Mind, she's the sort of woman who doesn't like digestive biscuits. She likes something a bit fancier. She calls coca fat pies.

Coca has nothing to do with soft drinks or narcotics. Coca is a sort of thickish pancake made with flour, water and olive oil, salted to taste. You make a dough, separate off a small ball shaped lump of it, squash it down with the heel of your hand to make a vague circular shape before frying it up on a plancha which is an oil coated flat hot surface. You couldn't get much simpler. There's another traditional food around here called gachamiga made with just flour, oil, water and garlic. In most of the village fiestas there will be competitions (traditionally for men) to cook gachamiga in a big wok like pan over an open fire. Indeed lots of the traditional regional dishes of Spain are based on what's to hand. Think fabada from Asturias, paella from Valencia, migas in Extremadura, cochinilla in Segovia, calcots in Catalunya or tortilla de patatas everywhere. It's a bit unlikely that Jijona would have become famous for Christmas turrón if they hadn't had access to plentiful supplies of local almonds, honey and eggs.

Peasant food, simple food, cooking with what you have to hand applies equally well in the UK and, probably, all over the world. Think Yorkshire pudding - flour, eggs and milk. Fry instead of bake and the Yorkshires become  pancakes. Shrove Tuesday, Pancake day, is the feast day before the God fearing population plunged into the denials of Lent on Ash Wednesday. The food of the feast being so simple says something of the society in which that tradition was forged. I don't suppose most young English people would have a clue about Pancake day now. Young Spaniards like pizzas and burgers too but they seem happy to eat both the traditional fare and the more recent introductions. I have no idea whether that will last. Everywhere we see example after example of invasive species driving out the local species.

I was reminded of the coca though when we went to the artisan Christmas Market in Murcia city. We bought some little biscuits. There were four or five in a pretty cellophane bag tied off with a ribbon - they cost four or five Euro. The biscuits were multicoloured, they had patterns iced onto them, there were various different fillings; they looked really scrumptious. They were nice enough but they definitely looked better than they tasted.

I understand that substance over form is an accounting term but it does seem that so often nowadays that form is much more important than substance. Double plus good to the women of Caritas and their coca then.