Tag Archives: tapas

fran & kaz

11 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by in food & drink, friends, gastronomy, home, restaurants, sevilla, spain, tapas, tapas bars, tapas tours, wine

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I kind of hit the ground running after getting back from my London Getaway. I had already planned to get together with Jane & John and Sue & Monty, but before those meet ups took place I had the pleasure of being introduced (via email by Annie Manson) to Fran & Kaz Kuzui. Fran & Kaz were travelling around Andalucía, doing some research on Japanese influence on southern Spanish cuisine, and would also be spending a couple of days in Sevilla, so we arranged to meet the evening after I got home from London. They had also tried to meet up with my friend Tomoko in Jerez, but there had been an email glitch, and so I invited Tomoko to come and stay over so we could all go out together.

It was a fabulous evening. Fran is a native New Yorker who now lives in Tokyo with her husband Kaz. Aside from being film producers and art lovers, they are both also food & wine lovers, and as usual Sevilla worked its magic on them. By the end of the evening we had all become fast friends and F & K were already talking about planning a return visit to Andalucía. Come back soon! xx

sue & monty

10 Monday Apr 2017

Posted by in andalucia, food & drink, friends, gastronomy, restaurants, sevilla, spain, tapas, tapas bars, tapas tours

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I have “known” travel and food writer Sue Style on Twitter for a few years now, and we’ve even collaborated on a couple of articles about Sevilla and Andalucía. So I was thrilled to find out we were finally going to have a chance to meet in person.

Sue and her husband Monty were travelling with friends in Jerez and said they would have a free day in Sevilla before their flight left on the evening of lunes santo (Holy Monday) at the start of Semana Santa. This turned out to be a bit trickier than I had considered, with traffic issues and whatnot, but in the end we managed to get together for a lovely afternoon tapeo.

After a plate of perfectly sliced jamón Ibérico and some fabulous Goya manzanilla pasada at Las Teresas we headed over to La Azotea Santa Cruz for our “main course”. One of our favourite dishes was the courgette and anchovy salad with frozen grated goat cheese. Sue loved it so much she was inspired to create her own version of it when she got home to Alsace.

As we have a mutual friend in San Sebastián – the lovely Gabriella Ranelli of Tenedor Tours (aka Shawn of the North 😉 ) – I’m thinking it would be fun to organize a San Sebastián meetup that would half-way for Sue and me.

Stay tuned…

jane & john

08 Saturday Apr 2017

Posted by in food & drink, friends, gastronomy, restaurants, sevilla, tapas, tapas bars, tapas tours

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A few weeks ago Jane & John got in touch with me, saying they were coming to Sevilla and that our mutual friend Simon Majumdar had recommended that they look me up. Well, it turned out that they were arriving in Sevilla the very day I was leaving for London, but happily they were going to still be here when I got back. Jane had already done some Serious Research on my Sevilla Tapas website, and I also gave them some extra tips to keep them going. And then we finally met up!

Peter also joined us on what ended up being one of our favourite things – an afternoon Tapeo Extremo with new friends – which of course properly began in Bar Las Teresas with a plate of jamón and some chilled manzanilla. A few bars and many glasses of wine later we walked J & J back to their apartment (turns out they were also neighbours!) with full bellies and lots of nice memories.

I think Jane put it best when she wrote on her Facebook page…

Love it when we travel and come home with the best souvenir of all: a new friend!

Yep, she’s even got me “slumming” on FB now  😉  since she refuses to use any other social media. Honestly, the things I do for my friends…

Good times! And although J & J say they seldom return to the same place, they are considering another Andalusian adventure. Fingers crossed.

bacalao galore!

29 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in food & drink, gastronomy, sevilla, spain, tapas, tapas bars, welcome

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bacalao galore
I usually cringe when someone refers to me as an “influencer”, but it this case the reference was in an invitation to El Bacalao, to try their new menu in their freshly renovated location in Plaza Ponce de León. So well, okay then. I decided that you can call me an influencer if it means attending a lovely event such as this, and off I went with Peter, where we joined a dozen or so other influencers for lunch.

The meal was served in a dining room in the back of the restaurant, and took the form of a tasting of thirteen menu items – four starters, seven main courses and two desserts, with either manzanilla sherry or white wine (even in small portions that’s a lot of food, but one has to be thorough).

As one might expect given the name of the restaurant, bacalao (salt cod) figured prominently in the menu, from the signature bacalao al ajo confitado, through pavias and croquetas to an excellent tartare. Other personal favourites included a lovely fresh spinach salad and the milhojas de cola de toro (oxtail). Many thanks to everyone at El Bacalao for making it such an enjoyable afternoon. I’ll be updating this on my Sevilla Tapas site asap so look for more pics there.

ania sevillana

22 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in friends, sevilla, sherry, spain, tapas

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I met the lovely Ania @ania_marchlik a few years ago in Las Teresas, and so it seemed fitting that while we were out celebrating her 10th Anniversary of living in Sevilla that we would end up there. Though we started off the day’s celebrations revisiting another spot with fond memories for both of us – the Corral de Conde – a “patio de vecinos” where Ania and her friend María once hosted a Peirogy Party in the fabulous courtyeard there. Then we stopped off at another of Ania’s favourite places, Taberna Quitapenas, before heading for a sumptuous lunch across the street at La Quinta.

Before and After (no more wine… oh hey! cava!)

It was after lunch that we found ourselves at Las Teresas, sitting at the very spot where we first met. We had a nice chat with Rafael, enjoyed some of his perfectly sliced jamón and then, as so often happens, we ended up at The Office (AKA La Azotea) for a Penúltima.

TUG-O-JAMÓN – yep, kinda drunk at this point

Ania has gone from acquaintance to work colleague (she is also part of my fab We Love Tapas team) to cherished friend. I can always count on her honesty and discretion and, besides that, we always have so much fun together. So happy we met.

LA PENÚLTIMA!