Caramelised Blog

So, for over 40 years, I consistently refused all cooking classes my Mother ever offered. I am even (semi) proudly self taught. My poor suffering testers guests are all alive and still show up for dinner every now and again. What would make me, food-blogger wannabe, take cooking classes all of a sud

Pain perdu literally means “lost bread” in French. As in the bread which you cannot eat while french and becomes stale. Probably during Roman times, a resourceful cook realized that if the bread was softened by dipping it in milk and/or  eggs and then fried, it could be converted it into a delicious

Once I got the empanada de atun [savoury tuna parcels] properly tested and under control, I decided to expand to other combinations. Not knowing where to start, I turned to Carlos Horrillo and Patrick Morcas, whom seemed to favor  spinach, cream cheese and spinach. If it is good enough for Patrick a

It seemed like a good idea to cook this dish for the 10th anniversary of my doctoral exam. It is almost finger food, it is somehow Spanish and its recipe seemed straightforward enough. For an extra touch of nerdiness, I could even use the same species of mushrooms I used for my PhD (Pleurotus erying

A few weeks ago, I posted the watered down light version of this dish. A dinner party loosely inspired in Spanish cuisine prompted me to do the actual thing, with all its condiments, red wine and olive oil. Mind you, for extra slow-home-made-cooking points, the meatballs were rolled by hand with all

Nowadays, you can get decent (and indecent, for that matter) Manchego cheese in almost every supermarket. But, Idiazábal cheese is only to be found in high end delicatessen shops, at the price of an arm, a leg, and your children corneas.  I only remember having it once in the 9 years I have been liv

Have been many times to Valencia, and never saw this combination. Normally, what you get if you ask for an ensalada valenciana is a mix of tomato, lettuce, onion and olives, dressed with some olive oil, vinegar and salt. In any case, Thomas Keller’s take is absolutely worthwhile trying… A lot of fla

Cheap, cheerful and (almost) universally liked by grown ups and kiddies. The kind of thing you can prepare on the fly a few hours in advance and let rest in the fridge. It won’t let you down, as long as you  make sure the version for kiddies is rum-less. Bananas with lime and rum (adapted [...]

One might think that after 8 dishes, David Leite’s  The New Portuguese Table has given everything it had to give. Nothing could be further away from truth  - there is still plenty of interesting stuff that looks worthwhile trying. For example, this roasted pork with prune and Port sauce. It was a co