Spanish Cooking in Wintertime

When the rain and the first cold spells arrive, we feel like trying "comfort" recipes that can recharge our energy and fill our stomachs… and our spirits. Below, you'll find three of our favorite Spanish recipes, which can help you confront the rainy autumn and the cold winter. Keep on joining us on our blog - soon you will discover more traditional Spanish dishes of other Spanish regions.

Besugo al horno (Baked Sea Bream)

Ingredients

1 kilo sea bream, 4 potatoes, 1 green onion, 1 green pepper, 6 cloves of garlic, Spanish Olive oil, salt, chopped parsley, ½ guindilla pepper

Preparation
Cut 4 of the garlic cloves in slices, the green onion and the pepper in thin strips and the potatoes in thick slices. Cook it all in a pan on low heat. When it's almost done, transfer it to a cooking tray, covering the bottom surface. Put it in the preheated oven and cook for 15 minutes. Clean the bream, remove the head and the tail and save them. Separate the fillet meat, removing the spine. Salt as desired and place the bream fillet, with the skin side up, over the mattress of potatoes on the cooking tray. Also place the head and the tail here. Moisten with a little more oil and put the tray in the hot oven for 10 minutes. Serve in a serving dish with the skin side down. Chop the other two cloves of garlic into small cubes. Sauté them in a pan with oil and the guindilla pepper without the seeds (they're too spicy). Add some of the juice from the bream left in the cooking tray. Add the chopped parsley, mix well and pour the sauce of the fish.
Serve with the baked potatoes to one side and the fish with the skin side down.

Cocido madrileño (Madrilenian Stew)

Ingredients
250 g of garbanzo beans, 300 g of beef sirloin tip, ¼ chicken, 100 g of tocino entreverado (a type of bacon), 100 g of blood sausage, 100 g of chorizo sausage, 50 g of Serrano ham, 4 small beef marrow bones, 1 kg. of cabbage, 4 medium sized potatoes, 100 g of noodles for the soup, 2 carrots,  1 onion, 1 turnip, 1 clove of garlic, olive oil, salt

Preparation
Soak the garbanzo beans the night before in warm water and with a little bit of salt. In the morning, drain them. Place the meats, the tocino, the cleaned bones and the Serrano ham all in the pressure cooker and cover with water. Place it on the stove top and close it. When it starts to boil, the foam will rise to the surface. Remove the foam with a skimmer and add the garbanzos. When the water boils again, add the carrot, the onion and the turnip. Cook under pressure for 30 minutes to soften the garbanzos.
Open the cooker and add the potatoes (peeled and cut into pieces that aren't too small). Try it and salt to taste. Remove the vegetables and the garbanzos and put them to the side, leaving the broth to prepare the noodle soup. At the same time, in another cooking pot, cook the chopped cabbage for half an hour. Drain, and lightly fry with the garlic. Cook the chorizo sausage and the blood sausage in a separate pan so the color won't mix with the broth.

Presentation: Cocido Madrileño is eaten in three steps. First, the noodle soup is served (noodles must be cooked in the broth for 5 minutes). Then, the garbanzos are served in a serving dish with the vegetables: the lightly fried cabbage, the carrot, and the sliced turnip (about 2 centimeters). The onion is added to the broth to give it flavor, but then it's removed. In the third step, serve the meats cut into pieces, the chorizo and the blood sausage, the tocino and the bones pieces. The marrow spread over toast is delicious.

Patatas a la riojana (Rioja style potatoes)

Ingredients

6 potatoes, 3 chorizo sausages, 1 onion, 1 green pepper, 2 bell peppers, 1 head of garlic, Water, olive oil, salt, 2 bay leaves, 1 guindilla pepper (optional)

Preparation
Place the chopped onion and green pepper in a pressure cooker along with a little oil. Add the entire head of garlic, the bay leaves and the guindilla pepper (this is optional, depending on if you want it spicy or not). Add the sliced chorizo and the potatoes which must be broken into pieces using a knife and your hands (this makes the broth thicker). Cover with water and add salt. Cook for 5 minutes beginning from the time the cooker is pressurized. Soak the bell peppers in warm water after removing the seeds. When they've rehydrated, scrape off, chop up and save the pulp. Open the pressure cooker, take out the head of garlic and the guindilla pepper (if you added it). Add the bell peppers, stir and cook for two more minutes (so the flavors mix). Salt to taste.