Polpo con patate in umido (octopus and potato stew)



This is the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde... went a famous song in the early Eighties.

 

That is my story these days, the story of my blond-haired, blue-eyed baby who not-so-occasionally morphs into a little monster with tentacles, a spinning head and flying spittle.

 

I get that Terrible Twos sounds much more catching than Terrible Fours, but for me it has always been about the fours. And from what I hear and see around, it is not just me. So to hell with the Terrible Twos, let's get serious and discuss the Frightful Fours.

My daughter had a pretty bad case of them, much worse than my son's, but she had the partial excuse of a baby brother invading her territory at the time.

He, on the other hand, may be a little easier to handle (and I have a feeling this is partly because he is a boy, a more simple gender to deal with in general) but he has no such excuse.

 

Lately the constant "No"s and whining and defiant attitude have been eroding my soul like a slow yet steady trickle of water. I know this phase will pass, I know he is taking his first steps in becoming independent, I know deep, deep down inside he is still my sweet little boy. But let me tell you, he can be a real pain in the a** on the outside these days.

Unfortunately, there is not much you can do except breathe in and breathe out (after you have tried everything from ignoring to reasoning to time outs - because everything just makes it worse) until it passes.

 

So when it takes me 20 minutes to get his shoes on at pre-school because this involves ten minutes of cajoling on my part and crying and screaming on his just to get to him to his locker (the last time it was about me daring to kiss him on his ear when he ran into my arms minutes before), five minutes of him flinging said shoes off every time I get them on his kicking feet and another five of him opening and closing the velcro straps repeatedly because I did it wrong and I am mean... I breathe in and I breathe out.

When he constantly and very publicly refuses to sit near me anywhere, whether on a bus, a plane or in a restaurant, because he wants Daddy and only Daddy - even when it is logistically impossible... I breathe in and I breathe out.

 

Ca's Patro March

We are back!

Yesterday we were still swimming in clear waters and today we went back to work... talk about culture shock (and thermal shock waking up to rainy, cool weather). But this way is best, no time to think about or to acknowledge the sadness you feel when leaving those you love.

Mallorca never ceases to surprise us with its beauty, variety, traditions and breathtaking scenery. Every time we leave its sunny shores, family and good friends, old and new, we cannot help but feel that we are leaving our second home. There are so many stories to tell, so many images to show, it is hard to decide where to start.

So I will start with food of course. I will tell you about a restaurant I highly recommend you visit if you are ever on the island. It is exactly the place you dream of when you set off in your rented car to find that small, quaint seafood restaurant you know is hidden somewhere among the rocks. A place that is relaxed, where the fish is as fresh and as uncomplicated as can be. A place with a view, with the sound of waves lapping up onto the shore, a place to have a late, lazy Spanish lunch, drinking chilled white wine and enjoying a breeze. The locals' best kept secret apparently, because every time I looked for a place like that on my travels, I rarely managed to find it.

You always seem to end up sitting in a crowded tourist trap, with overpriced fish and warm wine. There is never a breeze and as much as you try to smile and make the best of your vacation, rivulets of sweat are running down your cleavage and your thighs are sticking together under your napkin.

I thus present to you Ca's Patro March, so that you will no longer have to revisit that nightmare.

The restaurant is located in the Deìa Municipality, in a little hidden cala you reach driving or walking down a winding road through olive groves. After parking you will have to walk in the scorching sun for a little under five minutes but it will be worth it once you get there. You can go for a swim from the little beach and sit in the sun first or head directly to lunch. The restaurant is perched up on a cliff (yes, you will also have to climb up some stairs to get there) like an eagle's nest and offers the most spectacular of views. It looks like it was built by the Flintstones, lots of stone, straw and wood.  It is a simple and very child friendly place (I was surprised at the amount of strollers and children given the arduous climb up) so don't go there if you are looking for white linens, flowers in silver vases and monastic silence. It is bustling with people and laughter, waiters zigzagging through the tables with large trays laden with the day's catch.

The food was exquisite, the wine was served ice cold and kept chilled and the service was extremely friendly if a little frazzled by the afternoon crowd.

We enjoyed a few dishes of a local treat, our beloved chipirones, baby squid, not much larger than a thumbnail. They were served hot and crunchy, fried  to perfection and seasoned with just enough salt. A drizzle of lemon that grows everywhere you look and we were in heaven. One of our party ordered a gazpacho and claimed it was superb. As our main course we ordered a parillada de pescado y mariscos, a grilled mixture of fish and seafood.

In other words, when you can't make up your mind, go all the way. The platters included calamari, lobster, swordfish, monkfish, shrimp and more (yes, even the grilled head of a rock fish with the its enormous tender cheek, the most prized morsel).

After, large chilled slabs of fresh honeydew melon to cleansen the palate and ice cream for the kids.

If you zoom in on this picture you can see the guy standing up there on the cliff

We even got a show worthy of Acapulco while enjoying our coffee. A group of kids entertained us by diving, frontwards and back, from various heights off of the cliffs right in front of us. Quite an exciting experience, followed by gasps from the lunching crowd and rounds of applause.

Ca's Patro March

Cala Deia +34971639137

Thai fried coconut & lime shrimp

Yesterday I became a member of yet another food community and had to answer a few questions for my profile. Among these, I was asked what my favorite cookbook was. That is a tough one, I thought to myself, I have many and love them all.

This got me thinking. How do you decide what your favorite cookbook is. Is it the one you cook from the most? Or the one that answers a lot of the questions you have on cooking techniques?  Is it the one that makes you dream about conquering your favorite exotic cuisine? Or iss it that great new one with the lovely pictures that make your mouth water whenever you flip through it?

I love some because they were gifts from people I care about, or because of the stories that go along with the recipes, others for the photography and food styling. Some because they are so comprehensive and some because they are filled with original, exciting and unsual recipes.

I have had a longstanding love for all things food and my first steps in cultivating this passion was buying books about food and cookbooks. I spent many an hour reading them and looking at them, but the truth is that at the time I seldom cooked from them. Despite having cooked basic meals for myself on a daily basis since adulthood, I only started really cooking and experimenting with recipes and pushing my boundaries in the past years. Since then, if I have to be really honest, I have used the Internet and the blogosphere to get inspiration much more than my beloved cookbooks.

 

There was my revelation, that is how I came to realize that you are my favorite cookbook! And that is why, as you may have noticed, so many of my recipes link back to you guys.

Today is no different, I adapted this fabulous recipe from Tiffany, over at Care's Kitchen. It is not the first and will certainly not be the last.

If you have been reading me for a while you will know of my fear of deep frying. Once again I overcame it (I hope once and for all at this point) and fried up these little guys in a handful of minutes. It is a tasty, fresh , summery recipe (I promise, despite the deep frying) that I highly recommend: max result, minimum work (ok, except for cleaning the shrimp. But I did that earlier so actually making the shrimp literally took 10 minutes).

What is your favorite cookbook?

Mediterranean octopus salad

In my quest of making things that are refreshing in this heat and inspired by the many jokes about Paul the Octopus after Germany was kicked out of the World Cup last week I came across another recipe from my mother in law: a Mediterranean octopus salad that is usually served warm but that can also be served chilled. It is delicious, so don't let the idea of octopus put you off. If cooked well, it is extremely tender and it is very subtle in taste.