And so after a long 8 days of perfect slog from the gent, the revised version of his phd was produced. He was like Daisy in that episode of Spaced* where she suddenly, after much procrastination, pings into action and types all her articles (including one about ‘bogling’) to the theme tune of Miss Maple (?). Anyway, he was focussed, stuck to his timetable and completed in time to join me at an excellent talk on the History of wine, given by Kathleen Burk.
I do love wine, but don’t have the whole oenophile obsession where it verges on academic endeavour. Despite this, I just love Prof Burk’s book ‘Is this bottle corked’ (written with Michael Bywater) which doesn’t so much have chapters as concise dollops of anecdotes, history, myth and facts. A complete treat to dip into.
The gent also had the luxury of a housekeeper for his busy 8 days, who cooked inventive meals to spur him on. There can be few sentences more exciting to read than the one that says ‘I will take you out for dinner’, but that is just what he did, to say thank you.
Sister to the sublime Salt Yard, Dehesa is definitely similar, but fits its area by being speedier and snackier. Where Salt yard is quiet and mellow, encouraging you to linger and order just another plate of cheese or jamon, Dehesa is energetic with fidgety music, tall bar-like tables and chairs, and - perhaps - a slightly different menu.
Our table was booked late and there was definitely a Friday night, post-office feel to the surrounding streets, where customers proliferated onto the pavement outside pubs. We eased ourselves into the meal with a jamon de teruel and charred, oily, soft-crispy bread. Enlivened by this, we continued with pork belly on white beans, megrim sole with broad bean puree and tortilla.
The pork belly was as heavenly as it could be – perfect, oozing, fatty chunks with perfect, teeth-alarming crackling. But the white beans beneath were a masterpiece! They could have been a dish by themselves, really creamy-tasting and heavily scented with herbs - we thought perhaps thyme and rosemary. I positively ignored the megim sole dish which also arrived, just so I could fill up on these beans, incidentally breaking all the Roy Rules of eating.
With the tortilla I set a challenge for the gent: was this tortilla as good as, or better than, the one Guy made at his and Debora’s party. The gent stared. “Guy MADE that tortilla?!”. We paid a moment’s silence to his genius, then ploughed on with the one in front of us. Answer: they were completely different, both I would love to eat again, but Guy’s might have the edge. Given my extreme chaos around Spanish tortilla I won’t ask for the recipe. We don’t need our new kitchen decorated in raw egg. Some things you have to admit defeat to in life and let the experts do it for you.
Knowing my weakness, and enjoying it himself, the gent mooted the three manchego platter. Scooping membrillo paste onto each cheese (he favoured the mid-matured, I the oldest) I pretended to be in Spain and poured more wine. How lucky we are to have Spain on the doorstep!
*'Ends', series 1, for completists.
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