Cooking against barbarity

Cuina! O barbàrie, by Maria Nico­lau (Ara Lli­bres), has be­come a pub­lish­ing phe­nom­e­non. The five edi­tions that have al­ready been pub­lished and the more than 25,000 copies sold es­tab­lish it as the book of the year in the world of cook­ing and gas­tron­omy. The chef at the Fer­rer del Tall restau­rant in the vil­lage of Sau, her en­thu­si­as­tic, non-con­formist and hi­lar­i­ous rev­o­lu­tion­ary speech has helped to re­turn the power of pots and pans to the peo­ple by re­mov­ing snob­bery from the kitchen. Be­cause every­thing in life is a choice: do we want to con­tinue cook­ing real food or suc­cumb to bar­bar­ity? So let’s get to the stoves and get cook­ing!

An­other book about food pub­lished re­cently is by Jaume Fàbrega, one of the most im­por­tant food crit­ics in the Cata­lan Coun­tries. His new book - his 81st - is en­ti­tled Cuina tradición Cata­lana amb ter­rissa (Farell Ed­i­tors), which re­views cui­sine that through­out his­tory has been made with pots and re­cep­ta­cles and other uten­sils made with type of pot­tery. Cook­ing with clay is a taste of his­tory that takes us from the Stone Age tot the kitchens of our grand­moth­ers. The book re­veals all the se­crets of cook­ing with earth­en­ware, with great recipes from the Cata­lan Coun­tries, and with a focus on such earth­en­ware cen­tres as Breda, La Bis­bal, Quart and Verdú. There are also recipes for es­sen­tial dishes, such as arròs a la cas­sola, Ma­jor­can soups – the only ones in the world that are eaten with a fork, as Fàbrega points out – and even tan­gia mar­rakchia, the only thing that men cook in Mo­rocco. He also em­pha­sises that women are the ones who in­vented pot­tery and cook­ing in the Stone Age, and there­fore the ones who helped take us away from bar­barism to civ­i­liza­tion.

With one eye on tra­di­tional Cata­lan cui­sine and an­other on the pre­sent, Jeroni Castell, the chef of Les Moles restau­rant, pre­sents a col­lec­tion of recipes for can­nel­loni, su­quet de peix, pol­las­tre amb prunes, men­jar blanc,... in his book, La cuina de sem­pre per a la gent d’avui (Cos­setània). Some 60 recipes in­clude starters, main courses and desserts.

Quim Casel­las, chef at the Casamar restau­rant in Llafranc, also knows about tra­di­tion and moder­nity. His tele­vi­sion show is now fol­lowed by the book, La Mar de Bé (Cos­se­ta­nia), a sum­mary in which he con­tin­ues to marry the cul­ture of fish­ing with the cui­sine of fresh fish. The flavour of the sea is what the book is all about, from clas­sic recipes like zarzue­las to fish stews, soups and can­nel­loni. The book has 40 recipes in­spired by both in­no­va­tion and tra­di­tion, and it in­cludes an­no­ta­tions of a his­tor­i­cal na­ture and en­vi­ron­men­tal aware­ness.

For those of us with a soft spot for Jamie Oliver, the pi­o­neer­ing TV chef has yet an­other book out, Un: Un sol re­cip­i­ent. Re­ceptes fàcils (Columna Edi­cions), as it is called in Cata­lan. As al­ways, the British chef pro­duces a vol­ume that is im­pec­ca­ble in terms of de­sign and that helps us plan the weekly shop so that we can make amaz­ingly good dishes “with­out any stress”. He has taken stel­lar dishes from his recipe book, pop­u­lar in­gre­di­ents and cook­ing meth­ods to come up with pro­pos­als that can be cooked in a sin­gle con­tainer.

Eva Oli­vares, Evacuin­era (who has more than 20,000 sub­scribers to her YouTube chan­nel), pre­sents her first book, Cuina a famílies es­tres­sades. The Girona-based chef of­fers us ideas and so­lu­tions with recipes that will save us time and ef­fort in the kitchen. With hu­mour and plain lan­guage, she pro­vides ideas for fam­i­lies who among other things worry about their chil­dren’s nu­tri­tion. The struc­ture of the book is by sit­u­a­tion, which go from using the pantry to or­gan­is­ing a ro­man­tic din­ner, and pass­ing through mak­ing a good im­pres­sion when you have fam­ily or friends over or prepar­ing fun recipes with the lit­tle ones on a rainy af­ter­noon.

As for books aimed at more spe­cific read­ers, we high­light two. On the one hand, Girona. Men­jar de fires (Girona City Coun­cil), a sec­ond vol­ume co­or­di­nated by Sal­vador Gar­cia-Arbós. The book il­lus­trates the food and drink of the Fairs of Sant Narcís, from roasted chest­nuts to chur­ros, pan­el­lets and ratafia.

And as a good way to bring any meal to an end, what could be bet­ter than invit­ing you to taste these 90 Licors cata­lans ca­solans (Farell), in which Pau Maties-Guiu Martí shows us how to make your own liqueurs at home. In Cat­alo­nia there is more than one recipe for liqueur in each town, and each in­hab­i­tant has a dif­fer­ent way of mak­ing their own. But they all start from the same base: flavour­ing and sweet­en­ing a brandy with plants and spices. Salut, as they say in Cata­lan!

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