Sketches from Spain:
Croquetas de Trucha
y Jamon Iberico

"When I ordered the eel, Jose brought me a plate of these croquetas and then went out to the vivero to net the rest of my lunch." Jeff Koehler, from Spain














Don Quixote himself, we are sure, once rode Rocinante through the hillsides of San Facundo in the far northwest corner of Castilla y Leon.  He had hoped to find respite there at its cool waters from his adventures jousting windmills and courting the fine princesses of the day for the sake of their

rescue from some such daily terror.  It is said that he once sat in the very seat of an inn at the edge of town, now called Las Hoyas where the chef by name of Jose Arias serves three ancient dishes from the time of Quixote.  The innkeeper had approached, as the story goes, with a very short list of offerings from the kitchen, which was nothing more than a brick oven and open flame fire.  He asked what the traveler might have, perhaps Escalavida? Yes? To start with a Papasalinas? A small cup of

port to mull these options over?  Don Quixote, who had walked in with a leather riding bag had set it down on the ground near the table chair next to him.  Yet as it sat there, the innkeeper noticed that it still moved inside and wondered if this weary traveler kept a cat a companion.  There were certainly no cats allowed in this inn! Enough of horse play -- the cat would raid the stores of fresh meat and who knows what else.  "I have just been down to the Facundo waters and I wonder if you might use these?" the traveler appealed as he held up his bag.  "I have spent three nights now out on the open ground under the stars.  They are all eyes you know, as the ancients could only know, and they blink at us as women of the night.  I have spoken to them.  The whisper as the wind." The innkeeper had

seen the type many a time.  The witching hour turns the most substantial of men to shadows of themselves and behind the grand pines lay shadows who speak more often than we think.  "I believe these are trout.  I caught them with my lance with the help of my steed." The lance was five feet long and these trout had no holes to speak of.  "Oh yes, we make the most delectable croquetas de trucha on God's earth." Out of his side pocket Quixote held out a pink chunk of ham and as he asked to also include this, the name stayed and trout and ham this way has been enjoyed from the Facundo creek from that day forward.