Mine host BigM and the cheerleaders

Australia makes a long-awaited return to the Fuengirola fairground as the popular Feria Internacional de los Pueblos opens on Saturday 28 April (continuing until Tuesday 1 May).

This fun-filled melting pot of 30 countries’ culture and cuisine, now in its 18th year, attracts between 500,000 and one million visitors over the four days. Australia is one of four new countries (not present last year) with a caseta in 2012 – together with Finland, Romania, France and Italy.

Rev Richard John

As always, one of the most popular venues (apart from the Brazilian!) will be the US caseta run by Costa del Disco, featuring live music (blues, C&W, rock and traditional American pop), cheerleader displays, line dancing performances and a repeat of the Superbowl, and Madonna’s half-time show, on a giant screen.

Sideshows and competitions have been organised for the younger revellers while their parents enjoy classic American food and drinks, and the caseta will also be adorned with traditional memorabilia and some “Hogs” outside, thanks to the presence of the Fuengirola Harley Davidson Club.

IN AN INNOVATIVE twist on the traditional “Week of…” gastronomic extravaganzas, Barceló Málaga Hotel is offering diners a fusion of art and cuisine from 31 October to 5 November.

David Sanmartín, chef of the hotel’s award-winning El Andén restaurant, has used works of art on display at the Carmen Thyssen Museum in Málaga as the inspiration for a week-long “From Canvas to Plate” menu.

Contemplating a painting and savouring a dish of food have a common exponent, he explains. “They are both experiences for the senses, with personal sensitivities playing a a key role.”

The first “brushstroke” is ajoblanco, a traditional Andalucian cold soup served with grapes, inspired by “La fuente de Reding”, an oil painting by Guillermo Gómez Gil.

The next aperitif is a mini-hamburger of oxtail, alluding to “Picador herido” by Marià Fortuny i Marsal; followed by a salad consisting of purple-coloured potatoes, bacalao (cod) petals, spring onion and elderberry flowers, and imitating the colour palette and geometric shapes of Juan Gris’s “Mujer sentada”.

The natural colours featured in Claude Monet’s “La maison vue du jardin aux roses” inspired a deer steak dish accompanied by green mustard and rose petals.

Finally, for dessert, Sanmartín took inspiration from Henri Matisse’s  “La Conversation sous les oliviers”, to create a colourful dish of chocolate flakes, pistachio and lemon mousse.

The menu costs €35 (including wine) and is available for hotel clients as well as members of the public. The wine served at a special presentation lunch for the media was Codorniu 1551, Solear sherry and Enate red from Somontano.

SPAIN’S PREMIER food channel has joined Málaga restaurant La Reserva del Pastor to create the first Bar Canal Cocina in Andalucía.

Launched in Madrid last year with the slogan, “Unidos por una misma pasión: la comida” (“United with the same passion: food”), the initiative will be presented in other Spanish cities after concluding in Málaga on 30 November.

Thursday is the key day for Bar Canal Cocina, with “multiple surprises” and gifts for clients visiting the restaurant (in C/ Sánchez Pastor), as well as a free tapa courtesy of Canal Cocina. Various other activities are featured on the website CanalCocina.es, including a competition offering dinner prizes.

The only channel in Spain specialising in gastronomy, Canal Cocina is – according to presenter Mandi Ciriza – aimed at viewers who enjoy food and are interested in learning about new gastronomic trends. The schedule includes programmes on travel, “eco-cuisine”, nutrition and healthy cooking, reality shows, and series featuring Spanish and international chefs such as Jamie Oliver.

Canal Cocina in Málaga

THE TABANKO chain of Basque-style “asador” restaurants has now stoked up a new grill on the Fuengirola-Mijas Road. Finca Tabanko Asador extends over a 6,000 square metre setting, with ample terraces overlooking the Mediterranean and a backdrop of the Mijas mountain sierra. 

Meat (including exquisitely prepared chuletón de buey) is the piece de resistance of chef Miguel Palma’s cuisine – as a group of inveterate bon vivants discovered to their pleasure during a special private presentation lunch – but the menu is varied and extensive, with traditional Spanish classics such as Manchego cheese, Navarran asparagus, Cantabrian anchovies, bacalao (salted cod) omelette, potato salad with melva (tuna from Barbate), and Murcia salad.

The other two Tabanko establishments are in Málaga city: Tabanko Asador Málaga (Avda. Pintor Sorolla) and La Luna de Tabanko (C/ de la Luna).

Finca Tabanko Asador

Spanish Food & Wine

A NEW SEASON begins at Hydros Boutique Hotel – part of Benalmádena’s Holiday World complex – with all five senses on the menu at both its spa and May y Tierra restaurant.

Open to both hotel guests and the general public, Mar y Sierra offers a “completely renewed” menu blending traditional Málaga recipes with a fusion of cuisines from around the world, as well as special thematic events organised by head chef Daniel García, who has worked with three-star Michelin chef Martin Berasategui.

Also in line with its aim of offering “the art of creating sensations”, the hotel is continuing to organise its popular “Full Moon Nights” this year, plus Mediterranean Nights” on Saturdays –combining evening spa with fine dining.

Guests from along the coast were able to enjoy the Hydros experience first-hand at a special inauguration party.

New-style boutique spa hotel

ANDALUCÍA’S links with Somontano bodegas were highlighted when tourism and regulatory council representatives celebrated the wine region’s 25th anniversary with a special media lunch at the La Reserva restaurant in Málaga.

Mariano Beroz and Francisco Beroy, president and manager, respectively, of the Consejo Regulador de la Denominación de Origen Somontano, noted that Jerez company González Byass owns top Somontano bodega Viñas del Vero (which produces six million bottles a year); and the pioneering Bodegas Pirineos belongs to the Barbadillo Group in Andalucía.

The Somontano Denominación de Origen area comprises 34 bodegas and more than 500 wine-growers.

Sozzled in Somontano

FUENGIROLA becomes a festive profusion of sounds, flavours and aromas from around the world when the town hosts the annual Feria Internacional de los Pueblos from 29 April to 2 May.

Last year’s fair – the 16th edition – attracted an estimated one million visitors over the four days, with 33 countries and Spanish regions offering an exotic taste of their traditions and cuisine in the colourful setting of the Fuengirola fairground.

GARUM OFFERS discerning diners the dual attraction of being one of Marbella’s hippest establishments while also providing a versatile culinary experience.

Centrally located in a vibrant and picturesque setting on the Paseo Marítimo (seafront), the restaurant is one of those rare gastronomic gems with an “all-day concept” of breakfast, lunch, dinner, tapas and late-night cocktails and soft chill out sounds − the kitchen remaining open non-stop from 11.30 am to midnight, seven days a week.

The cuisine is a tantalising blend of contemporary flair and innovation with traditional touches and a broad cosmopolitan perspective, all backed up by friendly and attentive service – par excellence.

Tel. 952 858 858

garummarbella.com

Fond memories of popular chef

Friends and colleagues were deeply saddened when Marcel Geel, the head chef at Garum Restaurant in Marbella, died suddenly at the end of the February (2010) – with no signs he had been ill.

Originally from Holland, Marcel had been on the Costa del Sol for 15 years, the last five at Garum, which had just celebrated its fifth anniversary. He was an innovative chef and a popular figure among diners, with his warm hospitality, wonderful sense of humour and highly creative personality.

A special memorial evening was held for Marcel at the restaurant, where an understandably emotional owner Timo Hamalainen said his death had been a huge loss for everyone: staff, clients, associates… “Garum was his family here in Spain.”

WHEN RAMÓN MORADA moved to the Costa del Sol in 1973 Japanese cuisine was not so much on the back burner – it had barely set foot in the kitchen.

The Cuban owner of Misono in Madrid asked Ramón, who had previously been working at the Hyatt Regency in Manila, to open a sister restaurant in Fuengirola. It was the first in the area to offer teppanyaki to diners and soon became an institution on the Coast, with such celebrated clients as Sean Connery, Antonio Banderas (and his parents), Lew Hoad and Ronnie Knight, who ran a nightclub in Los Boliches at the time. It was also a favourite eatery for numerous Spanish celebrities including Rocio Jurado and Rocio Ducal.

Ramón remained at Misono, which translates as “grill” in Japanese, until 1996, before being head-hunted to run several other top establishments including a Japanese grill in Puerto Banús, Japanese restaurants in Torreblanca and Torremolinos, and his own Misono Oriental (Japanese, Chinese and Indonesian) in Fuengirola.

He also took the opportunity of moving to a friend’s new restaurant in Barcelona, the Gran Muralla, to refine his Chinese cooking skills.

Then, in 2008, his daughter Asunción decided to open a restaurant in Los Boliches and he joined forces with her to launch Makati.

Not surprisingly, it quickly became the place in town to enjoy exquisite teppanyaki cooking, as well as an expansive menu of other Japanese delicacies… maki and nigiri sushi, sashimi, tempura, sukiyaki and teriyaki. Many came to the new restaurant as long-time fans of Ramón’s cooking (there have been just three teppanyaki restaurants in Fuengirola and he started all three); but many others followed as word spread – not only foreigners familiar with the cuisine but a growing Spanish clientele.

“People like teppanyaki because they like to see the food cooked in front of them,” says Ramón. “The kitchen on your dining table.”

He notes that, as people’s tastes become more refined and eclectic, there is not so much competition with Chinese restaurants these days, but rather with other Japanese or “fusion” establishments (Chinese mixed with Thai or Japanese).

The main difference between the various oriental cuisines, notes Ramón, is that in Chinese and Thai the ingredients are mixed with the sauce in a wok; whereas Japanese is deep-friend, with the sauce separate. “The taste of the food is in the sauce.”

Another key difference is that in Chinese cuisine rice is cooked in vinegar; while mirin, a kind of rice wine similar to sake, is used in Japanese cooking. “The secret with sushi is always in the rice,” says Ramón.

Makati is located behind the Stella Maris hotel just off the paseo marítimo near the river that borders Fuengirola and Los Boliches. It is open every day (12.30-4.30pm; 7pm-midnight); and a home delivery service is available (except Friday and Saturday evenings).

SO YOU’VE set up camp on the beach, the steaks are nicely caramelised on the barbie, the first few beers have gone down nicely and now you would like a glass of wine.

Who forgot the corkscrew!

No problem… as long as someone has a shoe and there’s a vertical wall (or similar structure) nearby.

http://www.wimp.com/wineshoe