MacsTravel Blog

Sevilla is blessed by access to incredible food: fresh fruit and vegetables as well as high quality meat and fish are readily available. The supermarkets are well organized and well stocked, and the neighborhood stores and daily markets provide access to accessible, fresh food as well. If you live in the city centre it is easy to shop daily rather than the weekly “binge shopping” we are accustomed to in North America.

Darren loves to cook as do I, and our weekly neighborhood Dinner Club group back home has certainly benefited from Darren and Truus’ culinary efforts over the years. Here in Sevilla he has been experimenting with a number of Spanish recipes, and has made good use of the excellent blog, Spain on a Fork. We enjoyed a number of excellent meals this week courtesy of the blog’s inspiration and Darren and Truus’ talents.

Some of our most memorable meals were courtesy of items picked up during the course of a day out: our visit to Feria and Macarena yielded a bounty of bread, olive oil, olives and fresh tomatoes which made for a fabulous lunch.

In terms of food out, while we really enjoyed the tapas culture most places seemed to serve very similar menus.

In most instances, the setting (patios, sunshine, unhurried lingering for drinks and tapas) and company were the highlights. The big exception was the wonderful Eslava, named for the street where it can be found. Elevated food in a charming, friendly and welcoming atmosphere, a hit combination and a rarity anywhere! We loved it so much we went twice.

An omnipresent food item in Sevilla is the orange: orange trees line the streets and at this time of year, “ripe” oranges are falling everywhere. However, these oranges are notoriously bitter and are not for consumption. They are harvested (crews tackle the orange’s neighborhood by neighborhood) and used for marmalade, cosmetics and even to make a type of wine.

Every so often you see keen visitors peeling oranges and popping segments in their mouths, like characters in some Greek or Roman myth. The result is never pretty.

A nun-bun update: our second attempt was also unsuccessful. After buzzing and sharing my tortured request for “dulces artisanales” we were admitted through a series of gates only to meet a man (!?) coming out who informed us that there were no nun buns left. Whether he was another frustrated customer or some sort of strange nun proxy we will never know.