Mad(rid) and Englishman

As well as being a snooty food critic (with well over 10, count them, 10 restaurants under my belt) and being a tower of attraction to all women, I am a professional person replete with duties and concerns. These took me to Madrid this past week which while powerfully interesting to you was another notch on the Del Monte eating spoon for me.

Spanish food was invented in 2002 and discovered by me a few weeks later: you are welcome globe. With their unwavering focus on pork, Spanish food is Olympically snafflable. Sure there are interesting sideshows. Who doesn’t like some pulpo or manchego? (Heathens and molesters – you know who you are). But ham, chorizo, snausages, cutlets …. The list goes on. I’m pretty much fluent at most languages, but when I don’t understand Spanish I just assume it’s pork and order it. If it’s not pork I go batshit crazy and smash the place up (once again my apologies to the lovely ladies of Age Concern off Playa España).

To illustrate the point, Madrid hosts 4,000 or so outlets of the Museo Del Jamon (http://www.museodeljamon.es/). A museum for ham? Frankly it’s overdue. Those Trafalgar-losing geniuses have compiled a pork-based line-up of Galacticos. We visited the one near the Bernabéu and scoffed ham, sausage and a selection of manchego, including aged manchego which competes with Parmesan and my treasured aged Gouda.

We also took in El Rodizo (http://www.elrodizio.com/), a Brazilian restaurant which beat the pants off Cabana.

Other notables included Ferreiro (http://www.restauranteferreiro.es/) which offered my much loved pulpo. ¡Pulpo! ¡Pulpo! ¡Pulpo!

Gozeiko Kabi (http://www.goizekokabi.es/), a Basque restaurant, sorely disappointed me, the staff and the clientele when I found out that Basque was a region not a dress code. I was poured into that thing. The food was excellent forcing me to unhook the corset and, as night follows day, another bout of catechisms, vomiting and self-blindings ensued. Special mention to the burata served over warmed tomatoes so that it melted on a bed of rocket and the lemon sorbet blended with cava – that I’m going to try at home.

Tapas and Pinchos are triffbrill and for that alone the whole of Spain is to be congratulated. Madrid maintains the well earned reputation and I hope to return hopefully with Mrs Del Monte in tow to tend to the recently fainted and blinded.

¡MADRID!

Museo Del Jamon

There’s a reason the menus are wipe-clean

It’s like that scene in Aliens when the aliens are in the room on the ceiling except instead of aliens it’s hams and I couldn’t be happier to see them!