{"id":200,"date":"2023-06-05T22:08:22","date_gmt":"2023-06-05T22:08:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/?p=200"},"modified":"2023-06-05T22:08:23","modified_gmt":"2023-06-05T22:08:23","slug":"sea-to-sea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/sea-to-sea\/","title":{"rendered":"Sea to Sea"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

We headed east today, making our way through the lush green of the northwest and Bilbao on our way to the small beach town of Stiges, on the Mediterranean. We had planned to stop at a few wineries and a salteria (a place where they salt fish) on the way, but Artesoro Basseria was such a wonderful place we chose to stay there for as long as we could. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the next few days, I don\u2019t have a planned culinary journal stop or a specific food I want to try on the road, or when we get there, and I am glad for it. I have so many pictures and notes and questions to process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Parador de Olite<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Denise chatting from the castle balcony.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Castle at night<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Our first stop to break up the drive is Parador de Olite, a medieval castle turned into a hotel.  We stayed in the castle which was exciting and spent a day wondering through the castle and the walled, cobblestone city.  Ironically this is where I tried migas for the first time in Spain. Migas were first a peasant food of breadcrumbs fried in oil or fat, sometimes with onions or meats, and were created to use anything you had left in the pantry for sustenance especially during lean times.  They since have become a beloved comfort food and it was an interesting paradox to have them served in a castle where the kings and nobility of Navarre lived for centuries. It is always interesting to me to follow the humble beginnings of a dish that then becomes an integral part of a culture. I would like to choose a few of these foods and follow them through time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We continued our journey through many regions of Spain. It was wonderful to see the topography change from lush mountains and rolling hills to the arid interior with vineyards as far as you can see. This is another area of study that I would like to dive into deeper; how is wine connected to the different regions of Spain and what impact has the development had on the culture. Spaniards and Basques consume a lot of alcohol, what have the effects and benefits been on the culture here compared to, for example the United States?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 As we got closer to the Mediterranean the soil lightened, and grape vineyards were mixed with fields and fields of olive trees until there were only olive trees as far as you can see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s talk a bit about olive oil – aka liquid gold!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until I began this project, I would not have believed you if you told me that Spain produces over 51% of the world\u2019s olive oil.\u00a0 According to the International Olive Counsel, during the 2021\/22 harvest season Spain produced a whopping 1,491,500 TONNES of liquid gold.\u00a0 Out of the top 10 best olive oils produced in 2019 \u2013 8 of them are Spanish. What about Italy you ask? So did I! That same year Italy produced 329,000 tones of olive oil and even imports olive oil from Spain, I was shocked. \u00a0Needless to say, I was not shocked to see the amount of olive groves I did on our drive. I will be tasting olive oil in Andalusia and I can’t wait (https:\/\/www.internationaloliveoil.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/HO-CE901-13-12-2022-P.pdf<\/a>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since I was not going to the largest olive producing area during this trip, I did a surface amount of research and have more questions! A very quick view of the history – It is believed that the Phoenicians brought olive trees to Spain over 3000 years ago from present day Lebanon, the Romans took power of the region which they called Hispania, planted more trees and used this fertile land to grow and supply their oil thirsty empire. When the Moors came into power, they improved irrigation practices and increased production among other updates. Today there are olive groves in Andaluc\u00eda that are said to have trees over 1000 years old. All of this being said, there is a lot more depth and history and power struggle and information that goes into the olive oil story of Spain as it is today. As Claudia Roden notes in her book Spain, ” I have found that history is a sensitive subject that arouses passions whenever I say that I am researching teh history of Spain through it’s food” pg 9 Through it\u2019s history how did the layering of power changes, culture changes and time grow this industry into what is today? How did the different types of policing, now Designated Origin accreditation, impact the product, and the people involved today? Did these limitations help or hinder the growers and producers? How did these changes through time impact the environment, the quality and growing practices? What is the difference between all the different types of oil? What is the process of tree to fruit to oil? What do they all taste like? I wish this was going to be one of my stops this year \u2013 I will add it to next year\u2019s adventure for sure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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View from the apartment<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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The Mediterranean<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Paddleboarders<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Beachgoers playing paddle board in Stiges<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

 I also did some more research and re-discovered Claudia Roden, a food writer, traveler and cookbook author. I had heard of her before, here and there, and I\u2019ve cooked a few of her recipes in the past. Being on a culinary journal project myself, I saw her work in a new light. She began to travel through the Mediterranean when she was my age, kids out of the home and ready for a new direction. She began by asking people what their favorite recipe is, what their parents and grandparents ate and she connected these recipes to a history and a culture of a place.  Being in the same stage of my life I felt a connection to her work and became newly inspired. She reminded me that recipes are important, not only to understand a dish but be able to explain it, to understand and explain the culture, to be able to say what this dish is, what it represents and why it is important to share.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe stories of what you eat in Spain are like pieces of a puzzle” Roden, Spain<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this point I was realizing, what I am truly interested in is how people in a place cook in their homes, how and what they eat when they go out, what social connections they have to the food they eat, where they get their food and who they eat it with? How has and does the people in power structured who can eat and who can not through time? How has the power struggle and the narratives from those struggles shaped how and what people eat? So far I have been struggling to break out of the tourist experience of food \u2013 somehow I thought I would be able to get off the beaten path of tourist food and experience the \u201creal\u201d food of Spain. Tourist food in a place tells a story as well to be sure, and I think it is an important piece to the puzzle yet I long for the day to day home cooked food of locals. \u00a0What would it look like to cultivate connections to people here \u2013 like Laura and Roberto in Basque Country \u2013 and share recipes with them, ask them what their favorite recipe is, what did their parents and grandparents eat? What different kind of experience would it be to make connections with people in each place I traveled and asked them these questions. What would it look like to stay in one place for a longer period of time to get a feel of the rhythm of the place and the food and the people? What if I traveled through the Mediterranean and retraced some of Rodens travels, how has the culture and ways of food in these regions changed since she set out on her adventure so many years ago? Thinking of this project ignited an excitement in me, tapped my insatiable curiosity on the shoulder and woke me up again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s off to Barcelona tomorrow with renewed excitement, far more questions than I arrived at the beach with – and a suntan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We headed east today, making our way through the lush green of the northwest and Bilbao on our way to the small beach town of Stiges, on the Mediterranean. We had planned to stop at a few wineries and a salteria (a place where they salt fish) on the way, but Artesoro Basseria was such … Continue reading Sea to Sea<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":999,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"geo":{"latitude":41.2703056,"longitude":1.9665527,"description":"Pla Parcial Sector 28 (Mont-Roig Del Camp), Cataluna, 43892, ES"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/999"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":208,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions\/208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/foodag-portfolio-sp23-ball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}