A Spanish Escapade

On Saturday morning, I arrived alone in Bologna with my backpack and seven hours to kill before jetting off to Alicante in the evening. Fortunately for me, I  quickly stumbled upon one of Bologna's famous food markets, Mercato di Mezzo, in the old medieval town where I lingered gawping and ruing the lack of space in my luggage. Each shop, with laden trestle tables sprawling out into the narrow street, was a specialist in it's wares. From Pescheria to Pasticceria, Salumeria to Formaggeria, there was everything you could possibly dream of to the highest of Italian standards. Next time I go back, I'm taking a large empty suitcase. From my point of view, filling that suitcase with Bolognese edible goods will be a sensible investment for my larder as many of their best specialities keep well and even improve with age.

A short hop across the Mediterranean Sea later, and I was sitting in the flat of my old friend Miss Jones eating hot bruschetta topped with  tomato salsa, prosciutto, rocket leaves and goat's cheese. We spent  much of our time eating as becomes necessary when you have a lot to catch up on and it's raining. As a testimony to the wise words of the local Spanish students, we found that by far the best meals that we ate were those cooked at  home, like those by Miguel, who would knock up a paella at the drop of a hat. I  soon realised why this was when we went to Mercadona to buy for the dinner I was cooking. It is a sad result of the economic crisis, but you can buy such  varied and great ingredients for an absolute pittance, that it isn't surprising that  people are making their own rather than splashing out on restaurants. Needless to say, I made sure to squeeze some chorizo, vanilla pods and saffron into my backpack to bring back!

Nevertheless, we did sniff out a few gems on our wanders around the streets of Alicante. One particularly irresistible stop was at the Borgonesse Icecream Parlour on the Rambla where the elegantly sculpted mountains of 'helado' topped with jaunty cinnamon sticks and large chunks of nougat hooked us in despite the drizzle outside.

 Another sweet spot we found was a nearby Creperia called Yog&Bluffin where we sated our sugar cravings with first one crepe, and then a second. We gorged ourselves on strawberries submerged in Nutella, and then walnuts drenched in salty caramel; not quintessentially Spanish but extremely satisfying.

To round off the day, we headed into El Barrio, the old town which is the most picturesque part of Alicante, where the beauty of the traditional architecture remains unspoiled by the jumble of concrete flats that plague the rest of the city. Here, there were many small, boutique bars so we sat down for a couple of Mojitos in a casually retro place sporting battered old petrol station signs and a buffalo head mounted on the wall. The inhabitants of this bar were certainly interesting; we met a Parisian eye surgeon, a bearded old rocker who barely masked his affection for his friends with his rough-edged insults, and a half-Irish, half Pakistani Londoner who made his living in Spain playing poker.

The next day, we climbed up Santa Barbera, the castle that dominates the coastal skyline of Alicante, and refueled ourselves afterwards with a couple of small beers and a selection of traditional tapas in an unassuming bar along the road. For all it's shabby appearance, and it's even more questionable characters, the tapas we were brought out was very good. Making the most of being by the sea, I was delighted by the various morsels of whitebait, prawns, fried squid and crab meat. Megan was even tempted enough to eat some of whitebait, bones 'n' all...

I was very sad to leave, having absorbed a bit of the laid-back Spanish attitude to life and wanting to explore more of this new and intriguing country in which my friend was having such fun on the last stretch of her Erasmus year. However, the call of a hearty bolognese ragu with Cecily on my return to Bologna  and the promise of making my very own paella on arriving home in Siena sweetened the departure somewhat.