The Anatomy of a “Pop-UP” Mediterranean Feast
The making-of an authentic tasting menu — from the heat of a traditional Spanish ceramic wood-fired oven — by an American Ex-Pat cook.
So what must be done…? What CAN be done! A text will bring it into the light: those inklings of an idea welling up within. An utterance; what must be written?
— Well, chef, begin at the beginning, a menu perhaps.
— But I am not a chef; I have a good memory of color and texture, of the savory taste of umami; cooking times and the the many kinds of heat; of wine and people eating at my table; next to my wood oven — with a buon gusto; a joie de vivre; a manage a trois…
The Economics of Popping-up
Just because there is no classical physical “restaurant,” with it’s over head and flow, there are costs. What do you want to do? This is not a factory, but the cooking of perfect food. Perfectly sourced. Perfectly seasoned; perfectly cooked whether in 3 minutes or for three days. A porter house (chuleton, bone in, perhaps two bones in) steak dry aged for 3 weeks or 42 days. A two bone, 42 day dry-aged chuleton baked, roasted, and grilled — C’est si bon — two bone!
Price 65 Euros
That will cover costs and provide for the improvement of the experience for the next iteration. Susanne wants to extend the terrace to accommodate a far larger table — from the prep area to under the shade of the olive tree.
Pipe-UP your Pop-up: Marketing
There is always EatWith, but why not Medium, Twitter and Facebook and the rest of the internet to entice international travelers to get 40 KM up the hill from Madrid to the foot of the Sierra de Guadarrama National Park. And what about Snapchat; goose up my Instagram channel; like give at least a one sentence description of what’s going on. There are two fun things to do; either eating and drinking; or learning to cook in a ceramic wood-fired oven; or both.
Susanne has suggested sea food. What about adding to the fish course. On our walk this evening she waxed about navajas. Knives. They grow in the sand. shes giving me another beer now. So clams and mussels ala Marinera. Sicilian maranara. Ala carte. Right notm bom. Boom boom. One after another. A bouillabaisse in a little glass. A hot sizzling plate of steel heated up in the oven and placed on a smoking plank of enebro. You know. That’s what you make gin with. Then place on the table with fresh red tuna sizzling.
This Feast will be served in a beautiful private garden perched at the edge of Spain’s newest National park, La Sierra de Guadarrama. Come early for a wine and tapa to learn the secrets that our cook, David Peck, gleaned from decades investigating the culinary heritage of the Mediterranean; and the years cooking in his beloved wood-fired oven — an oven architected by the designer Susanne Mack.
Our POP-UP Traditional Mediterranean Tasting Menu
Spanish wood-oven roasted red peppers
Red peppers stuffed with feta and rice from Crete
Clams, mussels and navajas Marinera
Little grilled sardines coated in Marco’s Clasic Sicillian sauce of lemon, garlic, and mint — with a little olive oil and garnished with California Poppy.
Spring baby lamb from Cantimpalo Segovia
Grilled baby Lamb chops on Spazle
A two bone, 42 days dry-aged chuleton!
Oven baked re-hydrated dry cod from Lisbon
Roasted vegetables — Ottolenghi style from Jerusalem
Humus from Algiers
Baba ghanoush from Tangier
Tabbouleh from Istanbul
Flat bread from Beirut
Tiny sourdough pizza from Naples
Bottomless glasses of Red wine fron Rioja
Baked apples
Baked pears
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