These are two recipes from my Spanish tapas and paella dinner a couple of weeks ago. These rounded out the ‘something green’ and ‘something carby’ requirements of my menu.  They also ticked an extra box, ‘something Catalan’.

 I mainly came across Catalonia in my linguistics studies. It’s a politically and culturally autonomous part of Spain, and includes Barcelona. The Catalan language has had a somewhat troubled past but seems to be getting a boost from the Government these days – public education is in Catalan, and businesses have to use Catalan as well as Spanish in menus, and posters etc, or they can face fines. Catalan public television broadcasts only in Catalan. It’s also the only official language in Andorra, a tiny little country nestled between Spain and France (thanks, Wikipedia!).

So, back to the dishes. I found this Ray McVinnie recipe for Catalan Tomato Bread – not a recipe for the bread itself, but instructions on rubbing tomatoes on lightly toasted bread, so the bread gets covered in tomato juice and seeds and little bits of flesh. Sure, I thought. That looks nice. But we need more tomatoes. So I made semi-dried tomato bread. The recipe comes from Simon & Alison Holst’s New Zealand Bread Book, which I bought when we got our breadmaker. I really like the book actually, it’s got every kind of bread I can think of, and all their recipes have breadmaker and by hand instructions. So you can make your bread entirely by hand, or get the breadmaker to do the donkey work on the dough before you shape the bread yourself and bake it in the oven, or the breadmaker can do the whole dang thing.

When I’m feeling authentic and virtuous I make the bread all by hand. But that doesn’t happen very often. And it certainly didn’t happen on this day. So Panasonic came to the rescue.

As for the Catalan Spinach, it’s really just steamed spinach with toasted pine nuts and raisins. It doesn’t sound that incredible but it’s funny how such a simple addition can really lift plain spinach and turn it into something special. It was goooooooooood! And healthy. Bonus. 10 Points.

Home Made Catalan Tomato Bread

 Semi-Dried Tomato Bread – from Simon & Alison Holst’s New Zealand Bread Book

3 tsp surebake yeast
1 cup warm water
¼ cup tomato paste
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 cup wholemeal flour
2 cups high grade flour
¼ cup chopped semi- or sun-dried tomatoes
1 Tbsp chopped fresh basil (optional)

By machine: Measure all the ingredients into your bread machine in the order the manual tells you to. Set to NORMAL cycle, and choose your crust etc, and hit START. Or, you can set it to dough and shape the dough yourself, then bake it (as in the by hand instructions). I have a Panasonic breadmaker and set it to LARGE loaf.

By hand: Measure the yeast, water, tomato paste, sugar, salt, oil and wholemeal flour into a large bowl and mix thoroughly. Cover and leave for 15 minutes in a warm place. Stir in the high grade flour, tomatoes (and the basil if you’re using it). Make a soft dough just firm enough to knead. Knead for 10 minutes, until the dough forms a soft ball that springs back when gently pressed. Turn the dough in 2-3 teaspoons of oil in a clean, dry bowl. Cover with cling film and leave in a warm place for half an hour.

Lightly knead the oiled dough for 1 minute. Turn it out onto a lightly floured surface, then pat it into a cylinder that will fit in your loaf or bread pan (or shape it round and bake it in a cake pan). Place it into the greased loaf pan and leave it to rise for about 1 hour or until doubled in size. Brush with milk (if you like) and bake at 200°C for about 30 minutes.

 To make it into Catalan Tomato Bread – a Ray McVinnie recipe from Cuisine

1-2 cloves of garlic, peeled and cut in half
1 very ripe tomato (a vine-ripened one if you can), cut in half
extra olive oil and salt, to serve

Slice the bread into 15mm slices and lightly toast. Rub each toast slice with the cut clove of garlic, and then with a tomato half, so that you leave plenty of tomato juice and seeds on the bread. Drizzle with olive oil and serve sprinkled with salt.

Catalan Spinach – from this recipe I found randomly

1 Tbsp olive or avocado oil
1 Tbsp pine nuts
2 Tbsp raisins
1 bunch spinach, washed and stems trimmed
1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar

Heat the oil in a large saucepan, and add the pine nuts. Watch them carefully; it’s a fine line between aromatic and burnt. As soon as they smell lovely, add the raisins, and let them plump for 1 minute. Add the spinach. Toss for a minute while the spinach wilts. Splash in the balsamic vinegar and toss for another 30 seconds. Season to taste and serve straight away.