Cuisine of Las Alpujarras

La Alpujarra’s simple and natural cuisine is based on the wide variety of its fruit, vegetables and trees such as walnut, almond figs and olive. It is also based on its flocks of goats and its ham production.

In the mountain areas, dishes don’t vary much, whereas on the coast one finds more variety. Many dishes, specially the sweetmeats, are recipes descending from the Muslims whilst the exquisite ham dishes are the introduction of the more recent Christian era. Hams from Trevélez (jamón serrano) deserve a special mention, specially since they are the main industry of Las Alpujarras, followed by the wine production from the Sierra de la Contraviesa region, known as Vino Costa or Vino de la Tierra.

Notably typical dishes on an Alpujarra menu are: cured sausages, chorizo longaniza, (blood pudding) morzilla, migas, (breadcrumbs fried in garlic) gachas pimientonas or gachas de ajo quemado, (hasty pudding with paprika or with scorched garlic), truchas con jamón (trout with cured ham), potaje de castañas (chestnut stew), choto al ajillo (kidd in garlic sauce), conejo picante (spicy rabbit), sopa alpujarreña (Alpujarra soup) and most popular of all is the plato alpujarreño, a degustacion of cured hams, the various sausages, fried eggs, fried sweet peppers, potato a lo pobre and local cheese. To finish, one of many delicious Moorish sweetmeats: tortas (flat crumbly aniseed cakes), pan de higo (fig bread), soplillos de almendra (almond meringues), roscones de hojarasca (a type of ring-shaped cake) and cuajados (curds), to name but a few.

Migas

Ingredients:
4 glasses of water, 4 coffee cups of semolina flour, salt,
1 –2 cloves of garlic, 2-3 soupspoons of olive oil.
Garnish: bacon sausage, baked onion, baked garlic, fried green peppers, fried dried tomatoes.
Fry the chopped garlic and leave to cool. Then add the warm water and a pinch of salt when the water boils; slowly sprinkle in the flour, stirring with a spatula until it has a uniform consistency.
Cook over a low heat for 30 – 45 minutes, stirring continuously until it forms small
golden balls. Serve with the garnish of sausages, fried green peppers, grapes or melons.