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Tradiciones Catalanes

Catalan Traditions

Appears in
top 1000MoVida Rustica: Spanish Traditions and Recipes
MoVida Rustica

By Frank Camorra and Richard Cornish

Published 2009

  • About

THE VINEYARD WORKERS SAT IN A CIRCLE IN THE SHADE OF A TREE EATING THEIR LUNCH, DRINKING THEIR COFFEE AND SMOKING THEIR CIGARETTES. SIMULTANEOUSLY. THERE WAS A TORTILLA WRAPPED IN A CLOTH, AND THIN LOAVES OF CRUSTY BREAD THAT THE WORKERS WOULD BREAK OFF, THEN RUB WITH A CLOVE OF GARLIC AND SMALL THICK-SKINNED TOMATOES. ‘PA AMB TOMÀQUET,’ SAID GERARD IN CATALAN: ‘BREAD WITH TOMATO, THIS IS OUR NATIONAL DISH.’

Gerard Batllevell Simó and his family were working quickly, harvesting their grapes before the autumn rain clouds rolled in over the hills from the Mediterranean. Soon these would be drenching the stony soils of the Priorat, a once-great wine region to the south-west of Barcelona. Here the steep ground is covered in little flat stones that resemble fingernails and flat broken tiles. In this grow squat bush vines that cling to the steep hills. New terraced vineyards have been bulldozed into the hills, creating bands of green vines on otherwise bare brown slopes.

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