Post by Charlie: The Spanish eat ridiculously late. Lunch is 2-4 and dinner is 9-11 or later. This can be a problem for tourists. Some restaurants open for lunch at 1 but usually it is 1:30. We are still jet-lagged so we fit in pretty well. We woke up at 10 were ready to go out touristing by 11 and had lunch at 2, early but within Spanish bounds.
Dinner is more of an issue. Last night we had tapas for dinner. You probably know about tapas, an old Spanish custom where you had bar food to go with your drinks. It developed into an established culinary form where you would go bar-hopping in the early evening (7 or so) and have the specialty tapas at each bar, then go have dinner at 11 or 12.
This seems to have developed into something a little different. We had “todo tapas”, a tapas sampler, basically a dinner in the “small plate” form that seems to be popular now in lots of countries and food styles. It is a way to have an early dinner and get to bed at a decent hour. Lots of the restaurants have this.
It seems like a good deal for the restaurants. We were in the bar at a tiny little table with lots of people around us. No big dinner set-up, packed them into a small space, sell lots of high-margin alcohol, what’s not to like for the restaurant? And it worked for us too. The “small plate” idea is great because you get to have lots of tastes and, as we all know, the first bite is always the best (or is that the first toke? I forget.)
So this will be our dinner solution and the solution for lots of people it seems. The couple next to us was having an orange fanta and water so they weren’t there for the drinks. Note by Wynette: We split a pear cider. Very good.