How to make Christmas Dinner – Spanish style!

It’s Christmas Eve ‘Noche Buena’, not Christmas Day, when the serious festive eating starts in Spain and it will usually go on till the early hours. So if you are planning a Spanish Christmas dinner, where do you start?

Tapas

This is just the beginning, supposedly light nibbles, whilst everyone is arriving and getting comfortable. But as plentiful as tapas can often be, the amount can seem like a meal on its own. That said, tapas are easy to pre-prepare and three simple traditional Spanish tapas are:

Artichokes, sautéed with ham or filled with white sauce and meat

Gambas a la plancha (Pan-grilled shrimp)

Spanish Chorizo on bread

Primer Plato (first course)

One popular first course dish in Spain is Sopa de Pescado y Marisco (fish and seafood soup) or cold gazpacho (vegetable soup with a tomato base).

There will most certainly be a very complex salad served with the first course.

Plato Principal (main course)

Although the Spanish are one of the main consumers of chicken in Europe, it is more likely that other meats will find their way first onto the table for the traditional large family Christmas gathering. The main course is therefore likely to be beef, lamb, poultry or game and served with pan fried potatoes or possibly rice.

Postre (pudding)

The Spanish don’t scrimp when it comes to puddings, especially at Christmas. You can expect to take your pick from the likes of:

Spanish Crumble cakes (Mantecados) or almond candy (Touron), almond cookies (Polvorones), or crème custard or rice pudding.

Spanish Christmas cuisine is of course washed down with plenty of red wine and cava, lots of lively discussions and laughter, followed by coffee, cheese, chocolate and anything that’s left over!

The following morning, Christmas Day, sees the celebrations start all over again and many of the bars are often full. It is not a time for presents or Santa Claus though as the kids must wait until January 6th, Epiphany, to open their presents.