Tapas Appetizers And Spanish Menu Ideas
Tapas has to be the start to any Spanish menu ideas page and with these BBQ recipes you really can reproduce the taste of the Mediterranean in your backyard barbeque.
The word originates in the Tascas and Bodegas (bars, to you and me) of Andalucia, an extremely hot part of Spain. The word is derived from the verb tapar – to cover.
In the days before air conditioning, the men in the bar would be served with a small slice of bread to cover (tapar) the top of their sherry glass to keep the flies off. It then developed so that the bread was then served with a little something on top, and so became “una tapa” – a cover.
Here I am searching for Spanish recipe inspiration - it's a hard life!
Now I have to confess that I've used the word tapas to describe many of my appetizers that aren't really Spanish, it's just that it's a great word to describe finger food destined to be eaten with an aperitif whilst the main meal is cooking.
On this page however you'll find only those recipes that are guaranteed typically Spanish.
Note
The Spanish tend to grill an awful lot of their meat and fish on the plancha which to you and me is a hotplate barbecue grill.So many of the recipes above can be improvised to simply use the hot plate on your gas grill or the plancha accessory for your kamado.
The concept is that the heat is in direct contact with the food so it cooks that much more evenly.
Imagine you're in Spain and sit out on the patio with a glass of Rioja and listen to the sizzle of the plancha. Buen provecho!
Related Pages:-
Italian Menu Ideas
Greek Cooking
Indian Menu Ideas
Chinese Barbecue
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