Spanish Culinary Lesson #3 (Numero Tres)

All Spanish food can really be divided up into three categories...

1. Paella.

Arguably Spain´s most famous dish, paella is...

...as far as I can tell...

...cooked food.

There are are about a 794 different ways to make paella. It starts with a seafood. Or a meat. Or a chicken. Doesn´t matter. It is then cooked with vegetables. Like onions. Or peppers. Or tomatoes. Or all of them, or none of them. Whatever. Then rice. In all reality, I could just take whatever ingredients I have on hand, cook them in olive oil and saffron, serve it to you and call it paella. I may have a tough time arguing that it was paella, but trust me. You would have an even harder time arguing that it was not paella.

2. Tapas.

See Spanish Culinary Lesson #1 (Numero Uno) for the definition of tapas. But the snack of the Spanish also has a pretty wide definition. Olives and grapes are popular, but it can be as elaborate as small sandwiches, or calamari, or whatever. I´ve even seen chips advertised as tapas. Just as long as they are small.

So the next time you crack open that bag of goldfish, think of them as tapas, and think about the cultural experience you´re having.

3. Bakery.

Bakery can be divided into three sub-categories:
Sub-category #1: Bread.
Self explanitory.
Sub-category #2: "What-is-this-,-and-do-you-think-if-we-dipped-it-in-chocolate-it-would-still-taste-good-?"
This can vary from croissants, to waffles, to donuts, to random fried dough, pretzels, chocolate covered chocolate, etc. And yes, it still tastes good.
Sub-category #3: "This-could-be-covered-in-chocolate-!-But-we´re-just-not-going-to-do-that-right-now."
This encompasses everything else.