Guaranteed scorchio and sunshine and blue skies, sultry evenings and the scent of jasmine and a glass or three of fine chilled white wine for under €3 a bottle, there’s nothing quite like a Spanish summer. She says, after coming back from a 12-day stint of English drizzle and cloud and occasional burst of sun. [...]
Oven-hot is the only way to describe the weather when it gets to the 30 somethings. Housework gets relegated to 7am or midnight. Or in a Quentin Crisp sort of way, not at all. (“There is no need to do any housework at all. After the first four years the dirt doesn’t get any worse.”). [...]
‘Con Canon, tu puedes’ works almost as ‘You can with Canon’, the ‘con’ and the ‘Canon’ resonating in a similar way to ‘can’ and ‘Canon’. Not all advertising slogans translate so well, though, and on occasion the marketing whizzes have screwed up big time. You would not, perhaps, expect a Spanish drinks manufacturer in the 1950s [...]
Two of the first fillers you ever pick up in Spanish are más o menos (more or less) and así-así (so-so), phrases that you hear over and over again in everyday exchanges. Half the time you don’t even hear them: you see them. “How was the exam?” Hold out your arm and rotate your wrist [...]
Now that the weather is heating up, it’s time to make escalivada. Mmmm. You absolutely can’t beat it – Mediterranean, healthy, fat-free, delicious, and perfect for preparing in advance. You can serve it as a salad or sidedish, warm or cold. A lot of recipes mention onions and tomatoes, but I just do it with [...]
