Speaking of Spain
  • Home
  • Civil War & Volunteers
  • Anarchism in the Spanish Civil War
  • Forgotten Stories From Spain
  • Radical Recipes
  • Library

The Death of 100 Palm Trees: 

7/9/2013

1 Comment

 
Picture
Picture
Menu especial: Hoy Tenemos....
Gusanos Frito 'Sago' al Pil-Pil
"We've lost hundreds. The beetles have just eaten them up from the inside out". She sighed. "The trees were so old and so tall too."
I'm in Puerto de Santa Maria, across the bay from Cadiz, a town steeped in history and tradition. A town, synonymous with fine wine, with Alfonso El Sabio, with Rafael Alberti and more recently with the decapitation of hundreds of palm trees throughout the town: All due to the presence of the palm weevil. 

The beetle - an immigrant from asia - eats out the heart of palm trees, including the coconut palm, date palm and oil palm. 

Unknown on the Mediterranean before the 1980s, It gradually spread from country to country, arriving in Spain in 1994.

Eggs laid in crevices or where branches have been pruned and not sealed, hatch lavae that travel deep inside, burrowing into the heart of the palm, eventually causing the death of the tree.

On a positive note: Apparently dogs can now be trained to recognise the unique scent of the beetle in order to detect the presence of the infestations at the earliest possible moment.

Was this fact linked, I thought, to the previous nights presence of the dog training classes on the beach? In most towns in Spain, dogs roam free with owners either at home, or following behind in their car. Yet here, dogs were on leads, well behaved and looking like they had a job to do.

Nothing would surprise me about this town. 
But there could be an alternative solution to the problem. The Palm larvae are considered a delicacy and reach high prices in parts of Asia. Known as Fried Sago Worms, they could be bred and incorporated into the classical Menu del Dia, with a little imagination and could, stimulate a new tourist market for Asian holiday makers? 




























1 Comment

Escape From the Tortilla

7/6/2013

0 Comments

 
Picture
Given that this weeks temperatures have soared beyond the thermometer scale, we are heading out of the Tortilla town for a few weeks to explore some parts of Cadiz and the province of Huelva, possibly boating into Portugal if they'll take small brown animals as passengers too. 

Long hand blogging will therefore be at a minimum, though I can be stalked as the Gazpachomonk on numerous social media sites including twitter, Instagram, Foursquare and at last re-employing the mico-audio blogging tool: AudioBoo. (Gazpachomonk) Listen in to the sounds of the south....

If you haven't tried Audioboo, its spontaneous, easy and available as a free app on all platforms. You can check it out here...

Or follow the Monk's journey towards the windy coast directly here: Hope you catch up with you on route.

0 Comments

Surviving a Spanish Summer

7/1/2013

1 Comment

 
Having a Black Belt in Gazpacho Tasting - I can assure you that when Summer hits, you will require all the garlicky, tomato-y and oilive-oily survival skills you can muster.

For yes, summer has arrived and with it, dancing sown the high street, hand in hand, comes the Spanish heat. When I say heat, I should clarify what I mean: I don't mean warmth, I mean HEAT.

Imagine, if you will the oven has been on all day and you didn't realise. "Is that oven still on?” You ask yourself as you cross the kitchen and spot a small red light that shouldn't be on. You open up the oven door to check that it's not just a faulty switch and...too late! A wave of scorching, eye-brow-removing-heat smacks you across the face

Or imagine, if you will, it's mid summer and you are lying drowsily in bed, the sound of crickets chirping in the distance and the gentle sway of a palm leaf sends cooling shadows across the wooden beams of the bedroom ceiling. Sunlight, tip-toes gently across the room, caressing your spring wardrobe, suggesting it may be time to pack away the socks till autumn. Then, in the very same instance, some trickster sneaks up to you and super-glues two steaming hot water bottles to your face. Well, that's what the arrival of a spanish summer is like.
Gazpacho survival skills
In Today's Episode of Speaking of Spain…what to do when you live inside the oven..the Gazpachomonk presents his dastedly 9 point plan to  Surviving a Summer in Spain.

Listen to the survival guide here.. Or subscribe to the whole series on iTunes and a by the end of the year, you too could be a black belt in Gazpacho tasting. 
1 Comment

    BOOKS

    1984 and Spanish Civil War
    Available Now
     Why Orwell is essential to understanding Spain today. More here - Forgotten Stories From Spain
    Follow @GazpachoMonk

    Norman Bethune and the Spanish Civil war
    The Ambulance Man and the Spanish Civil War (2nd Ed)
    Find out More about the ebook and audio
    Forgotten Stories From Spain Book HERE
    AND WATCH THE TORTILLA VIDEO HERE
    Inside the tortilla book cover
    Listen to an audio sample here

    POSTS

    CNT newspaper
    Spain 1936: The Silenced Revolution
    Did Laurie Lee Lie - a 2 part investigation
    Did Laurie Lee Lie? Listen to the two part investigation.


    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2019
    June 2016
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012

Store

Books
Videos
Audio

Free PDFs to Download

Anarchist Car Designs from Civil War
​Anarchism & the Death of an Idea


Free Stories

The Bullfight
The early Morning Hours
​Laurie Lee

Contact

Contact

The gazpachomonk
© COPYRIGHT 2020. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • Civil War & Volunteers
  • Anarchism in the Spanish Civil War
  • Forgotten Stories From Spain
  • Radical Recipes
  • Library