Zoe at the mercado

So I had to go shopping today. Well let me be honest I didn't really need to shopping but I had to get out of the piso because it's like 400 degrees in here. The upstairs neighbors are watching tele-novellas with the volume at 11 while at the same time listening to mid eighties Spanish Pop at 12 and hooting like wounded blood hounds, not to mention that the school in the back has decided to throw a fiesta for the remaining remedial kiddies featuring 1980s disco and traditional catalan songs of love, death and sepia. And speaking of sepia, AKA cuttlefish, it ain't my favorite thing to eat in the sea. It's basically a fat squid with shorter footsies. Mostly is comes out tasting like art gum erasers ala plancha. Cheweeeee. These critters are much more interesting alive and underwater than dead and swimming in olive oil on a plate.

So my five year old Zoo Zoo and I supped at Manu's bar at the mercado. I had some lovely salt cod with great, thinly cut potatoes and Zoe had her favorite croquetas and patatas bravas. Manu has Pilsner Urquel on tap which is like McDonald's having some swanky merlot as part of a happy meal. I of course partook of one of the finest beers in all the world, Zoe wisely went for a Fanta.

OK back to the sepia, after we bade Manu and his bird whistles adeu, we strolled by the big fish stand where they did in deed have the aforementioned sepia as well as cap de rape, which is monkfish head. Even in the best of times a monkfish is one oogly fishy but when you are staring at a pile of freshly decapitated specimens, well they don't look like fishsticks.

Zoe has been on this aquisition knowledge regarding cartlidge for the six months. Every day begins with questions about this miraculous material somewhere between bone and tissue. And a pile of monkfish noggins is of course going to peak her interest. The heads were all placed upside down for esthetic reasons one could presume. One of the nice vendedoras flipped one over for us. Yep... Oogly! We checked out the merluza, AKA hake, another looker. Now a dorada is a lovely looking fish, a fish as if designed by Disney. Big eyes, stylish flippers and a lovey almost pink sliver color. They are also lovely to eat. A recipe shall be forthcoming.