Madrid

November 13, 2017
In this enjoyable and educational culinary history, Moreno, a professor of Spanish at the University of Cincinnati, enthusiastically explores the food of Spain’s capital. She methodically traces the culinary development of Madrid from the days when the Romans ruled the Iberian Peninsula, popularizing bread, olives, cheese, and roasted meat, to the mid-2000s, when Ferran Adrià and his restaurant, El Bulli, made molecular gastronomy a hit. Moreno provides brief historical sketches of the city, explaining that the cuisine was often influenced by the ruling class of the time: the Arabs introduced phyllo dough and nuts, the Bourbons and Hapsburgs indulged in sweets and pastries, and when Felipe V arrived in 1700, “he brought with him a French cook.” Moreno describes cookbooks published over the centuries, as well as restaurant menus, both historic and recent, that highlight Madrid’s vibrant culinary scene. In vivid detail, she describes markets such as Mercado de San Miguel and Centro Platea (“the largest gastro leisure space in Europe”) and introduces readers to Madrid’s two oldest restaurants, Lhardy and Sobrino de Botín. In a final chapter, Moreno provides recipes for the city’s most characteristic dishes, such as gambas al ajilio (garlic shrimp) and paella. Moreno’s informative guide is an excellent preview for those visiting the city.

September 15, 2017
Essayist and professor Moreno's comprehensive guidebook, part of the Big City Food Biographies series, covers the historical and contemporary food scene in a city that has become known for its inventive eating and drinking establishments. While the entries about the prehistory of Madrid tend towards the encyclopedic, the author hits her stride when she gets to the last couple of centuries, during which the change in cuisine has accelerated markedly. Illustrated with photos by the author and others, the book's lush descriptions of neighborhood markets and restaurants, with particular emphasis on those that have been serving customers since the nineteenth century and before, will give tourists plenty of places to explore and armchair visitors reasons to envy them. Excerpts from historic cookbooks, including one for stuffing partridges with sardines and another that puts turducken to shame, are entertaining if occasionally appalling. The representative recipes that conclude the volume, some of which require daunting ingredients such as veal tripe and veal snout, could use some fleshing out, but the adventurous will be tempted to experiment with them.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)