Calçots

Calçots

Calçots are a type of salad onion grown in Catalonia that are traditionally eaten in the autum/winter months. They are chargrilled until black and served in newspaper or on a roof tile, one cuts the head of it (the hairy bit of the onion) and pushes them out of the skin by the green leaves and gets a moist, sweet and lovely onion. Then, one dips it in a beautiful almondy sauce mmmm

Last x'mas Gary tried Calçots in a restaurant when we were in Barcelona and has been asking me to make this amazing recipe since then... Last week I called my dad's wife who is the best one at making this sauce as far as I am concerned. I did make it and it was delicious. I thought it'd be nice to share the recipe, as there isn't anything similar outside Spain...

Sorry, I didn't take a photo of it so I had to go on google in order to get a nice picture of Calçots and their sauce in my blog... (The photo above is from a Spanish blog that also shares a recipe for the it)

And here I go:

Salsa de Calçots

Ingredients (to make about 500ml of sauce)

100g almonds peeled* and crushed

4 ripe tomatoes

2 garlic cloves

1 dried ñora**

1 tablespoon of vinegar

aprox 200ml of mild olive oil

3 digestive biscuits , crushed

1 teaspoon of Spanish paprika (or a non smoked one)

salt n pepper

*soak the almonds in boiling water for 30 seconds to 1 minute, allow to cool and it'll be easy-peasy to peel them

** ñora is a type of dried sweet pepper grown in Spain which is the base for this sauce. I bought mine in a Spanish/Catalan deli in Liverpool called Lunya (which is just brilliant by the way and I would recommend it to everybody) but if you can't find it in your home town try with any sort of dried peppers (sweet ones if poss)

Preparation

- Bring the ñora (or equivalent) to the boil for about 15 minutes or until is tender and moist. When ready keep both the pepper and the water, as you would be using them later on. Set aside and allow to cool. When chilled remove the seeds and skin of the ñora (which will leave with a tiny amount of pulp)

- Roast the tomatoes and garlic in the microwave at medium power: 5 minutes for the toms and no more than 3 min for the garlic. Allow to cool. When chilled remove skin.

- Place almonds, tomatoes, garlic, biscuits, ñora's pulp, paprika, salt, pepper and vinegar in a tub, then add the oil until it's just covered (there may be oil left over or you may have to add a bit more). 

- The process is similar to making handmade mayonnaise or allioli. The sauce could split, to avoid that place a hand blender at the bottom of the tub and leave there until  emulsion, then you can start moving the blender up and down to obtain a thick paste. Then add the water from the ñora to achieve desired consistency and blend it in (you should aim for the consistency of a cheese or white sauce). Here you can also add more vinegar, salt pepper or paprika to your taste, but always blending it.

In Liverpool we haven't got real Calçots, so we used jumbo salad onions instead and roast them for about 40min at 180.

This sauce also works well with fish or chicken and any roasted vegetables, really.

You could also add it to your salads as a dressing.

There's a Catalan salad called xató that includes this sauce in its recipe: to make it you only need some curly lettuce, tuna, black olives, anchovies and salted cod (previously soaked in water to desalt). 

Bon appetit!