* * * * *
Quique Dacosta at Casa Elías, Xinorlet (Alicante), October 18, 2012.
Photo by Gerry Dawes©2011. gerrydawes@aol.com
Quique
Dacosta has long been a friend of mine. I was very happy to hear that
is was announced in November that he had received his third Michelin star,
for which he has worked so hard for so many years. I last ate at
Restaurante Quique Dacosta in October 2011, when I was staying in Denia
at Hotel La Posada del Mar. I was traveling with Ryan Mcilwraith,
Michael Chiarello's executive sous chef and we were supposed to go to
Quique Dacosta that night. Ryan was sick with a bad stomach, so I
decided not to go either, but Quique called me on my cell phone at 10:30
p.m. and demanded that I get my ass over there (it is about 2
kilometers from the hotel), so I ended up going by myself. I was pretty
wiped out from ten days of taking Michael and Ryan around northern
Spain (Michael had left the day before from Barcelona), so I told Quique
I was only up for an abbreviated menu. He sent out a dazzling parade
of his incredible cocina de vanguardia estilo Quique dishes, then came out and sat with me for half an hour.
Quique Dacosta, Denia (Alicante). Dish with the spooky vapors of the dry ice beneath swirling around your food.
Photo by Gerry Dawes©2011. gerrydawes@aol.com
In October 2012, I was the inaugural speaker at the annual Turismo conference
in Benidorm (Alicante) and I met Director General de Turismo de Valencia
Sebastian Fernández, who told me he was going for lunch at one of my
favorite restaurantes in Spain, Casa Elías, a exceptional family place
in the small village of Xinorlet. Casa Elías specializes in wonderful
thin-layered arroses (rice dishes, call them paellas) con conejo y caracoles
(rabbit and local snails [with fresh rosemary]) cooked over grape vine
cuttings, usually from the local Monastrell vineyards. Casa Elías also
serves a number of other authentic local speciaties (see photos of the
luncheon here: Xinorlet (Alicante) Casa Elias Rabbit & Snail Paella Paco Torreblanca - Quique Dacosta Oct 18, 2012). Sr.
Fernández also told me that two great friends--two of my favorite
Spanish chefs--Quique Dacosta and Paco Torreblanca were also coming. I
managed to wrangle (not wangle) an invitation to accompany Sr. Fernández
to the luncheon.
We got to Casa Elías first and I hid in a private dining room until Paco, his wife Chelo, Quique and journalist Maria Canabal (http://www.gastronomad.eu)
were in the main dining, then came out to surprise them (I took it as a
good sign that they didn't flee). I felt like I had hit the
lottery. Not only did I get to schmooze the Director of Tourism for
Valencia on the hour-long ride from Benidorm to Xinorlet and have a
chance to eat the terrific food at Casa Elías again, among my dining
companions for the next two hours were two of Spain's real culinary
super stars: Paco Torreblanca may be the top chocolatier in Europe and
Quique Dacosta could well be the heir apparent to Ferran Adrià's throne,
now that elBulli has closed.
* * * * *
Paco Torreblanca Slideshow, Including the Full Food Arts Article.
I
never see Quique without remembering (how could I not?) that on September 11, 2001 I was
having lunch with Santa Fe Chef Mark Miller (then owner of Coyote Cafe)
at Quique's restaurant in Denia, at the time called El Poblet. Halfway
through a terrific meal--we were having a course of supernal grilled gambas de Denia (superb rosa-colored
shrimp that actually come from deep water off the Balearic island of
Ibiza), when my Spanish cell phone rang. It was chef Teresa
Barrenechea, who then owned Marichu restaurant in Manhattan. She, too,
was traveling in Spain. She told me that a plane had hit The World
Trade Center. I thought, "Wow, someone has had the misfortune to have
crashed a private plane into The World Trade Center!" Soon enough,
Quique called us to the bar, where we saw the rest in real time,
including the second plane crashing into the second tower. Mark Miller,
Quique, myself and his employees watched dumbfounded as we the events
unfolded on television. Mark
Miller's Coyote Cafe restaurant managers from Santa Fe and Las Vegas
were still in-flight headed for Valencia, where we were supposed to pick
them up after lunch.
Mark Miller (at the end of the table) and some friends tasting wines with me at Taberna La Boca in Santa Fe
during the Santa Fe Wine & Chile
Fiesta in September 2012
Miller's
managers were able to get to Valencia on time, but, as we soon found
out, there would be no going back to the U.S. right away, since all
flights were grounded, so we continued on our planned intinerary to
Barcelona, Navarra, The Basque Country, la Rioja and back to Madrid.
In Navarra, we had lunch in Tudela, and found out the next day that an
Al-Qaeda operative who had planned to blow up the U.S. Embassy in Paris
had been apprehended in a nearby village, where he had been living for
several months.
For
several days, I was sure that I had lost friends in The World Trade
Center attack, including Michael Lomonaco, one of the original members
of my Chefs From Hell Club, who was then Executive Chef of Windows on
the World, Cellar in the Sky and The World Trade Center Club; Jules
Roinnel, the Managing Director of The World Trade Center Club; and a
number of others who had been on a trip to Spain with me that spring.
Chef Michael Lomonaco, now Chef-partner at Porterhouse New York.
Ironically,
in May of 2001, I had led a group of 26 people from The World Trade
Center Club around Spain for eleven days. The group include Jules
Roinnel, the Club's Director and my old friend, Michael Lomonaco,
Executive Chef of Windows on the World, Cellar in the Sky and The World
Trade Center Club. Ironically, on that trip, we had gone for lunch one
day in Madrid at a great seafood restaurant, La Trainera, on calle
Lagasca. Since the street was too narrow for our bus, the driver
double-parked the bus alongside some parked cars on calle Goya across
the street from Bar Goya and in front of a BBVA bank branch and we
walked a block or so to the restaurant. After a terrific lunch, at
which on old friend of mine, John Ewing, joined the group, we drove back
to our hotel and continuing touring Madrid in the afternoon.
After
dinner, some of us decided to have a drink in the Hemingway Bar at the
Hotel Palace. John Ewing, who had also joined us for dinner, decided to
call it night and took a cab back to his hotel, which coincidentally was
the Hotel Lagasca, on the street where we had had lunch. Within half an
hour, Ewing called me on my cell phone and told me, "You won't believe
what just happened! A bomb just exploded and damned near blew me out of
bed."The
Basque separatist group ETA had planted a bomb in a car parked in front
of that BBVA bank branch where our bus was parked during lunch.
For
all we knew the bomb could have been there while our bus was
there. The bomb injured 14 people, destroyed a number of cars and
wrecked a number of business along calle Goya, including the Bar Goya,
which got destroyed and was where John Ewing had considered stopping for
a nightcap, but opted to return to his hotel, go to bed and read a
book, a decision that may have saved his life.
The
next morning, our World Trade Center Club group was preparing to leave
for Ribera del Duero, Burgos and The Basque Country. The Deputy
Security Inspector for The Bridge and Tunnel Authority (in
charge of The World Trade Center), had his offices on the 77th Floor of
the tower that was home to the World Trade Center Club, Windows on the
World, Cellar in the Sky and City Lights Bar. He stood outside the
cargo compartments of the bus and made sure that each bag belonged to
its owner and was verified. Looking back, I have always considered that
Basque bomb on calle Goya as a harbinger of things to come.
As
Mark Miller, his Coyote Cafe managers and I continued our trip, I
checked newspapers at every stop and listened to Spanish radio in the
car, but, in the absence of any direct news about my friends, I was
almost sure that they had perished. Then three days later, my daughter,
Elena, who had dined with me at Windows on the World in August, called
crying about the attacks, but told me that she had seen my friend, Chef
Lomonaco, on television. Michael had survived because he took 15
minutes to have his glasses repaired and did not catch the elevator that
would have taken him 110 stories to his kitchens at Windows on the
World and to certain death.
Later
I would find out that Jules Roinnel had switched shifts and planned to
work that evening. Mike Nester, the Deputy Inspector who had checked the bags going
on the bus in front of the Hotel Ritz in May had had breakfast at The
World Trade Center Club and had just reached the 77th floor when the
first plane hit. He was able to get out in time by walking down all
those flights of stairs, helping and injured person to get out as well,
injuring his neck in the process. But, of the some 24 people on that
Spain trip with me, not a one perished. Pardon
me if I have digressed in reporting about Quique Dacosta's third
Michelin star, but I spent one of the most unforgettable days of my life
in his restaurant.
Subsequent
meals at Quique Dacosta have fortunately had a much happier outcome,
but we seldom see one another for any length of time without recalling
that incredible afternoon that we watched unfold on television
together.
(A video trailer on Valencia and Alicante showing Quique Dacosta, Paco Torreblanca and Casa Elías.)
____________________________________________________
About Gerry Dawes
Gerry Dawes was awarded Spain's prestigious Premio Nacional de Gastronomía (National Gastronomy Award) in 2003.
He writes and speaks frequently on Spanish wine and gastronomy and leads gastronomy, wine and cultural tours to Spain.
He was a finalist for the 2001 James Beard Foundation's Journalism Award for Best Magazine Writing on Wine, won The Cava Institute's First Prize for Journalism for his article on cava in 2004, was awarded the CineGourLand “Cinéfilos y Gourmets” (Cinephiles & Gourmets) prize in 2009 in Getxo (Vizcaya) and received the 2009 Association of Food Journalists Second Prize for Best Food Feature in a Magazine for his Food Arts article, a retrospective piece about Catalan star chef, Ferran Adrià.
In 2009, Dawes was awarded the Food Arts Silver Spoon Award in a profile written by José Andrés.
". . .That we were the first to introduce American readers to Ferran Adrià in 1997 and have ever since continued to bring you a blow-by-blow narrative of Spain's riveting ferment is chiefly due to our Spanish correspondent, Gerry "Mr. Spain" Dawes, the messianic wine and food journalist raised in Southern Illinois and possessor of a self-accumulated doctorate in the Spanish table. Gerry once again brings us up to the very minute. . ." - - Michael & Ariane Batterberry, Editor-in-Chief/Publisher and Founding Editor/Publisher, Food Arts.
Gerry Dawes would like to host a reality television series
on wine, gastronomy, culture and travel in Spain that features a different star American chef in each episode. Serious inquiries welcome.
Gerry Dawes can be reached at gerrydawes@aol.com.
Gerry Dawes can be reached at gerrydawes@aol.com.
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