With apologies to the Galician Chamber of Commerce
A few weeks ago I was talking with the owner of a small restaurant in Riego de Ambros where we had just had a drink and tapas after another day of walking on the Camino Frances. I told him that I had enjoyed the snack he served called “pulpo”. He smiled and said, “Yes, it is good. I believe you call it octopussy in the US”. This, of course, stopped me dead in my tracks.
A vision of Roger Moore flitted briefly before my eyes. Then I had to concentrate on not doing something socially inappropriate, like laughing in a heart stopping, can’t get your breath kind of way. So, instead, with what I thought was a barely perceptible additional pause, I simply said, “yes, something like that”.
Thus it began. Actually, it had begun a few miles back up the track in the town of El Acebo where we had stopped for a late lunch. We struck up a conversation with a Spaniard who had walked the Camino a couple of years ago, with his chihuahua no less. Anyway, our conversation turned to local cuisine. To emphasize a point, he put his fingers to his lips, kissed them and then said, reverently, “ah, but the pulpo in Melide!” Clearly, this was a man in love. I was forewarned.
For the record, I will stipulate that I am not the most adventuresome eater. Better than some, but not a huge risk taker. And, I must admit that, in the interest of international relations, I had in fact lied to the restaurant owner in Riego de Ambros. I had not liked the pulpo appetizer he had served me. In fact, I had barely choked it down, saved only by the consumption of significant amounts of cerveza (which I found to be just fine). Let me be clear about this and, at the same time, throw in a gratuitous misquote of Shakespeare: The fault, dear reader, lies not in our stars (or the restaurants of Melide) but in ourselves and especially in the lack of an educated palate (graymountaineer’s, to be precise).
Given the above, it was with some trepidation that I considered my dining options when we hit Melide. It was coming up. We were due to hit Galicia, an autonomous region within Spain, particularly known for all things pulpo and apparently, the city of Melide was pulpo ground zero.
I considered my options. I’ve been other places where there were unusual (by my standards) local delicacies and needed to find a way to negotiate the dining scene in an appropriate manner. For example, when visiting my daughter while she was doing a semester abroad in Australia, I was confronted with restaurants serving kangaroo. I came up with what I thought was a brilliant solution, I found a restaurant serving kangaroo burgers. Basically, I am willing to eat almost anything labeled as a “burger”.
Thus, my culinary survival in Melide might come down to finding a restaurant serving a pulpo burger. Confronted with this dilemma I did what any minimally intelligent person does these days – I started googling like mad using terms like Melide+burger+pulpo. Google revealed one promising option – Casa Alongos. They had a bonafide pulpo burger on their menu.
But maybe, I thought, it wouldn’t come to that. Perhaps this pulpo thing was overblown. Eight days later we hit Melide. And, indeed, there seemed to be a lot of restaurants calling themselves “pulperias”. The speciality is Pulpo Galega, described succinctly as boiled pulpo and potatoes, according to my extensive on-line research. I found Casa Alongos and Google had not lied – on a placard sitting outside the restaurant they had a picture of a bonafide pulpo burger. Temptingly, it did indeed look something like a burger. However, unlike Australia, where I did get my kangaroo burger, I just couldn’t pull the trigger on this. Finally, after searching the city for over an hour, my wife and I found a place willing to serve something that tasted like and indeed actually was, chicken. Mea culpa.
Despite what I will openly admit is my own shortcoming, I can report that Galicia is far more than pulpo. Of all the regions through which we have walked on the Camino, Galicia is my favorite. The scenery has been stunning. First, there were the Cantabrian Mountains, still snow covered when we passed through. This gave way to rolling hills and tons of small rivers, bucolic farmland and a local delicacy which I did try and loved, Arzúa-Ulloa cheese.
Honestly, I am sorry to disappoint my readership on the pulpo thing. Maybe on our next Camino???
