Looking for an Atmospheric Tapas Restaurant on Tenerife

Anyone who enjoys spending a leisurely lunch lingering over a taste-bud teasing selection of tapas dishes accompanied by a carafe of local vino will find that, depending where they’re staying on Tenerife, finding an atmospheric tapas bar will either be as easy as falling off a log, or as difficult as getting a flight out of a UK airport at the moment.

On my birthday I enjoy having a long tapas lunch. In Puerto de la Cruz we’re spoiled for places to have tapas. There were twenty eight bars and restaurants participating in a recent ‘ruta de la tapa’ (a council sponsored competition to find the best tapas in town). These aren’t all the places in Puerto that serve tapas, just the ones which had opted to participate. We only managed to get around six of the restaurants and the tapas in each were a delight. But what added to the experience was the ambience and surroundings which ranged from interior courtyards of colonial mansions to stylish terraces to pavement cafés overlooking charming squares. Like I said we’re spoiled in Puerto.

On my birthday I opted for a place we hadn’t been to before, Tasca El Olivo, on one of the back streets behind Plaza del Charco. It’s not the most picturesque location in town, but being situated beside a Cuban bar whose salsa music added a South American soundtrack to the scene, it was atmospheric and we whiled the afternoon away eating the most delicious tapas and people-watching.

Rewind a few weeks and we’re researching in Costa Adeje around the San Eugenio/Torviscas area. There are hundreds of places to eat and if we wanted burgers, toasties or bocadillos (filled baguettes), or even a meal in a nice restaurant we’d be fine. However, when we’re out and about working, we like to try a couple of tapas dishes in a quaint little bar/restaurant if possible. We were on a hiding to nothing.

A couple of days later we’re in a couple of other resorts carrying out more research – same result. There just wasn’t anywhere that fitted the bill and in the end on both occasions, we settled for baguettes in pleasant, but run of the mill establishments.

Admittedly it’s difficult for resorts which have only been in existence for a few decades at most to meet the ‘quaint’ requirement. If you’re in Santa Cruz, La Laguna or La Orotava, you’ve got five hundred years of history to add to the overall ambience and that’s something that’s almost impossible to replicate.

But it’s not impossible. Los Cristianos has a wonderful selection of contemporary tapas bars in the San Telmo area. El Médano has great tapas restaurants overlooking the harbour and even small places like up and coming Alcalá has a couple of inviting tapas bars around its small square. And there are plenty of others like them.
But then these three were towns or villages first and that’s where for me the difference lies.

For many years establishments in some parts of the main southern resorts have occupied the culinary middle ground, offering familiar ‘international’ menus to appeal to the masses.Recently that’s changed in the newer, more upmarket areas.

But generally speaking, if you want to try some local tapas in an ambient bar where the atmosphere complements the food on your plate, look to the towns that were already in existence before the mass tourism boom of the 70s.

A Month Going Native in Tenerife #3: From Exploding Tapas to Tsunami-Sized Waves

Enjoying a lively Christmas lunch in the courtyard of a museum party was a fittingly surreal topping to the last few weeks in Tenerife.

Exploding Tapas in Puerto de la Cruz
The period had started bizarrely enough when we took my sister and her boyfriend, who were on holiday in Playa de la Arena on a tapas route around the town. Some great tapas dishes were tested; however, the one which got the best reaction wasn’t the tastiest, but the oddest. Ravioli filled with space dust in Casa Pache was quite unlike anything I’d ever tasted. No wonder they called it ravioli sorpresa.

Volcanic Eruptions on Tenerife
The 18th of November saw the centenary of the last eruption on Tenerife at Chinyero above Santiago del Teide. We went along to see how it was being celebrated and stood on the edge of the volcano as a load of suits, looking completely inappropriately dressed for trekking across a lava field, posed for photos with Ricardo Melchior, the Island’s President (who was at least dressed for the countryside). The event also coincided with the opening of Santiago del Teide’s new cultural centre set in and around the lovely old buildings of Casa El Patio. We’d first clocked the building about three years before, when its estimated opening date was already 6 months behind schedule. In Tenerife time that’s not bad. On maps of Puerto de la Cruz, the car park at the harbour has been identified as ‘futuro parque marítimo’ for about 20 years.

Chestnuts, Wine and Street Sliders
This year’s arrastre de las tables, where local lads scream down steep streets to celebrate San Andrés in Icod de los Vinos was a bit of a washout. Much more enjoyable was partaking of a poke of chestnuts and some new vino tinto around the harbour in Puerto… if you could get a seat. It’s the sort of thing that Puerto does brilliantly. The smells, tastes and sounds were a reminder that for anyone wanting to sample the real Tenerife and do the sort of things that Canarios enjoy doing, Puerto’s hard to beat.

Yellow Weather Alerts on Tenerife #1 The Rain
November is always a dodgy month on Tenerife. It’s the month that the rains can return with a vengeance after the long dry summer. We always advise people that if they’re coming to Tenerife for only a week and want some sunshine, don’t come to the north in November or February. The rains don’t normally last long, but when they come you know about them. This year’s were the worst we’d seen since we moved here and although they only lasted about 24 hours, they left chaos in their wake and destroyed part of the town beach.

Christmas on Tenerife

The Christmas lights in Puerto this year are a bit of a disappointment. They’re very nice and tasteful, but lack a bit of colour. Thank goodness then for a completely over the top psychedelic big wheel, whose frantically whizzing neon lights dominate the town’s skyline. The funfair in Puerto’s harbour is part and parcel of Christmas here, as are aisles full of turrón in the supermarket – we’re on our third packet of the season.

Snow on Mount Teide

They were a bit late in coming and they didn’t stay long, but the first snows of the year fell on Mount Teide’s slopes last week.  We’re hoping that more falls during the next week so that we can say we’ve had a white Christmas on Tenerife.

 

Yellow Weather Alerts on Tenerife #2 The Waves
Some people panic when they hear there’s a weather alert on Tenerife, but when the alerts for big waves, it’s more of a heads up to experience nature’s show than to batten down the hatches. Last week I was hoping to see some surfers tackling ‘El Bravo’, but although the waves turned up as promised, the surfers didn’t… hey ho.

Christmas is almost upon us, so with Christmas concerts during the next week, New Year’s celebrations and the Tres Reyes parades there are a few things that we’re looking forward to before the fiesta season starts again in January.

Feliz Navidad Todos

Going Native in Tenerife – Eating Where the Locals Eat

There’s a rule when it comes to recommending restaurants that is applied in nearly every travel guide book and also in countless travel articles.

It’s this: A restaurant where the locals eat must be the place to eat. As rules go, it’s not a bad one. We’ve applied it everywhere we’ve visited and usually ended up enjoying a good meal.

However, living in Tenerife and getting to know the local culture and quirks has made me view this rule slightly differently and with slightly more caution.

Firstly, as we talk about in 'Going Native in Tenerife' in more detail, Canarios generally have a conservative nature when it comes to dining. They like Canarian food which tends to be simple dishes of grilled meat and fish with papas arrugadas (literally wrinkled potatoes). Any vegetable or salad accompaniment isn’t usually the most imaginative in the world.
The mainland Spanish don’t always hold Canarian cooking in high esteem and I’ve had restaurant owners go out of their way to make it clear that their restaurant serves Basque, or Galician dishes rather than Canarian.

Canarios aren’t the best at experimenting with food from other countries apart from maybe Italian. So what that means is that when you see a restaurant filled with Canarios, you can bet your house on the fact that the menu will be traditional Canarian cooking and almost exactly the same as every other Canarian restaurant on the island.  However, lots of local clients usually means that the food served will be a notch above other restaurants dishing up the same fare. La Tasquita de Min beside Puerto’s harbour is a prime example of this. Their fish is simply prepared and divine tasting (the parrot fish, vieja, is particularly good) and on Sundays it’s almost impossible to get a table as they are filled with well to do Canarios.

But whilst full tables may be a sign of the best Canarian restaurants, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they're the best restaurants full stop. In areas which are popular with a mix of nationalities, there’s a choice of dining from all over the world, but they might not be frequented by ‘locals’, or Canarian locals anyway.

And this raises another factor which applies to places where there is a high ex-pat population. And that is what people mean when they use the term ‘local’.

In an article we wrote about restaurants in Valle Gran Rey on La Gomera, we include a cheap and cheerful joint which served up everything from Canarian cooking to pizzas. When we told our friend who lives on La Gomera that we were including this restaurant she announced:

“But no locals ever eat there.”

Her statement surprised us because when we’d eaten there the other diners included a large group of workmen and some young couples – all Canarios.

It turned out that the locals she was referring to were the resort’s large, German ex-pat population.

Similarly on websites like Tenerife Forum, the majority of whose members mainly live or holiday in the south of Tenerife (where most of the British ex-pat population reside) when people talk about places the locals eat, they might be referring to ex-pat locals rather than ‘Canario’ locals.

Clearly it’s legitimate to use the term local for someone who lives here irrespective of where they originated. But if you’re planning a holiday, or even looking for a place to live for a while, it’s a distinction that you need to be aware of the next time someone recommends somewhere because it’s ‘where the locals eat’.

Going Native at Christmas on Tenerife

A couple of years ago we spent a week in at our friend’s house on La Gomera just before Christmas. By the time we returned to Tenerife I’d actually forgotten that (A) La Gomera was part of Spain and not Germany (the small valley she lives in is populated mostly by Germans); (B) It is warm in the Canary Islands at Christmas (she lives 1000 metres up at the edge of the rain forest); and (C) it was actually Christmas. Despite Jo’s complaints that the Gomerans were being seduced more and more by sparkly Christmas baubles and lights, I can only remember seeing two houses with sparkly Xmas decorations in their windows.

Tenerife is different, well parts of it are anyway. Here the Tinerfeños have most definitely succumbed to the temptations of rows of twinkling lights and I for one am not complaining.

There can be a perception that opting to spend Christmas in Tenerife’s warm climes means having to sacrifice all that nice Christmassy atmosphere that balances out the madness of packed shopping centres and overspending in the UK and presumably other northern European countries. But it needn’t be the case.

In Tenerife’s historic centres, some councils really go to town and the streets are festooned with elaborate decorations. When darkness falls, plazas in La Orotava, La Laguna and Puerto de la Cruz are transformed into magical places to sit and pass the time. Add some children from the local brass band, practising festive hymns on their instruments to try to earn a bit of extra dosh and the Christmas atmosphere goes up a couple of notches. Throw in the sweet sound of choirs performing concerts in the plaza’s church and elaborate nativity scenes in shop windows and the vestibules of town halls (anyone who enjoys ‘Carry On’ humour should keep a look out for ‘El Caganer’) and suddenly you’ve got a festive atmosphere straight out of Dickens. And if Teide obliges, as it so often does, you get snow with your sunshine and the promise of a white Xmas, even if it is only visible to the eye on the mountain slopes rather than underfoot.

And the best thing about it all is that there’s a lot less of that materialistic madness that has blighted Christmas a bit in Blighty.

The most ‘Christmassy’ memory I’ve got from anywhere ever is of standing outside the Iglesia de la Peña de Francia in Puerto de la Cruz as the local band played Silent Night and the mixed crowd of Spanish, British and German onlookers sang along. It sent a shiver down my spine and brought a tear to my eye (more than one in truth – Andy. my mum, our nephew and myself were almost openly blubbing). It was the most perfect Christmas moment.

However, there are a few cultural differences as well, so check out our Real Tenerife Christmas page and our Tenerife Matters December blogs to make sure that you get the best out of Christmas on Tenerife and don’t get caught out.

Events on Tenerife: Walk for Life in Playa de las Américas

We receive lots of queries about walking on Tenerife, well here’s the opportunity to indulge in something you enjoy and also do it for a great cause as donations made go to (AECC) “Asociación Española contra el Cáncer” (Spanish Association against Cancer) and (AMATE) “Asociación de Mujeres afectadas por Cáncer de mama” (Association of Women Affected by Breast Cancer).

Each year, thousands of people turn the promenade at Playa de las Américas into a pink parade in a colourful show of support for those who have been affected by this horrible disease.

Simply, register, make a donation, pick up your Walk for Life t-shirt, or pink cap and you can become a member of the pink parade.

Walk for Life this year takes place on Sunday the 13th December and the route runs along the promenade from the Mediterranean Palace hotel in Playa de las Américas to the Sally Tien Plaza, Costa Adeje.

Have a look at the Walk for Life website for more information

Food and Drink on Tenerife – You Can Tell a Place by its Supermarket

Here’s a general rule of thumb, if you want to get an idea of what a place is like and what sort of people
live thereabouts visit the local supermarket. It’s essentially important when you’re looking at locations as potential places to move to whether for good, or even just for a couple of months.

When I lived in Levenshulme near Manchester, the local Asda was full of the most exciting and diverse range of food products aimed at satisfying the culinary needs of the different communities living in the area. I could even buy the Jamaican speciality ackee. It was heaven for food lovers .

A few miles further down the road in Stockport, the range of products wasn’t quite as extensive and tended to be generally quite unadventurous, but perfectly adequate for most of the people who shopped there. A further few miles along the A9 in Hazel Grove, Sainsbury’s opened a flagship store aimed at what they saw was a middle class shopper from the ‘posher’ end of Stockport and surrounding area. Whilst the choice wasn’t quite as worldwide as Levenshulme, it did have sun dried tomatoes and the likes – quite adventurous at the time.

On Tenerife it’s no different. A supermarket in Los Gigantes will stock very different items from a supermarket in La Laguna for example. The supermarkets in the tourist resorts are different from the supermarkets which cater for mainly Canarian residents.

I’m a self confessed foodie; I love all types of food and will try virtually anything and subsequently it's important to me that I have access to a wide variety of international products as well as local foods.

In this respect, living in the La Orotava Valley turned out to be perfect; more by luck than by good planning I have to say. The Al Campo supermarket in La Villa isn’t perfect by any means, but there are very few ingredients which I was able to get hold of in the UK (and I mean ingredients, not products which is a completely different thing) that I can’t pick up there.

Products are mostly aimed at the valley’s Canarian residents which means that there are hardly any TV dinners or pre packed meals (an indicator that Canarios still prepare meals from scratch). There are sheets of salted fish, walls of hams, pigs ears, sheep ears, whole skinned rabbits and piglets, horse meat, cow’s tongues and strange things which cling to rocks which I haven’t figured out what to do with yet.

However, there’s also a decent mix of other nationalities in the valley from a variety of countries including Europe, South America and Africa. So the supermarket also has German sausages; cheddar, brie & feta cheese; Mexican, Indian & North African products like ‘ras el hanout’; an incredible spice which adds the most divine flavours to anything it’s sprinkled into.

What it means is that I can still prepare all the recipes I used to before I moved here, as well as adding a few more, locally inspired dishes.

But if you don’t check out what the local supermarket stocks, or even where it is, you could end up like my friend who lives in a remote valley on La Gomera. It’s a beautifully stunning location, but the nearest shop is a thirty to forty minute drive away and it doesn’t stock much anyway. The island’s main supermarket in San Sebastian is only marginally better.

When she stays with us and we go to the supermarket, she always ends up resting her head on one of our shoulders, almost crying at the treasures she sees filling the aisles in front of her eyes - bless her.

Another Month Going Native in Tenerife – Bikers, Neo Hippies, Marauding Clowns and Surreal Killer Whales.

It doesn’t feel as though there was as much going on this month. The fiestas have slowed to a bit of standstill (on Tenerife that means there are only a handful of them as opposed to one every other day) and we’ve moved into the winter season – the temperature in town yesterday was around 33 degrees Celsius.

The Germans and British are returning to Puerto de la Cruz (I spotted a woman sunbathing in her bra on the harbour beach – a sure sign that the British winter visitors are back) and the vibrancy of the summer months is slowing down to a more sedate pace (until Carnaval kicks in of course).

However, that’s not to say that there’s been nothing happening.

Eco Warriors
We started the month at a lovely little Eco Fest in Los Silos, still one of Tenerife’s secret spots. The bohemians were out in force and unless you were sporting dreadlocks, wearing Arabian pants, or had an impossibly cute mongrel in tow the chances were that you’d be feeling a wee bit dull amongst the hordes of cool looking dudes. Unfortunately the music was crap, courtesy of some incompetent sound engineers.

Hell’s Angels in Garachico
The same night saw leather clad bikers converge on the sleepy picturesque town of Garachico. It was on the same stretch of road as the Eco Fest so we had a two-fest night out. Some of the people were as eye catching as the neo hippies but for different reasons – note: leather mini skirt, fishnets and thigh length boots is a difficult look to pull off when you’re in your 60s. Good music at this one though.

Colourful Killers and Clowns with Frowns
Santa Cruz has featured quite a lot in our travels this month and although we got nowhere with a fashion feature we had planned, we did get to see some surreal killer whales and finally manage a couple of half decent profile photos where we don’t sport expressions like Myra Hindley and Ian Brady. 

There’s always something interesting going on in the capital and although I wasn’t overly excited by the idea of a clown street festival (bloody scary things if you ask me) it turned out be quite good fun. Although some of the laughs were unintentional. An Australian clown, Oskar, whose Spanish was limited, ran into serious problems during his ‘sound check’. Every time he started playing a little guitar to check the sound levels a lot of the audience began clapping along. Telling them 'Sssshh, this is a sound check’ in English got him nowhere and every time he strummed, they clapped making his sound check virtually impossible. The expression on his face wasn’t particularly that of a friendly clown – it made me laugh, but I did feel for him.

Three Walks in One Day
A lot of people have been asking about walking on Tenerife, so we figured that we’d better crack on with writing some more ‘Island Walks’ and set ourselves the target of three walks in one day around the Adeje/Arona areas.  It was hard going, but we managed it. I’m sure that when we limped into the plaza in San Miguel, tired and dusty looking and then performed a series of leg stretches which really don’t help with any street cred, but do cut down on potential aches and pains (although from the noises Andy made every time she moved the following day, I thought she’d learned Mandarin during the night), the locals in their nice clothes turning up for mass must have thought we were just a pair of odd extranjeros.

Much more fun was a trip around Las Arenas Negras with our friends Nikki, Richard and Baz of Tenerife Dogs fame, especially when the route signposts deserted us and paths became virtually non existent. Still, a beer and an almond cake at the end of the walk in the sunshine just rounded off a very nice day and a great walk.

The end of the period was taking up by working on the final preparations for Tenerife Magazine, the island’s first online English language magazine, which was launched at the end of last week.

We’re working with some really excellent and talented people and are very excited about the project. The magazine also has a great competition to win a week at Sands Beach in Lanzarote which is open to anyone who becomes a fan on Facebook, so sign up and get your name in for the draw.

I’m sure I’ve missed a few things out, like our running battle with the local supermarket over ‘creative pricing’ and the beautiful sunsets and monster waves which coincide with the change of seasons and some outrageous political shenanigans.

All in all, it was just your average month on Tenerife.