Anyway, I digress.......One work day earlier this month, I met Ramon and we headed out to an unknown (at least for me) destination. The drive started on the highway and after a few minutes we exited onto a smaller road that took us toward the barren hillsides.
You can see from a few of the photos on this blog that the landscape here is pretty desolate..dry, scrubby, mountainous land with no trees for windbreaks and the ever present ruins of former stone cortijos. Within a couple of kilometers of the highway, the narrow paved road took us into un pueblo pequeno, or at least the remains of a pueblo.
There were a number of centuries old, crumbling stone houses right against the road; with the same missing roofs and windows and broken stone walls that I described in an early posting. They're really quite fascinating.....As we crept further into this pueblo (if you were driving 30mph through this town and blinked you would miss it, seriously!) we saw a broken, old car with a Mastiff chained to it.
This scenario was close enough to the road that when the dog lunged for our car, the short chain stopped him within a meter from my passenger window. There was also one or two scraggly old trees and even a row of about five new concrete and stucco condos...they seemed quite out of place in this very old and seemingly abandoned settlement. We turned onto a drive between two of the stone ruins and after about 100 feet, and around a little bend behind the old buildings, there was a long, stucco wall that was one story tall.
It was freshly painted and the small garden in front of it was fully landscaped. At one end of the wall was a heavy wooden door and a sign that said “Restaurante” and another sign that read “Timbre” with an arrow pointing at the bell.
Ramon parked the car and we sat for a few minutes talking our Spanglish. I thought..maybe this is just a quiet, out of the way place where we are going to have our intercambio today. Not that we ever do that (he is working after all) but...since we arrived about 11 am and there was no one in this town except for the chained dog and an old lady who gave us the evil eye as she passed us in her car, I thought maybe we were playing hookie.....Nope! A few minutes later, who pulls up but the farmer I had met a couple of weeks prior (the one who's mother had the hog hanging in her kitchen). It was another work related meeting (this time about watermelons) and I guess this restaurant was the halfway point between Ramon's office and this guy's farm.
We rang the bell and Juan, the restaurant's proprietor, greeted us warmly in both Spanish and English. The restaurant was not yet open for business that day but he obviously knew we were coming and to my surprise, through that door and behind the well kept, rustic wall was something completely unexpected......
That long stucco wall made up one side of a very large enclosed courtyard. The floor of the entire courtyard was a stone and tile terrace broken by an in-ground pool, an in-ground hot tub, some landscaping and plantings that created privacy screens around the two outdoor showers.
The wall that ran along the parking area had a tiled, shed roof extending into the courtyard which created a shady refuge from the intense sun, and the other walls had openings cut into them allowing you to enjoy the Andalucian mountains beyond. Also within this courtyard were a number of thatched palapas and off to one corner was the restaurant of post and beam construction with wall to wall windows to enjoy views of the courtyard and the countryside.
It entire site was a beautiful, rustic oasis!
Before starting their meeting, we were offered coffee and once Juan found out I was American, he offered me Johnnie Walker! Of course I declined and while Ramon held his meeting, I wandered around the intimate restaurant, taking in the views through the windows and poking my nose in the wine list and menu. This menu was like none other that we've seen since we've been here! They served pheasant, trout, lamb, beef and pork (of course), mushroom crepes and apple strudel ????! The menu also showed where the food came from (names of purveyors, farms, etc) and it also gave a short history of the town (you can read more about it here it's really very interesteing). There were stories about the restaurant cut from magazines as well as on line reviews written by very, very happy guests......I remember one review saying it was their best meal in Spain! My first thought.....Where are these people from?! They couldn't be Spanish! (sorry but we have yet to find any restaurant that comes close to serving this kind of menu. We've been out to eat a few times and most of what is offered -for lunch, the big meal of the day-is pizza or the balance of a menu which is fried; a lot of pork and usually french fries with a fried egg on top...seriously! ). My second thought......You bet your bipper we're going to be eating here before we leave!
At a break in the watermelon negotiations (we're talking like thousands of plants) Ramon told me this restaurant was incredibly good and, even though I had only met the farmer one time and he spoke no English, he told me the same thing.
Come to find out Juan worked as a chef for 20 years in England, now he and his German wife Renata (hence the apple strudel!) lived here in Campico de Honor (seriously, the middle of nowhere) and run this wonderful little gem called El Albir.
Before leaving I also noticed their Indian menu (looked fabulous!) and their Valentine's Day special (ditto!) which mentioned they were filling up quickly.
So...with all of this information I came back to nuestro casa and reported to Christopher and we came up with a plan..since Christopher's parents, sister and friend were in town and seeing it was Valentine's Day we decided to make a reservation for an evening out; I called Juan and made that reservation for the evening of the 14th.
At the appointed time the six of us headed to the restaurant (about a 45 minute drive from here). I had told everyone about the menu and the atmosphere but not really about the location. With Christopher driving and me navigating, we made our way to the correct exit off the highway and followed the side road into the countryside. One thing to note about driving in Spain...unless you're in a village there are no street lights and because we're in rugged Andalucia, there are very few villages and the ones that are here are not near the highway. With that said, the drive on the highway was dark (with the exception of the few passing cars) but the two kilometer ride from the highway to the restaurant was in total blackness; thank dios the road signs were a little reflective or we never would have found the way!
From the minute we turned off the highway there were mumblings of nervous doubt coming from the back seat. All anyone could see was the narrow road framed in our headlights and the shadows of the roadside brush as we passed. There was not another car to be seen and thank dios (again!) I had paid attention to the where the little drive between the buildings was or we could have been driving around in the black Spanish night for a very long time...... there was not even one street light in this town.
As we pulled up the long stucco wall we noticed there were only two other cars parked there. I know I read the notice that said the place was filling up for the Valentine's Day celebration and I also knew Spaniards kept late hours so I thought with the 14th being a Sunday and it being 9pm there would certainly be more people there by that time.....What I failed to realize was even holiday meals (and romantic ones at that) happen midday, we soon found out that El Albir's busy time had come and gone. The six of us had the entire restaurant to ourselves!
Juan and Renata, knowing we were American and that we did things differently then the locals, never batted an eye when I asked for 9pm reservations (and I asked for 9pm reservations-late for us-because I didn't want to be the first people seated at the restaurant!). They had already worked a full day with a restaurant full of patrons yet they let us stroll in for our main event when they should have been resting their weary selves. They were truly gracious and warm and funny and they didn't even seem worse for the wear.
Our spot-lit table was already set and waiting for us in the center of the restaurant and we had Nina Simone serenade us while Renata poured the bubbly.
Without being too much wordier as this is one long blog post!, I will tell you that Juan worked his magic and brought to our table just about everything on the menu....the appetizers were of his choosing (and we could have stopped eating then as there were so many of them!) and included sliced tomatoes topped with poached eggs and tuna with a curry sauce, salmon carpaccio, avocados with gambas and even a little pate. For the main course we had pork ribs in an orange glaze, roast pork loin with cracklins!, beef fillet , roast pheasant and the best of all... leg of lamb....it just melted in your mouth. We were really beyond full but we certainly could not
leave without tasting the apple strudel, which I have to say, was better then any I had ever had, even in Vienna! I also remember a mountain of profiteroles and orange crepes......we rolled out of there! All of us were truly taken by our wonderful hosts and the incredible food and the intimate atmosphere. It was probably the high lite of the trip.This last photo is of our hosts after a very long day! Juan is in the Rod Stewart wig!
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