El Raval

Raval is kind of a younger hip neighborhood that we've been trying to explore. Last night our american friends host father took us out to a couple of really fun places with some of his spanish friends. We stopped into a very posh hotel to take a look around it was really amazing and they had this multicolored topiary outside. I would have taken pictures inside but there seemed to be too many big men standing around watching us. Among the things inside were lots of pig statues in either all black or silver. Again with the pig.



This photo really doesn't do it justice but there you go. I took that today when we were wandering around after brunch and we found the hotel again.

Anyways, before the raval tour last night we met up with our Lebanese friend Bassam who made some sangria with the help of his spanish roommates and I got to eat goat cheese from a tiny town in Lebanon next to where Bassam is from and also olives that his dad hand picked and processed, i saw processed because i'm not entirely sure of how they create olives, himself! The goat cheese was incredible, the olive was tasted way different than I am used to it was very dark and smoky, very good though. Bassam said he came to Spain to teach yoga and his dad tries to get him to come home by bringing him food from Lebanon. We also had tomatoes spiced with Sumac, interesting but I can't really describe the flavor there either.

ps- hamburgers here are made with ham, i don't really care for them.

ALSO, I figured out some more of the ham mystery. There is famed kind of ham, Bellota ham, from Iberian pigs that are fed with acorns and they have black feet. The meat then goes through a salting, curing, drying etc process that can take up to 18 months and fungi grows on it giving it a "unique aroma." It's usually eaten just sliced very thin. Let me just tell you, its delicious. I was told the really good stuff sells for like 150 euro a kilo. Cheap varieties sell for 30-40 euro a kilo. Rumor has it that obama requested Bellota ham which was actually barred by the FDA until recently in the United States. Learning, learning, learning.....