Spanish cuisine

Spanish cuisine, known locally as *cocina española*, encompasses the cooking traditions and practices found across Spain. The country’s food shows strong regional variation, with notable differences between areas. Broadly, the culinary styles of the Iberian Peninsula fall into either the Mediterranean diet or the Atlantic diet. Spain is the world’s top producer of olive oil, and this ingredient is used heavily in Spanish cooking, often serving as the foundation for vegetable-based sauces called *sofritos*. Common herbs include parsley, oregano, rosemary, and thyme, while garlic is also frequently used. The most typical meats are chicken, pork, lamb, and veal, and fish and seafood are eaten regularly. Small snacks and appetizers known as tapas and pinchos are often served in bars and cafes. **History**

**Antiquity** Ancient writers like Strabo noted that the native people of Spain relied on nuts and acorns as staple foods. The expansion of vineyards along the Mediterranean coast was likely due to Greek and Phoenician colonization, and these groups also introduced olive oil production. Spain eventually became the world’s largest olive oil producer. During the Roman era, the cultivation of the so-called “Mediterranean triad”—wheat, grapes, and olives—provided the foundation for the basic meal items of bread, wine, and oil in the southern Iberian Peninsula. **Middle Ages** The Visigoths made limited but lasting contributions to Spanish cuisine, including the consumption of fermented milk products. Rice is thought to have been introduced in the 6th century by the Byzantines. After the Muslim conquest of the Iberian Peninsula in the 8th century, the Arabs expanded rice cultivation. New irrigation techniques brought from the Indian subcontinent allowed for the farming of crops such as sugar cane, watermelon, lemon, and oranges. Other ingredients believed to have arrived during the Hispano-Muslim period include sorghum, spinach, eggplant, peach, apricot, and saffron. Spain’s most famous dish, paella, uses two ingredients likely popularized during the Al-Andalus era: rice and saffron. The Moors also laid the groundwork for pastry-making and introduced *escabeche*, a food preservation method using vinegar. Dishes such as *ajo blanco*, *alboronía*, *alajú*, *hallulla*, *albóndigas*, *mojama*, and *arrope* are among the many legacies of Moorish cuisine. Although Muslim religious law forbade alcohol, wine consumption remained widespread, as Qur’anic rules never fully overturned existing traditions. Numerous accounts describe the “drinking chats” of Abd al-Rahman II, Abd al-Rahman III, and Almanzor. Following kosher rules, Jews and Conversos drained meat of blood and avoided pork products. *Potajes* were an important part of medieval Jewish cuisine, especially *adafina* (a local name for a cholent dish), along with other Jewish culinary legacies in Spain. *Almodrote* originally came from Sephardic recipes. Early cookbooks in Spain include the *Llibre de Sent Soví* (1324) and Ruperto de Nola’s *Llibre de Coch* (1520), both written in Catalan. Among the earliest pre-modern Iberian cooking books are the *Fiḍālat al-Jiwān fī Ṭayyibāt al-Ṭaʿām wa-l-Alwān* by Murcia-born Ibn Razīn al-Tujībī and the anonymous *Kitāb al-Ṭabikh fī al-Maghrib wa al-Andalus fī ʽAṣr al-Muwaḥḥidīn, li-muʽallif majhūl*, written in Arabic. **Modern Era** The arrival of Europeans in the Americas in 1492 brought new culinary ingredients, including tomatoes, potatoes, maize, bell peppers, spicy peppers, paprika, vanilla, and cocoa. Spain was where chocolate was first mixed with sugar to reduce its natural bitterness. Other items traveled to the Americas, such as rice, grapes, olives, and many types of cereals. Influenced by Arabic *harisa*, grain-based soups like *farinetes* (along the Mediterranean coast) and *gachas* (on the Central Plateau) were common in Early Modern Spain. Foreign visitors often noted with disdain that Spaniards used olive oil and lard for cooking instead of butter, which was barely available. According to 17th-century writer Madame d’Aulnoy, on the rare occasions butter could be found, it came “from afar, preserved in pig’s tripes and full of worms.” Butter was only produced locally in places like Galicia, Asturias, and Soria, or was imported preserved in potassium nitrate, known as “Flanders’ butter.”

By the 18th century, many American ingredients, such as peppers and tomatoes, had become fully integrated into Spanish cuisine. Contemporary foreign visitors, like French ambassador Jean-François de Bourgoing, judged this change negatively: “Spanish cooking, which they have inherited, is not generally pleasing to foreigners. Spaniards like strong condiments such as pepper, tomato sauce, hot peppers and saffron, which color or infect nearly all their dishes.” Spain served as a bridge for the Columbian exchange between Europe and the New World. Many traditional Spanish dishes, such as *tortilla de patata* (a potato omelette), would not be possible without this exchange. *Gazpacho*, *salmorejo*, and *pan con tomate* are made with tomatoes, which traveled from the New World to the Old. For most of the 19th century, the aristocracy’s meals largely imitated French cuisine, which, along with the decline of regional cuisines, was the available cooking style at the time. One positive foreign view of Spanish dishes came from Richard Ford, who enjoyed specialties like sherry and ham, in contrast to the largely negative opinions of other commentators.