The ultimate food and wine holiday… in Spain

Street-food tours have become an increasingly trendy part of the travel experience. In India, stalls offer spicy selections of savoury snacks; in Vietnam, you can sit on plastic stools and slurp steaming bowls of pho soup and noodles in every backstreet. Closer to home, however, finding authentic regional cuisine usually requires booking a restaurant table, which removes a large degree of spontaneity. The exception is Spain, where tapas culture comes with the same casual street-food style – with the added attraction of a cold cerveza or copa de vino, often from an underrated local vineyard.

I have sampled wonderful cuisine in every corner of the world, but a trip around the historic Moorish towns and pueblos blancos of Andalucia, punctuated with the delicious food and colourful snapshots of day-to-day life found in any neighbourhood tasca or tapas bar, is my ultimate culinary holiday.

Tapas can be as simple as a plate of manchego cheese and olives, waferthin slices of cured smoky and spicy Iberico hams served on olive oilsoaked bread, a scoop of paella or deep-fried crunchy anchovies. They can also be as complex as sizzling earthenware casseroles of stuffed squid, clams or chickpeas with spinach (garbanzos con espinacas). They are always made in-house and presented in mouth-watering displays. The complimentary tapas or pinchos provided with your drink are usually moreish salty snacks served to encourage drinking; the more sophisticated larger tapas dishes, known as raciones, are added to your bill and are refreshingly good value.

In Seville, home of the magnificent Alcázar palace, there is no shortage of tapas bars, sporting hanging hams and decorated with attractive, locally made ceramic tiles, in the former gipsy quarter, Triana. Make a pilgrimage to Bar El Rinconcillo, on Calle Gerona, which claims to have invented the concept of tapas, then head up to Carmona, on a spur of the Alcores ridge above the city, for stunning views at sunset and evening tapas in Plaza San Fernando.

Tapas in the sherry capital of Jerez de la Frontera are accompanied by

iTurn

chilled glasses of delicate, dry fino. Bar Juanito, off Plaza del Arenal, has a menu of 52 tapas, with artichokes among its specialities.

Down on the Atlantic coast in Cadiz, wall-to-wall tapas bars specialising in super-fresh seafood line Calle Zorrilla. Try La Gaditana for the best selection and excellent value.

Inland, past the lovely white village of Arcos de la Frontera, Ronda sits on either side of the dramatic El Tajo gorge in the Serrania de Ronda mountains. Plaza del Socorro is packed with tapas bars. El Lechuguita, at 35 Calle Virgen de los Remedios, is famous for its fried calamari and vegetarian options.

After touring the mesmerising multi-arched interior of Cordoba’s Byzantine Mezquita mosque, order the wonderful salmorejo (cold tomato soup) with boiled egg or the pesto vegetables with fried egg at Taberna San Miguel in Plaza San Miguel.

Your final stop is Granada, high in the Sierra Nevada mountains and home of the mighty Alhambra palace. Los Diamantes, at 28 Calle Navas, serves superlative gambas al ajillo (garlic shrimps), and pulpo gallego (spicy octopus). Reina Monica, at 20 Calle Panaderos, offers complimentary Arabic tapas (three with each drink), and serves a generous tapas buffet of Andalucia’s finest culinary treats.

on the tapas: Andalucia is known for its superlative, mouth-watering tapas