[UKBusinessLive]

Heres my recipe for Tonight.

Dedicated to everyone who always wanted to try some lovely spanish recipe, but could not bear to be without their egg and chips Now you'll be able to turn your hand at this very popular spanish dish to be eaten hot or cold.

Tortilla (Spanish omelette)

Spaniards are somewhat obsessed with tortilla, and rightly so. It's pretty simple - just a set omelette with potatoes and onions - but when done right it's really delicious. Cookery book explanations are never quite right. So to continue with our Spanish Food Thread and dedicated to all those people that have wanted to try spanish food, but never got any further than egg and chips

Further to those recipes you get in books and online, nothing can quite match personal experiance, The cooking times and proportions of egg to potato are often wrong, tending to produce a rather dry tortilla. And they often fudge the process of flipping the tortilla over (or even tell you to stick it under a grill).

Another problem is that the Spanish concept of frying and the British/americian way are a little different. When Spaniards fry, they use quite a lot of oil, whereas people in Britain/usa tend to try to use as little oil as possible (which kind of defeats the purpose of frying ).

Like many things, I wouldn't usually measure the ingredients when making a tortilla, as it's all about proportions rather than absolute volumes. All you have to do is make sure that you have a few more eggs than you think you need. However, the last time round I decided to measure everything and make a note of it - the quantities below make one good-sized tortilla.

It's also difficult to be precise with cooking times. The perfect tortilla should be a little runny in the middle. However, some people prefer theirs more well-done, and if you're taking it on a picnic you may also want it to be a little firmer.

Ingredients

Plenty of olive oil
1 medium-sized onion, peeled and thinly sliced
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed or very finely chopped
1 kg of potatoes, peeled and quite finely chopped
8 large eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon of salt

Method

Place the onions and plenty of oil in a medium-sized non-stick frying pan, heat gently, and fry until the onions are translucent. Add the garlic, and cook for another minute or so. Place a colander over a large bowl, strain the onions and garlic through it, and return the oil to the pan.

Add the potatoes to the pan, and add more oil if required, so that the potatoes are just about covered. Heat gently, with the lid on, so that the potatoes are both frying and steaming at the same time.



Once the potatoes are cooked, strain them in the colander containing the cooked onions. (The oil which gathers in the bowl below can be reused.)

Allow the potato and onion mixture to cool for a few minutes, then add the beaten eggs and the salt, and mix well. If the mixture looks too 'potatoey', add another beaten egg.

Return a little of the oil to the frying pan (just enough to form a very thin layer on the bottom), heat it gently (being careful not to let it get to hot), pour the omelette mixture into the pan, turn heat to minimum, cover and cook for about 10 minutes, until the bottom and sides of the omelette have set, but the top is still runny.



Flip it over using one of the methods described below, and finish cooking for another 3 minutes on a low heat. Flip the tortilla out of the pan onto a serving plate.

This is the Fun Part!!

The flip

One of the scary bits of making a tortilla for the first time is how to flip it over when it is halfway through cooking. Here are three ways of doing this.

Method 1: Two Pans

This is my method. I have two identical pans. When the tortilla is cooked underneath, I put a little bit of oil in the second pan, place it face down on top of the first one, hold the two together (using oven gloves!) and flip them over. The tortilla thus ends up face down in the second pan, ready to continue cooking.

Method 2: One Pan - Two Plates



This is an adaptation of the traditional Spanish method, made a bit easier for us. When the tortilla is ready to flip, place a large dinner plate face down on top of it and flip it over (using oven gloves) so that your tortilla is now cooked side up on the plate. Now get another plate, place it face down on top of the raw tortilla, and flip again, so that the tortilla is raw side up on the second plate. Finally, put the frying pan face down over the tortilla, and flip so that the tortilla is raw side down in the pan, and carry on cooking.

Method 3: One Pan - One Lid

This is the authentic Spanish method. When the tortilla is cooked underneath, place a large frying pan lid face down on top of it and flip it over (using oven gloves) so that your tortilla is now cooked side up on the lid (As in Method 2.) Now slide it back into the frying pan so that it is raw side down, and carry on cooking.



So there you have it guys, another cheap and cheerful Spanish recipe, which you can have hot or cold

Enjoy