September 3, 2024 Unlikely lunch at La Parrilla in Areo Dinner - Monkfish Salad on the Posada terrace

September 3, 2024 Unlikely lunch at La Parrilla in Areo  Dinner - Monkfish Salad on the Posada terrace

This was a mild day of activity. We slept until 10:00 and ate a croissant and a cup of Greek yogurt before driving back up the hill and walking to a ruined castle with an unobstructed view both east and west along the coast for at least ten miles in each direction and a view of miles of the Picos to the south.

                                                A view of the Picos to the southwest

                                                       A view of the coast to the east

              

                                               A view toward the Picos to the west

                                            A view to the west down the coastline

                                 A view to the north toward San Vicente and the Picos

It was 1:00 when we drove back down the hill to La Parrilla restaurant that Suzette was only open on weekends. We were saddened to think it would be closed because it had a great view of the Picos and was highly rated at 4.3 stars.

To our surprise it was open and when I checked its website, the website said it is open every day.

It is a steakhouse that specializes in heavy aged beef, but we were interested in other faire. Suzette ordered a vermouth and I ordered water.

Then we perused the menu.  https://laparrilladeprellezo.com/carne-a-la-brasa-restaurante

We decided to eat something lighter than a steak. Suzette decided to order a Grilled shrimp from Huevla. 

I walked in to the bar to order a glass of rose’ wine and saw that five people were eating bean stew Cocido Montanes, which is the same bean stew we ordered yesterday at the winery.

I changed my order from Mixed Salad to a 1/2 order of Cocido when Suzette said she was full. Five locals slopping up bean stew can not be wrong.

Soon a large soup tureen arrived filled about 1/3 full with a bean and greens soup accompanied by a small bowl filled with slices of cooked chorizo, ham, pork rib, and ham and a small soup bowl.  I added the cooked meat to the beans in two or three helpings that I shared with Suzette and we both were satisfied. I was glad I did not order a whole order.

We were not over stuffed as we usually are when we order three dishes, so I decided to order dessert and coffee. The waitress started naming the desserts and when she said torta de tres chocolates I stopped her and ordered that.  It was fabulous three layer torte of white, dark, and milk chocolate on a graham cracker crush topped with a sprinkle of crushed toasted almonds. We loved it with the lattes we ordered.

This was a good meal in the sense that we were eating like the natives with bread, water, vermouth, wine, grilled shrimp, bean stew, dessert, and coffees; just not as much as we usually eat.

After a 1 1/2 hour lunch we returned to the room and rested until evening with three or four telephone calls for each of us and some work. I watched a real time written commentary of the race between 5:15 and 6:00. Marc Solar won the stage 5 minutes ahead of the GC peloton, but the the most exciting part of the race was Roglic taking 1 minute and 5 seconds out of O’Conner’s accumulated time, resulting in the current leader’s lead being reduced to only 5 seconds. Roglic has won the Vuelta several times before and appears poised to do so again if O’Conner does not improve dramatically. The race ends on Sunday, so there are four more days of racing.

Finally at 9:30 we took lettuce, mayonnaise, bread, the Cantabrian tomato, and the monkfish and scorpion fish pate’ and the Rioja white wine to the terrace and made a fish, lettuce, mayonnaise, and tomato salad for Suzette and I made mayonnaise, bread, tomato, lettuce and monkfish sandwiches. The white wine was lovely with the fish and salad. One of the things I noticed about the monkfish was that it was still tender and flavorful, unlike the frozen and thawed monkfish we buy in Albuquerque. We paid 71 Euros for this monkfish and we must have eaten 40 Euros of fish tonight, but it still tasted like a cold fresh lobster salad and 2 1/2 meals for two of us felt like a bargain to me, who had never eaten fresh monkfish.

I asked Suzette if she had ever had fresh monkfish and she said she had, a long time ago on the Chesapeake Bay she ate fresh monkfish that tasted tender and juicy like lobster, like this fish.

We returned to the room to blog and read at 10:00, happy with the messy but delicious dinner.

Tomorrow we drive west and try to see El Pindal Cave. I hope I will be mobile enough to make the hike to and through the cave.

Bon Appetit