Ingredient Tue Mar 18 2008

That Seductive Red Powder

When I saw the deep red powder in a big glass jar, I couldn't resist. Even in the dimness of the Spice House, the Spanish smoked sweet paprika (pimenton) was beautiful, its red somewhere between a court lady's lipstick and the blood of her lover. I only knew one dish to use this visually seductive spice, but nonetheless I picked up a bottle of it.

Pulpo Gallego is a simple Galician dish: boiled octopus and potatoes dressed with a copious amount of olive oil. Pimenton is what gives the kick to this very simple tapa. The bottle sat in my spice rack (a repurposed eyesore of a CD shelf that my partner bought many moons ago) for a while before I acquired a decent bunch of baby octopuses. I boiled them up with enough salt to give a cardiologist several heart attacks, added potatoes after an hour, and when they were done, placed them on two plates. Then went the drizzles of olive oil, fresh-ground black pepper, and of course, generous shakes of pimenton.

Which blew me away. Upon touching the warm olive oil, the pimenton released an incredibly intense, smokey flavor that hit my nostrils like a real smoke coming out of a well-used barbecue pit somewhere in Alabama. It was lucky that my partner was standing right by the kitchen counter, opening a beer. The aroma bursted with an incredible force, and was gone in a few seconds, leaving only a faint trace of its real potency.

It is not to say that the pimenton rendered the dish flavorless; on the contrary, it added just the right amount of smokey kick to the olive oil laced with crushed garlic (a heretical touch I added). It was wonderful. And I should add, for the sake of honesty, that I'm pea-brainedly pleased with the rich, passionate red of the spice adds some luster to my ramshackle spice rack, despite the spice merchant's recommendation to store it in the fridge.

— Yu Kizawa / Comments (1)