Sevilla | Abacerías

Updated: July 1, 2016 You may notice, or may have already noticed, as you make your way from bar to bar in search of tapas and a drink, that the word abacería (often antigua abacería) appears in some of the names in a way that suggests a particular meaning. But what meaning? On closer inspection [...]

Sevilla | Best Ice Cream

classic vanilla & chocolate cone from Freskura Okay, this is hardly news, but summer in Seville can get pretty hot. Afternoon temperatures often reach 40ºC, the sun beats down from directly overhead, and only mad dogs and Englishmen are still out and about (I’m joking of course; the mad dogs are all indoors, where it’s [...]

Day Trip to Córdoba

Just an hour by train from either Sevilla or Malaga, Cordoba is one of a string of romantic Andalucian cities stretching across southern Spain. It was an important Roman city (you can still see, and walk across, the Roman bridge over the River Guadalquivir), but its glory days were in the 8th to 10th centuries, [...]

Spanish Cold Soups

Light, cool and refreshing in the hot summer weather, gazpacho, the cold tomato soup of southern Spain, is nowadays well-known all over the world. It's one of a family of tomato based cold soups that includes salmorejo and porra, as well as other local varieties, but the origins of these dishes actually goes back to before [...]

Sevilla | Vamos a la Feria!

The Feria de Abril is Seville’s traditional spring fair and general celebration, and starts two weeks after Easter Monday (this year April 21 to 26), officially at midnight on Monday with the alumbrao, the switching on of the fairground lights, although in practice people may go to the fairground as early as the Saturday. Monday [...]

Sevilla | Semana Santa Preview

You may think you know something about religious festivals and festivities, but trust us, unless you've been to Sevilla for Semana Santa (Holy Week) there's a definite gap in your education. Although Holy Week is an important festival throughout the Catholic world, the celebrations in Sevilla are thought to be the largest and most elaborate. [...]

Postcards from Andalucía | Antequera

We love Andalucia! And to start off our series of "postcards" from our travels around the most southern region of Spain - where we live! - we'd like to introduce you to one of our favourite places, Antequera. Andalucía is justly famous for its great classical and mediaeval cities – Seville, Málaga, Cádiz, Córdoba and [...]

Málaga | City of Museums

Once considered something of a high rise beach holiday city, in recent years Málaga has been bringing itself into the modern age, with pedestrianisation of the old centre, a complete redevelopment of the old harbour, and other projects to attract visitors to what is actually one of Andalucia's most beautiful and modern destinations. You're here [...]

We Love Oranges

Although oranges don’t, in fact, play a large part in Spanish cuisine, there are so many orange trees in Andalucía - and especially Sevilla - that among the first questions we get asked are variations of “What’s with all the orange trees?” and “Can I eat them?” oranges being harvested in Sevilla To deal with [...]