Seville, Spain – I pushed my way into the Bodega Santa Cruz, and caught the bartender’s eye. “Diga me, Tell me,” he ordered. I blurted out “jamon,” the Spanish word for ham. It’s the only item besides olives I instantly recognized on the chalkboard menu.
He pulled the tap and filled a beer glass, scribbled my tab on the wooden counter with a bar of soap and presented me with a plate of cured ham hand cut from the hind leg of an acorn-fed pig.
It was the first of dozens of bite-size snacks called tapas that took the place of regular meals for me over the next few days I was in Seville.
Sip. Snack. Stand up. Sit down. Walk. Talk. Drink. Nod to the waiter when you’d like another. Pay whenever.
Spanish taverns used to use slices of ham or cheese as lids (tapas) on the tops of wine glasses to keep the insects out and provide their guests a little something to soak up the alcohol. The snacks are no longer free, but the ritual el tapeo, or “eating on the go,” endures.
Seville is home to an estimated 4,000 tapas bars and taverns. Going from place-to-place, eating, drinking and talking with friends, is a pastime as popular as flamenco or bullfighting.
“The busier, noisier and dirtier, the better,” says Concepcion Delgado, who leads historical walks around the city.
A tapas tour
With its bare wooden floors and empty beer glasses strewn around, the Bodega Santa Cruz fits that description. A few steps away from the cathedral in the Barrio Santa Cruz, it’s popular with locals as well as tourists. Going out for tapas is as much about socializing as it is about eating. It’s more fun with a partner, preferably a local who knows her way around a Spanish menu.
“How about a tapas tour?” I asked Delgado one afternoon. She agreed to meet me the next evening and show me some of her favorite spots.
It was around 9 p.m. when we set out from my hotel in the Barrio Santa Cruz, and walked to the shopping district of El Central a few blocks away.
Sevillians eat their main meal around 1:30-2 p.m., then dine again late in the evening.
In better weather, we might have stopped at one of the half-dozen or so open-air bars on Alfalfa Square, but it was raining, so we walked a few blocks more to El Rinconcillo, Seville’s oldest taberna, founded in 1670.
We threw our coats over one of the Tio Pepe sherry casks that double as stand-up tables, and looked over a menu filled with a dozen or more bite-size meat, seafood and vegetarian dishes. “In some bars, it’s pay one price if you sit, and another if you stand,” Delgado said. El Rinconcillo is self-service, meaning you walk up to the bar, tell the waiter what you want and pay when you leave.
Not for health-conscious
Seville’s most famous landmark is its 600-year-old cathedral and Moorish Giralda bell tower in Barrio Santa Cruz. The bars in this area tend to be expensive and touristy, but across busy Avenue Constitucion, wine bodegas serving simple snacks line hidden backstreets.
Delgado led the way down the dark Calle Garcia de Vinuesa to the 156-year old Casa Morales, a mostly stand-up bar with a few tables tucked against giant wine casks. The snacks were simple, mostly grilled sandwiches called montaditos, for $2.50-$3. She suggested a typical filling of pork intestines and lard called a pringa. Forget healthy. These were delicious.
It was around 10 p.m. when she reached for her cellphone. It was her husband, Juan, calling to join us for our third round. We met back in the Centro district at Bar Estrella in an alley like dozens of others in Seville that I knew I’d never find again on my own.
A seafood nightcap
The specialty was seafood, served either at one of the marble-topped tables in the bar or in a separate dining room. A board listed 20 or so tapas in the $2.50-$3.50 range. Juan recommended a plate of fried green peppers and boquerones fritos – crunchy little fried anchovies – that went down nicely with a sherry nightcap.
It was past 11 p.m., and if I hadn’t been yawning, we might have taken a 20-minute walk across the river to the working-class district of Triana, known for its friendly and cheap neighborhood bars and late-night flamenco scene.
No worries. I had my tapas legs now and felt ready to explore on my own.
Back in Barrio Santa Cruz, I became a regular at Las Teresas, a local hangout with cut-to-order sausages tacked to the walls and $2-$3 tapas. The waiters were busy slicing their hams and setting out bowls of olives when I arrived early one evening.
“No food yet,” the bartender told me. I started to leave, but he motioned to a man sitting at the bar with a pitcher of sangria, indicating that I could have a drink and wait.
He dried a glass with a hand towel and uncorked a bottle of red wine.
Fifteen minutes later, he glanced at his watch, then looked my way. “Diga me,” he barked. I felt right at home.
INSIDER’S GUIDE
DINE
The tapas bars most accessible to tourists are spread throughout the various barrios (districts), all within walking distance of each other in the historical center. The main areas are Barrio Santa Cruz, near the cathedral; Centro/La Macarena in the downtown area; Arenal, the former port district; and Triana, on the left bank of the Guadalquivir River.
Try these:
TRAVELER’S TIP
Bars usually display a list of tapas somewhere on the wall. Bowls of olives and cold salads and sandwiches are displayed behind the bar or in glass cases. Sometimes there’s an English menu available. When in doubt, just glance around and point to whatever looks good.
New smoking regulations in Spain allow bars to choose to either ban or allow smoking. Those that permit smoking are required to have nonsmoking areas.
MORE INFORMATION
For lists of tapas bars in Seville, see andalu cia.com, exploreseville.com and turismo.sevilla.org.
General tourist information is available from the Spanish National Tourist Office at 323-658-7188 or on the web at spain.info.
