Romesco Sauce

Inspired by Restaurant Can Marti in Sitges, Catalonia region in Spain.

You might enjoy this recipe on our tours in Catalonia, where this sauce is quite popular and mostly enjoyed with fish, meat and veggies. Specifically, a version of it acts as the dipping sauce for calçots, a type of green onion served simply grilled. (Calçots are available in February, March, and April in Catalonia. See pic below taken at the restaurant in February 2019)

Ingredients for 6 people:

• 3 tomatoes or the equivalent of 450gr
• 1 slice of bread
• 1/2 cup roasted almonds (80gr)
• 4 Tbsp of EVOO
• 1 garlic head
• 1.5 Tbsp of red wine vinegar
• 1oz dried ñora peppers (**see more info below)
• Salt to taste

Directions:

• Wash tomatoes and halve them. Roast them on a tray in the oven at 375F until they get wrinkled. Remove and let cool
• Halve the garlic head and cook in the oven at 375F until it becomes soft. Remove, let cool, and peel
• Remove the crust from the bread and toast the middle in the oven
• Cook the roasted almonds in a pot of boling water for 5 minutes. Remove, let cool, and peel them one by one
• Put almonds, toasted bread, cooked garlic and 2 raw cloves (or more, if you like) in a food processor and blend for one minute
• Peel the tomatoes, and add them to the food processor along with the ñora pepper flesh (***), EVOO and vinegar
• Adjust with salt, and more evoo and vinegar, according to your taste
• Store in the refrigerator for a few days. When ready to serve, enjoy it with fish, meat and veggies!

Buen provecho!

** ñora pepper is specific variety of pepper that is grown and dried in the Valencia area. This recipe requires that you soak the dried peppers in water and then scrape out the inner flesh to be combined with other ingredients. Ñora pepper is also used to make dried paprika, but it is hard to find in the U.S., so we used the flesh of red bell peppers instead, baked in the oven and peeled (50gr), along with 1/4 tsp of smoked paprika…..we hope our Catalan friends at the restaurant Can Marti will forgive us, but it turned out pretty well!