In Palencia they already know Ciri Gonzalez as the Queen of the Potato Tortilla, an appellation that has been earned after winning four times, the last this year, the Spanish Championship of Potato Tortillas that is held in Gastronomic Alicante.
While we are talking to her on the phone we have to stop the conversation several times. He walks down the street and stops to greet his neighbors, who they congratulate her on a new award. She herself reminds us: whenever she presents herself or wins or is among the best. Their potato omelettes are second to none.
Of course, experience is not lacking. He is 76 years old and she has been cooking since she was a child. “My family has been very cooking, they have valued food a lot, and I have always been next to my mother my grandmother learning,” he explains.
Started doing their famous tortillas in a cafeteria located on Calle Mayor de Palencia, from which he went to Asador La Encina, where he has been officiating for 31 years. And, although the wood-fired oven roast, stew, trotters and tripe are some of the establishment’s specialties, it is the tortillas that attract the entire clientele.
At his age, González is no longer working day-to-day at the restaurant, but he acknowledges that they force him “a little” to make tortillas. “More than anything I am as if it were the bay leaf, putting the point on the i”, he points out.
The secret of a good omelette
Asked about the secret of their tortillas, González insist that there are none. But, of course, it has its tricks. The main one, always use new potato – she uses Kennebeck potato from La Ojeda, a Palencia region–, in addition to olive oil, onion and salt.
His recipe, he tells us, has no greater mystery: “I put oil, when it is hot I make the laminated potato with a little chopped chives. If they ask for it without onion, then without onion. Once the potato is fried, add it to the beaten egg and curdle it on one side and the other. About three minutes on each side. If I see that it is still very soft I give it several laps, make it very juicy inside ”.
González assures that he does not get tired of eating tortillas and, as expected, it declares concebollist, although he recognizes that if a customer asks without it, he has no problem preparing it. Not many. “I will tell you that 85%, if not 90, prefer it with new chives, that the truth is not noticeable.”
What he doesn’t like so much, he admits, is messing around with more additions: “The Spanish omelette is with potato, and onion or not. Then you can make many tortillas, chorizo, zucchini, green and red pepper, of many varieties, but that is something else, the one they ask us here is the potato and onion one. The Spanish of always, that for something we are Spanish ”.
Images | Alicante Gastronomic
Directly to the Palate | Omelette with candied potatoes and caramelized onion: the best recipe for a picnic
Directly to the Palate | Tortilla vaga or potato omelette for foreigners, the recipe of Sacha Hormaechea