Spring is unfolding here in the foothills of the Suffolk Alps. We lived in the Cantabrian Cordillera for a time in a town at the entrance to a magical valley where there were more cows than people. This photo of peppers reminded me of a game we used to play when we came down from the mountains to hit the bright lights of Santander or Bilbao.
Going to a bar, our favourite had barrels for tables and wooden floors with sawdust, we would order our poison, beer or tinto, and a portion of Pimentos de Padron. The game was to eat the peppers, which were brought to you hot from the frying pan, one each in turn. They were delightful, in the hands of a good cook the sugars developed in the peppers without being reduced to a mush. This still left something to bite into.
In turn we took a pepper by the stalk, bit off most of it, looked each other in the eye, and savoured the flavour. Most of them were sweet, dulce, but you could always be sure that during the course of this roulette you would hit one that was fiery hot, fuerte! After this they were all fuerte and beer or tinto needed to be applied to the affected part.
