Friday, September 13: Cooking Lesson; Flamenco

Beverly has arranged a private cooking lesson with a chef who meets us at the Markat de la Boqueria, a major market in Barcelona.  We arrive a few minutes early to take in the sights and aromas of the market.
I love photographing markets with the beautiful colors, shapes and textures and I have almost a hundred images but I will be gentle with you here.
 
We meet with Ivie, our chef for the day, at the market.  That is Ivie on the left.
Ivie tours the market with us showing us the various possibilities of items that we could cook and menus that we could prepare.  The fish in this market were swimming the night before, purchased by the market vendors from boats at 4am and brought here for purchase by 8am.  You can hardly get more fresh than this.
After selecting our menu of mussels, crabs, Iberian ham, filet of sole wraps, pork presa with plum sauce, green beans and fruit salad for dessert, Ivie takes us to his house with a rooftop overlooking Barcelona.
 We set out our ingredients
and then get to work cooking.
This is the sole wrap.
And this is the fruit salad.
After eating lunch, we taxi back to our hotel and, with my right leg hurting, I rest while the rest of the group wanders Las Ramblas and Barri Gottic and passes the famous "kiss wall".
We meet up at the sidewalk bar for refreshment and to start planning to join our tour group tomorrow.  Cava is a specialty of this area of Spain.
But before then we have an exciting night of flamenco at the Palau de la Musica de Barcelona, which is a UNESCO world heritage site.
While we can't show you photographs of the actual flamenco performance, the building is absolutely fantastic
including the ceiling.
And here is proof that Beverly was there.
Buenas noches.

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