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Espardenyà

Sueca, La Ribera Baixa, Valencia

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Espardenyà

Food and drink · Sueca, La Ribera Baixa, Valencia

Image of Sueca, not of the place itself.

Espardenyà, or espardenyot, is a Valencian dish born on the shores of the Albufera lagoon, near Sueca, whose name —espardenyà, a blow with an espadrille— refers to the unorthodox mix of its ingredients. It is a relatively young recipe, from the early 20th century, of accidental origin: tradition has it that, during the rice harvest, two crews of day labourers who had arranged to eat in the marshland found themselves without rice to make a paella, so they pooled what they had brought —eel for an all i pebre and meat, mostly chicken, though also duck or rabbit— and from that jumble, which someone called espardenyot, the dish was born; it is served with potato, garlic, paprika and one poached egg per diner, just as it comes off the fire.

Photo: 19Tarrestnom65 (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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