Leon Lamo, grandfather of Edorta
When you can't go forward, you have to go back . When you no longer know why you are advancing (I think it is one of the sins of the post-avant-garde) we have to go back to the origin , to the simplest and most atavistic question: why do we eat . What was this gastronomy about?
Around this idea they are currently overlapping two circumscribed currents to this same look towards yesterday: the recovery of traditional recipes sometimes forgotten (Louis 186 on the Moritz factory either Usual ) and a glimpse of a wilder and more primitive gastronomic concept: the search for identity in a more rugged environment , recover species that have practically disappeared, bet on rusticity and the most primitive cuisine.
Let's see two examples that will be born shortly, so different and so similar.
Begoña in the Albufera
** Begoña Rodrigo and his new gastronomic project: a self-sustaining farmhouse-farm.**
Begoña (cook and owner of The little room , winner of the first edition of top-chef ) moved this summer to a ten thousand square meter farmhouse in the middle of the Valencian orchard (in Meliana, next to Alboraya and not far from the sea) and she there she will live and cook in a natural ecosystem based on the principles of permaculture: the philosophy of working with, and not against nature; of prolonged and reflective observation, instead of prolonged and unconscious work; to understand plants and animals in all their functions, instead of treating areas as mono-productive systems. They are words of Bill Mollison , one of the pioneer farmers in the recreation of natural ecosystems that Begoña has reached thanks to Hèctor Molina : llauro, villager and farmer . A unique type.
The little room will continue its journey as a gastronomic restaurant, this farmhouse will be something else. A biological environment focused on seed recovery, reminiscent of the raw food , where you will find cows, chickens and rabbits; that over time will house six wooden houses where twenty tenants can stay. Begoña, Jorne and her son Mik will live and cook what the farmhouse produces for each of the guests —I can't imagine a more authentic and exclusive trip (for the gourmet) (this was the new luxury, wasn't it?). She tells us: “I am excited as I have never been, and if you add to this that everything that grows I will see it from minute zero and then I will be able to cook it, knowing exactly what its process has been… I think it is indescribable, to be able to recover disappeared species and that nature guides in a certain way what I am going to cook. It's going back to the zero point."
Return to the zero point: the goal
Get up! of Edorta Lamo, a hamlet in the mountains of Alava that will bet on gastronomic poaching.
Edorta, owner of A Fuego Negro, has been involved in a unique project for some time. It's called Arrea!, a farmhouse (in its restoration they have collaborated the designer Txekun Lopez de Aberasturi and the architect Xavier Goicochea ) of more than two hundred years in Santa Cruz de Campezo, in La Muga, in the mountains of Alava. Once again, Edorta speaks to us about roots: “ It's a return to my roots! To the culture that I have sucked from 'txiki' or 'mocete'... An unknown culture, punished and survivor of my ancestors... As we investigate, we discover, it is as if I had lived it... Is there something More exciting?"
Mountain of Alava
This gastronomic project will open its doors in autumn 2017 and will try to recover the identity of an area but also a way of experiencing gastronomy and nature: the gastronomic poaching that for their ancestors was synonymous with survival and coexistence with the environment (Today, poaching conveys very different nuances) ; back then, local farmers had to combine their jobs with poaching birds, wild boar, hares, crabs, and trout; and with the collection of truffles, mushrooms or boxwood.
Edorta tries to recover the gastronomic heritage and identity of his grandfather León (owner of the first bar in Santa Cruz) with this country house that more than a restaurant, is a way of experiencing the environment (agricultural engineer Aurelio Robles is collaborating in the work of recovering species) and the past. In Arrea! there will be a lot of drying, quartering, pickling and fermenting. Stews, grills, game and orchard with native species. It will be exciting, this trip to not only a way of cooking —but a way of living with your surroundings and your past. Cook to live.
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These mountains are everything and everything will provide Arrea!
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