Malaga meals

I'm just back from Malaga in Spain, where I was a member of a PhD thesis defence panel.  It was a very interesting thesis, which I enjoyed reading, and I got to meet up with several colleagues, and have lots on good conversation.

And good food, of course. On the Thursday evening, the supervisors and I went out for a "tapas crawl" -- ham and cheese in the first place, anchovies, cod, and tuna in the next, then finishing up at a Moroccan tea shop.  Along the way we passed the Moorish Alcazaba Fortress and Roman Theatre.




Friday breakfast was churros (fried dough) which are eaten after being dipped in thick hot chocolate -- very more-ish.







Lunch was paella and grilled swordfish on the beach, "serenaded" by green parakeets in the palm trees.  The warm sunshine made a pleasant change from the grey and raining England I had left 24 hours earlier, but I did make sure to sit in the shade.




Dinner, after the defence, was a kind of "up market" tapas, in that there was lots of (relatively) small, varied, delicious and ... different ... courses.

1. Pear draped in salmon covered with blue cheese, accompanied by blackberries
2. Ham and honey crepes
3. Cod in a tomato sauce (okay, quite tame in comparison, really)
4. Lamb, goats cheese, and sweet onion chutney
5. Pork and pate rounds with strawberry sauce

There were several of us dining: the panel, the supervisors, and the successful candidate.  Although we cleared the early courses, it just so happened that we all left some of the final one.  And it was the final main course: next was delivered the sweet course.  So, was it coincidence that we all faltered at the planned final fence -- or would they have continued serving new courses for as long as we continued eating?

Oh, and in between all the meals, as well as the defence there were meetings, presentations, discussions ... and coffee.