Txokos offer a gastronomic experience like no other: Imagine eating in a restaurant where every table is filled with people you know.

Some of the best restaurants in La Rioja and the Basque Country are actually by invitation only. Txokos are select food members clubs also known locally as Gastronomic Societies. Each Txoko is founded by family members or friends who create a restaurant-style space with fully-equipped professional kitchens. It is a space used to gather for big get-togethers a la española where the meals last for hours.

Unlike a restaurant, here it is the members who prepare the food, which is often nothing short of a Michelin-star experience: pork chops smoked over vine shoots (chuletillas al sarmiento), olive oil salt cod with garlic and chili peppers (bacalao al pil pil), beef cheeks in red wine (carrilleras al vino tino), with a bottle of Finca Martelo often holding pride of place on many txoko tables.

Txokos can range from the more modern to the more classic in style, but they all have a very similar set-up: a room full of tables, a professional kitchen and a bursting wine cellar.

Beyond the space, the thing that makes them stand out are the little communities that regularly fill them with life. Some of them belong to a single family and others were founded by a group of friends. And, in addition to long lunches and dinners, you will also often come across card tournaments, cooking contests and even concerts. #Martelosophy at it’s purest, what a shame it’s limited to a lucky few.

When in Logroño, bypass the touristic Laurel street, and head straight to the tapas hotspot preferred by all the locals: Calle San Juan. Real authentic tapas, from the classics to some surprising modern suggestions. 

If you’re not sure where to start, here are some of Finca Martelo’s favourites: 

Tastavin

Tastavin is a tapas bar all about giving the good old Riojan classics a modern and fun twist. Tradition remains omni-present as is seasonal produce. 

Top Tapas Pick: the marinated red tuna on crispy bread (tosta de pan de cristal con atún rojo marinado) or the oxtail (la tapa de rabo de toro).

Calle San Juan 25.

Torres Gastrobar

Top Tapas Pick: The star tapa has to be the Kobe, two freshly made mini Wagyū beef burgers accompanied by padrón peppers and fries. 

If you are feeling extra peckish, the calamari sandwich (bocadillo de calamares), the cannelloni with chilli (el canelón con chili) and the cod with poached egg (bacalao con huevo poché) are definitely worth a try.

Calle San Juan 31.

Umm

Umm offers bite-sized haute cuisine. This is the only way to define tapas such as the foie gras, apple and cream cheese millefeuille with sultana bread (milhojas de foie, manzana y queso cremoso, con pan de pasas); the fried squid with ink foam (la fritura de calamar con espuma de tinta) or the sea crab totems with a mild chorizo pepper aioli (los tótems de buey de mar con alioli suave de pimiento choricero). 

Top Tapas Pick: You can’t leave without trying their ham croquettes (croquetas de jamón), trust us. 

Calle San Juan 1.

When you think of Spanish cuisine, one of the firsts things that probably comes to mind is tapas, those famous small portions of beautiful Mediterranean food, often served with a drink. But did you know that tapas also stands for “lids”? The legend goes that tapas were invented back in the Middle Ages when a bite-sized piece of food such as a slice of cheese or ham was used as a way to cover the wine glass of the Catholic Monarchs during a trip so as to prevent flies from going in. An ingenious invention to improve hygiene that, over time, has become a pillar of Spanish culture. 

Going out for tapas (or pintxos, if you are in northern Spain) is a gastronomic, cultural and social experience like no other. It’s an original way of discovering a new city whilst taking your time and enjoying the atmosphere of each new tapas bar you set foot in. It can also be a time to meet up with good friends while sipping a glass of Finca Martelo. It is truly a journey of discovery where you can enjoy the immense gastronomic diversity that is Spain. 

What began as a simple piece of bread with cheese, Iberian ham or chorizo on top has evolved into more elaborate preparations. Some remain classic, such as the gilda (a pickled guindilla pepper, white anchovy and a green olives on a toothpick – a quintessentially Basque pintxo), while others are so ambitious and innovative that they are more like bite-sized mouthfuls of haute cuisine.

So now you know, next time you’re visiting our country, you don’t need to book a table in a restaurant. Go from bar to bar and enjoy the diversity of Spanish food, tapa by tapa, pintxo by pintxo.

All villages have their little secrets, but few are guarded as closely as the places where one can find the best wild mushrooms. Although it is not surprising to find such secrecy when it comes to these gastronomic diamonds: truffles, chanterelles, amanitas, perrechicos, boletus… There is an array of delicious mushrooms to be found that can be sampled on many local menus to the delight of all you foodies out there. As for the walkers lucky enough to come across any of these beauties, they will pretty much get a medal of honour for having the eye to spot them!

Every year, after the first autumn rains, mushroom enthusiasts put on their wellies and set off in search of these wild treasures hidden in the depths of the forest. You can tell them apart by their wicker baskets, which are actually function over fashion as they help the mushrooms to spread their spores, and their curved-edged knives, essential for collecting the fungi without damaging the mycelium. 

Knowing where the best mushrooms are helps, but if you walk through any beech, holm oak or pine forest it is easy to come across all kinds of mushrooms. However, it is very important to speak to locals and understand the different species well so as not to confuse the edible with the non-edible that can sometimes look very similar. 

After a morning of picking comes the most eagerly awaited moment for the gatherers: showing off each of your finds over a bottle of Finca Martelo, removing the soil with care, admiring every detail, chopping and preparing a mouth-watering dish. Here are a few ideas to get your taste buds going: boletus risotto, stewed veal with chanterelles or the Spanish-classic of wild mushrooms and scrambled eggs. Although any recipe will taste great, you can’t go wrong with the quality of this raw material. 

After the grape harvest, the time comes to prune the vines to prepare them for the next vintage. And although it may seem that at this point the vines have already given their all, they still have one last gastronomic treasure to offer: the vine shoot.

These younger thinner vines pictured that sprout from what seems like nowhere, are what blossom and give us the bunches of grapes with which we make the famous Finca Martelo wine. These seemingly useless “twigs” are actually one of the most prized secret ingredients when it comes to Spanish cuisine because of the characteristic flavour they give to any dish cooked on an open fire made with Sarmiento.

Many wine regions of Spain see vine shoots as the special reward after a year of hard work. The traditional way to enjoy this unmistakable smoky taste is to use the sarmiento to make the cooking fire, sometimes directly on the ground, as a way of coming together at the end of a wine season to celebrate a job well done. In our native La Rioja, the signature dish is smoked lamb chops (chuletillas de cordero lechal al sarmiento), an ideal pairing for Finca Martelo thanks to its elegance and freshness with its sweet, silky tannins. And if we add good company to the mix, then you have the perfect #Martelosophy moment.

The use of sarmiento to cook varies from region to region, but the common thread is definitely that joyous spirit. In Catalonia, for example, it is often used in calçotadas – a big yearly winter event where calçots (resembling baby leeks) are blackened over an outdoor open fire, wrapped up in newspaper, served on terra cotta tiles and eaten standing-up after peeling the outer skin with bare hands, accompanied by red wine and bread. Other regions such as Alicante and Murcia use the vine shoots to cook their traditional mountain paellas giving them a spectacular taste. Sarmiento is also used in haute cuisine, where the characteristic smoky flavour is used to elevate dishes to a new dimension.

At the Torre de Oña winery, we make Finca Martelo, but not only that: you can eat in our very own dining room. Our in-house chefs Paloma, Arrate and Alicia are specialists in the authentic Riojan dishes to the more innovative cuisine. These Iberian cheek and mushroom ravioli with Finca Martelo sauce are the perfect blend between tradition and modernity, between local and global. As the saying goes in Spain, you’ll want to “wet your bread” in this sauce to not let a single drop go to waste.

Ingredients

• 6 pork cheeks, if possible Iberian
• 1 medium onion
• 2 carrots
• 100 g wild mushrooms such a boletus
• Fresh herbs to taste such as thyme and parsley
• 12 wonton wrappers/skins
• 1 cup of beef stock or bone broth
• A splash of brandy
• 1 small glass of Finca Martelo
• Salt and black pepper
• Extra virgin olive oil for cooking

For the sauce: 

• 1 spring onion
• 1 pinch of flour or cornflour
• 300 ml of Finca Martelo wine
• 100 g of melted butter (3.53 oz)
• A splash of brandy
• Good quality salt and black pepper
• A squeeze of lemon juice

Preparation

Starting with the preparation of the ravioli filling, finely chop the onion, carrots and herbs. Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan then add the chopped onion and carrots followed by the cheeks, season with salt and pepper and add the herbs. Then stir in the glass of Finca Martelo wine, the brandy and the stock. Simmer until the cheeks reach the desired degree of tenderness. 

Once the cheeks are cooked, put to one side then blend the sauce left in the pan in a blender and strain through a sieve.

Take the cheeks and chop and shred the meat. Finely chop the mushrooms and sauté for a couple of minutes in olive oil. Season with salt and pepper and mix in the meat. Stir the mixture well and add a little of the cheek sauce made previously. 

Carefully assemble the ravioli using the wonton wrappers and boil for 2 minutes. 

The Finca Martelo sauce

Finely chop the spring onion and fry in a little olive oil. Add the flour and fry for a minute. Pour in the 300 ml of Finca Martelo wine and reduce by half. Strain through a sieve. Slowly pour in the butter bit by bit while whisking with a whisk. 

Season with salt and pepper and add the brandy and the lemon juice. 

Assembling the dish

Choose a nice deep dish, and spread a base of sauce made at the beginning from the cheeks. Lay two ravioli on top and finally, drizzle over the Finca Martelo sauce. 

Open a bottle of Finca Martelo, serve a glass to each guest… and enjoy!

Salud!

Few chefs can boast about making the “Segovian-style Suckling Pig” one of the trendiest dishes in the cosmopolitan city of London, but when you cook with the loving passion that Nieves Barragan has for Spanish cuisine, nothing is impossible.

This is the only way to explain how a 20-year-old who went to London “to try her luck” has had such a meteoric career. After being awarded a Michelin star as head chef at Barrafina restaurant, she decided to open her own London restaurant: Sabor. Her Spanish omelette, tapas and Galician octopus have since become Michelin Star dishes themselves. And it is probably largely down to the love for cooking that her mother instilled in her as a child.

How did a delineation student from a port town in the Basque country end up becoming one of the most renowned chefs in London? 

When I was trying to figure out what to study, I was hesitating between delineation studies, because I liked drawing, nursing and cooking. I ended up choosing the first of the three, but I quickly found that drawing wasn’t as exciting as I had thought and it didn’t really fill me up.

At home, we have always loved food. I attended a few cookery courses here and there, but above all I learned my cooking skills from my mother. When I was little, she would talk about food all day long, always planning ahead what dish she was going to make for lunch or dinner later. On TV there was always a cooking program on in the background. And I remember going food shopping with her a lot.

When I was 20, a friend of mine went to the UK and fell in love with a New Zealander who worked in a 2-Star Michelin restaurant. After six months she said to me “Why don’t you come and work in London? Chefs are in high demand and you love cooking”, so I decided to take a leap of faith and give it a year. 

I literally fell in love with the capital as soon as I arrived. I started to cook with foods from Asia and South America that were not as readily available in Spain at the time… discovering other gastronomic cultures was a huge revelation to me. A year into my London life, my mother asked me when I was coming back and I realized that I didn’t want to go home. I felt that I was “in the prime of my life” and I haven’t looked back since.

On the Sabor menu we can find everything from Spanish potato omelette to Galician octopus. Why is this commitment to traditional Spanish recipes so important to you? 

I am and always have been a big foodie. Among my many travels, tasting food from all over the world was always one of the biggest highlights, but my Spanish heritage is firmly instilled within me. I believe that Spanish cuisine is one of the best in the world. From north to south, from east to west, there is so much variety. That’s what I wanted for Sabor : to take people on a sensorial trip around Spain without having to get up from their seat.

The Asador (the grill), for example, is extremely traditional. But there was no question whether to have one because I think that the British deserve to try an amazing Segovian-style suckling pig or a great octopus pulpera exactly the way they do it in Galicia. The Bar area of the restaurant is more focused on the informal tapas concept commonly found in southern Spain. Then there is the Counter, which is where I try to give my own personal touch to the dishes that are served. People often say they are surprised by the “very particular flavours” here. 

How can very traditional Spanish dishes be modernized without losing their essence?

After more than 20 years living here, it is easier for me to spot a little of what is missing in Spanish restaurants found in the UK. People want quality and seasonal products. A good cured ham, tender meat, fresh fish… I try to innovate using everything I’ve learnt on my travels whilst always respecting Spanish flavours. We are a Spanish restaurant, but it’s not something you would typically find in a big Spanish city like Barcelona for example.

Some chefs say that their mothers are their most demanding diners. In your case, what does she think when she comes to eat at Sabor? 

My mother has only been able to come to Sabor once since we opened. She was thrilled and finds what we are doing quite impressive, although she also told me “that’s not how she made sweetbreads“. She gave us a lot of liver, brain and sweetbreads (pancreas) when we were growing up. So I learnt from a young age that eating meat doesn’t have to be limited to steak… That’s also Spanish culture. 

Many modern Michelin-starred kitchens look like laboratories, but in Sabor we find large grills, very common all over Spain for cooking food, and even a traditional castellan moorish oven. Are customers surprised? 

I always say that “the only important thing about the tool is how well you know how to use it”. In the end, what people want is to eat well and have great service. We use grills, frying pans and griddles a lot. That doesn’t mean it’s less or more. It’s just different.

The thing I love the most is the sound of a kitchen as a dish is being prepared. The crackling of the grill, the sound of the meat on the griddle, it’s what I grew up with. The world of cooking is very vast and everyone chooses the journey that best suits them. In my view, you can’t get real Spanish flavours without a good grill. 

In the last few years you have not only become one of the most renowned chefs in London, but also an ambassador for Spanish cuisine across the country. What new ideas for the future are simmering in your mind? 

We have a couple of very exciting projects in the pipeline. A small one that will come out very soon by the end of this year if all goes to plan, and a much bigger one: a new restaurant aiming to develop some culinary jewels of certain areas of Spain which are not fully represented in Sabor. Watch this espacio!

Having said that, I don’t want to go crazy either. We’re doing very well, I would like to maintain the quality we are best known for and continue to find joy in what I do.

Finally, what would you say is the perfect Spanish dish to pair with a bottle of Finca Martelo (and some great company)? 

I am a huge fan of rice dishes simmered in broth (arroz meloso). I want my next holiday to be in Menorca and I’ve already started looking for places where they make the best lobster rice – an all-time favourite of mine – although the other kinds of rice dishes are pretty spectacular too: with wild mushrooms, with rabbit, with seafood. Best enjoyed with a chunk of crusty bread on one side and a great wine on the other!