• MARKET GARDEN OF SPAIN

MURCIA IS KNOWN FOR FIND WINES AND FRESH PRODUCE

(By Kieran Falconer, The Daily Telegraph May 2008)

The region of Murcia sits next to the Med, snuggled in the south-east corner of Spain between Andalusia; Castile and Valencia.  It is blessed with 300 days of sunshine per year.  As such, wine produced here can be very fruity, alcoholic and thoroughly pleasing to the palate.

Strangely, in the old days Murcian wine was shipped to France (it helped fill the gaps when phylloxera was raging) or Rioja to be blended with other wines. Then a minor revolution took place about 30 years ago and the Murcians realised that their grapes (the monastrell variety which lends heat and spice) were actually jolly good.  From being intimidated by the big boys, they became quietly proud of what they had and the denominations of Bullas, Jumilla and Yecla were quickly founded.

Jumilla seems particularly favoured with more than 40 wineries and one of the few official wine tours in the country; www.rutadelvinojumilla.com.  On this pilgrimage you may well come across the winery Agapito Rico – one of the founders of the Jumilla style.  Here, monstrell grapes have been coupled with Syrah to produce some of the greatest wines in the region, juicy, spicy, jammy – or in my wine lexicon, ¨´winey, grapy and quaffable´¨.  Well worth drinking but what with?  To understand the cuisine of the area you have to realise that the heartland is La Huerta ( the garden ) a plain composed of irrigated fields (first created by the Moors) that grow hectare-upon-hectare of lemons, oranges, rice, tomatoes, olives, peppers, lettuce and other vegetables.

For starters you might want to try zarangollo, a classic omelette of courgettes, onion and potatoes cooked in olive oil.  Things get heartier after this.  Rice and vegetables tend to be a standard of the huertano stews and Murcia´s 250km of coast and the Huerta are cleverly entwined in arroz caldero.

This fish (sea bream, mullet, grouper) and rice stew has just enough chilli to get your attention.  For dessert you might be offered paparajotes – lemon leaves fried within a sweet batter.  You´ll find fantastic restaurants all over the region, with the biggest choice in the ancient city of Murcia.  For an aperitif go to the white stone Plaza Romea or Plaza Santo Domingo.

But don´t get there too early because nothing happens until nine or 10.  Fill the time with a tapas crawl – Plaza Flores is a good place to start.  Grazing on these small, intense burst of flavour is the best way to get to know the varied cuisine.

Arroz con conejo (rice with rabbit), cocido con pelotas (stuffed meat with garlic, parsley and spices) or cabrito (goat roasted over charcoal with garlic) all teach you that you shouldn´t be afraid of flavours in Murcia.

• PARAMOUNT PICKS MURCIA

Good things are on the cards for the region of Murcia.

Paramount Pictures has decided to choose Murcia over Andalucia and Catalunya as the place to build a theme park and movie sets, centralizing their European filming in the region. The President of Murcia, Ramon Luis Valcarcel, together with the Councillor for Culture, Pedro Alberto Cruz, recently returned from a visit to Dubai to two project management companies in charge of the future development.

The building and running of what will be the largest theme park in Europe will create 20,000 jobs and boost tourism in the region.

If everything runs smoothly, as both the President and Cruz believe it will, more concrete details regarding the location of the development will be announced before the end of April.

According to Alberto Cruz, the region of Murcia will become, ´´ The centre of leisure and entertainment with a theme park that will stretch over a 2.5km square area expected to attract 3 million visitors a year.´´

The hunt is now on for private investors to invest in the theme park, which will rival Disneyland, Paris.