Calentita! food fest

Gibraltar is often described as a cultural melting pot, and with good reason. The origin of the local community goes back hundreds of years to when merchants from Italy, Malta and north Africa came to the Rock to service the needs of the British garrison here. Their numbers were bolstered by migrants from neighbouring Spain and nearby Portugal, and from India farther afield. Gibraltar, a British overseas territory to this day, is mainly Catholic, but we have sizeable Jewish, Muslim and Hindu communities too. On a Friday night in summer, youngsters dressed to kill for a night on the town mingle with orthodox Jews heading home from the synagogue and Moroccans in djellabahs enjoying a stroll on Main Street and a respite from the relentless daytime heat. I often wish I could see it through virgin eyes because for the first time visitor here, it must be quite something to see.

And so it is perhaps inevitable that once a year, Gibraltar comes together to celebrate its cultural diversity through the most simple, yet effective bridge-builder known to man: food. The Calentita! festival takes its name from what is widely regarded as Gibraltar’s national dish. Calentita is simple dough made from seasoned chick-pea flour baked in a hot oven. It’s probably Italian in origin, similar to farinata. It was, in the past, a poor family’s staple, a cheap and simple way of filling the gut in lean times. These days, it’s cooked for many a family occasion, a symbol of Gibraltarian – llanito, as we call it – identity.

Casemates Square on Friday was filled with thousands of people sampling local culinary delights. My friend Owen Smith, whose company Word of Mouth organises the event, was clearly overjoyed with the result. “As well as food from the main communities and cultures that have shaped Gibraltar, this year we have a whole new range of dishes from far-flung corners of the earth, cooked up by people who have made Gibraltar their home.”

At the entrance to the square, a large Moroccan stall serving up hundreds of pinchitos, or kebabs, of spiced chicken and lamb cooked over hot charcoal, the evening sun slicing through the clouds of heavily-scented smoke wafting over the crowd. 

On the far side, llanito stalls with calentita, torta de acelgas and local-style paella.

There were kormas and bhunas, dhals and fragrant rice. You could have a side of aubergine omelette, or torta de berenjenas, followed by a nibble on German worst bude with a side of torta de patata, the typical Spanish potato omelette.

In between we found Indian food, Malaysian curries, German sausages, falafel and hummus, all sorts of sweets and cakes, and, in a Sicilian stall, deep fried arancini rice balls stuffed with bolognaise. 

The bins, as you would imagine, were soon overflowing.