justretired

Thanks so much, everyone. Fodorites are so very generous with their time and knowedge and I'm grateful for all your help. Since discovering this site several years ago, Larry and I travel in new ways. Your experiences help. I make extensive files of restaurants and other travel suggestions and find them probaly more useful than travel books. Since we carry a netbook, I can alwasy ask last minute questions, which are usually answered quickly.

Clearly, our experince with tapas is limited and I'm exicted about sampling a myriad of choices, particualrly in Madrid and San Sebastian. I don't think that dinner will be a problem any longer, though I have to be vigalent due to a shellfish allergy ( see my other link).

If anyone has favorite restaurants in Madrid, San Sebatian, Salamanca, or Segovia, we would certaily appreciate hearing about them. Thanks again, Margie

Aduchamp1

Please note there are no paradores in Madrid and San Sebastian. Originally the system was established to encourage tourism in the less traveled areas. And many are are located in spectacular locations such as in monastaries or castles. Although one must be careful as some of the new facilities are just that and lack the charm of the more unusual sights.

The most common tapa is the omnipresent tortilla espanol. This is thick omelet with potato and onion and can be eaten cold but there are variations.

Oddly enough the menu del dia and the wide spread offering of tapas are a legacy of the brutal dictator Franco. Franco made the menu del dia, called the cubierto years ago, mandatory for restaurants. And if I am not mistaken he also made the serving of tapas mandatory in bars, even though it is hudnreds year old tradition. That way bars would not be just for drinking.

justretired

Does anyone know how to say?:
txikiteo

kimhe

Txikiteo would be quite "straight forward", it would be something like chikc-ee-te-o. Comes from the typical small glasses of wine, beer or cider called "txikitos".

justretired

kimhe, your pronunciation lesson has clarified where the word comes from, which was obscured by the Basque spelling. It doesn't take much to get me started on etymology - that's one of the things I love about language study.

In Spanish, <i>chico</i> as a noun means a boy, but as an adjective it means "small". It has more or less the same meaning as <i>pequeño</i>. I gather that the use of <i>chico</i> instead is somewhat regional, and more common in Latin American than in Spain.

Now, if you make <i>chico</i> even smaller by adding a diminutive ending, you get <i>chiquito</i>. By Spanish spelling rules, the "c" has to change to a "qu" to keep it hard in front of an "i", just as <i>mosca</i> (fly) changes to <i>mosquito</i>. So <i>chiquito</i> is an adjective meaning "very small", but it is also a noun that refers to a small glass, generally of wine.

Now, Basque is a language that at its base is entirely unrelated to Spanish, but nevertheless, it has picked up Spanish words over time. It seems to me that is clearly what has happened with <i>chiquito</i>, which with a Basque spelling becomes <i>txikito</i> (but the pronunciation is the same). And the Basque custom of making the rounds of the bars drinking small glasses of wine becomes <i>txikiteo</i>.

There seem to be those on the web who think that the Spanish word came from the Basque, but for me that defies credulity - it would be the most bizarre linguistic coincidence I've ever seen (although the Spanish words <i>llama</i> (the animal) and <i>llama</i> (flame) and <i>se llama</i> (he is named) are indeed entirely unrelated.

And there you have it - probably much more than you want to know, but I love this stuff.

And boy, am I now looking forward to our trip. I'm now convinced that our estimation of the possibilities of tapas was indeed crippled by our limited exposure.

- Larry

kimhe

Glad to get you going, and although I'm not an Euskera speaker, this one seems pretty obvious.

kimhe

By the way, the seemingly all-basque word pintxo itself comes from the Spanish 'pincho' (thorn, spike) and refers to the toothpic or the skewer that goes through all of the more traditional "pintxos".

jubilada

kimhe: you are a font of information! thank you.