My mother weighed around 60 kilos never over (about 130 lbs) all her grown up life. She would eat everything, there was nothing she wouldn't try at least once, but she always ate small portions.
My father would eat only what he wanted, but he ate with gusto. His all time favorite was a potato omelette or tortilla de patatas. He was always fond of telling the story that before he fell in love with Pepita, he fell in love with her tortilla de patatas.
Here's my tortilla version, with croquetas and pa amb tomaquet
He had to have a tortilla every night, no matter where he was. He traveled a lot and he said many times he even had to teach a chef in a hotel how to make one, but no matter. No tortilla could come close to my mother's. I remember my mother making one every night even if they had dinner out, he still wanted one when he got home. He was a tour guide and did the night tour of Barcelona almost every night in the summer. My mother would leave his tortilla on a plate with a napkin covering it next to a porron of wine. And he always had a little shot of rum before bed.
Other favorite foods of my father where catalan meatballs (he liked to dunk bread in the sauce, he could eat many meatballs in a sitting) he also loved her canalones. He didn't care for baked fish or offal: kidneys, liver etc), he liked butifarra amb munxetes, lamb chops with aioli etc And he had a sweet tooth, as I do. He also liked to drink, especially red wine with a porron every meal, and rum Pujol after dinner.
I remember going on special occasions to El Avion, a fish restaurant in la Barceloneta. They all knew him there. My mother always had the zarzuela de pescado -with my father ALWAYS complaining that it was the most expensive dish in the menu- :)
Here we are in El Avion
My mother was an excellent cook and my father really appreciated her cooking,
he often said they should have opened a Restaurant :)
