Lorraine Williamson
Walk down almost any Spanish street and you’ll find a type of bar that rarely makes it onto glossy travel lists. Fluorescent lights, paper tablecloths, clattering plates, waiters who’ve been there longer than most neighbours — and menus that barely change. Just simple Spanish food.
Yet these are the places Spaniards trust most. The food is simple, portions are honest, and the staff know exactly who sits where. They know who likes their coffee corto, and which customers always ask for extra bread. There is no theatre and no intention to impress. But the cooking feels rooted in something that’s disappearing elsewhere: confidence without pretension.
When less really is more
One of the things visitors often misunderstand about Spanish food culture is the country’s deep appreciation for simplicity. The most popular dishes — tortilla, lentejas, pollo asado, revueltos, berenjenas fritas, ensalada mixta — ask for very little more than good ingredients and a cook who knows when to stop. And in November, when the weather dips and locals return to their routines after the long summer, those unfussy plates feel especially right. They’re warm, they’re familiar, and they belong to a tradition that has very little to do with showmanship.
Mushroom picking in Spain
What Spaniards actually eat at home in November
Ask a Spanish family what’s cooking in late autumn and you’ll hear the same responses again and again: lentil stew simmering on a weekday, caldo bubbling on the stove, scrambled eggs with whatever was fresh that morning, roast peppers, chickpeas with spinach, pork cooked low and slow. These aren’t dishes for tourists — they’re the backdrop to everyday life. They’re also the dishes you increasingly see returning to restaurant menus as chefs lean back into seasonality and away from the fuss of summer.
The magic of the ‘basic’ bars
In Marbella, just as in Madrid, Zaragoza, or Cádiz, some of the best food comes from bars that look almost deliberately modest. They don’t reinvent anything; they refine nothing; they just serve the kind of food locals want to eat. A plate of revueltos with mushrooms and langostinos. Egg and chips with soft green peppers resting over the top. Albóndigas swimming in a tomato sauce that probably hasn’t changed in twenty years. These bars survive because they don’t chase trends — they feed communities.
A quiet shift back to simplicity
Across Spain, there’s a growing push towards what some chefs are calling cocina honesta: cooking stripped back to its essentials. It’s partly economic, partly cultural, and partly a reaction to years of fussy, “interpretive” plates that never quite landed with the public. Diners are increasingly choosing substance over spectacle. A good tortilla beats a deconstructed one every time. A beautifully fried egg needs no translation. And a dish built on two or three ingredients can still feel generous in the right hands.
A comfort dish and recipe to make at home
What locals are ordering right now
Talk to regulars in Andalucia and you’ll hear the same favourites mentioned again and again: revueltos with setas, pork fillets with roasted peppers, chickpea stews, boquerones, warm croquetas, patatas a lo pobre, migas, sopa casera. These are Spain’s true comfort dishes — the ones that appear on menus year-round but somehow taste best when the evenings grow cooler and the terraces quieten down.
A celebration of Spain’s everyday cooking
Spain’s dining culture is built on the belief that good food shouldn’t need a performance. Whether it’s a basic bar that knows its customers by heart or a family kitchen putting out another pot of lentils, the country’s strongest culinary traditions are often the simplest. They’re not designed for photographs; they’re designed for appetite, routine and the kind of comfort that comes from eating food you recognise.
And now we’d love to hear from you: which Spanish dishes do you find yourself returning to, time and time again? The everyday ones. The comforting ones. The plates that never need an introduction.