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Fried · everyday

Torrijas

The classic torrija and the "poor torrija": the memory of the hard years, fried in oil

also: «torrijas pobres»

Fried

Day-old bread soaked in milk, dipped in egg and fried, with sugar and cinnamon: Spain's Lenten sweet. Almería's own touch is the "poor torrija", without milk or egg.

Torrijas
Torrijas

Where it comes from

Province-wide

The torrija is not an Almerian speciality — it is the Lenten sweet of all Spain — but in Holy Week it was traditional to make "the famous torrijas all over Almería": slices of day-old bread soaked in milk, dipped in egg, fried in oil and rolled in cinnamon sugar. Hot, the sugar still clinging, they need no defence.

What is from here is the "poor torrija": no milk, no egg, the bread simply dipped in water before frying. It is the torrija of the lean years, and the one that sets the province's repertoire apart from the generic: the same frying pan, told from another era.

Torrijas, with milk or wine, remain among the sweets of Almería's Holy Week, and in those weeks they can be found in the capital's confiterías. The rest of the year, whoever wants a torrija will have to fry it.

What it is made with

  • Day-old bread
  • Milk
  • Egg
  • Sugar
  • Cinnamon
  • Olive oil