It might seem like an outrageous statement but that little bowl of gofio accompanying soups and stews such as puchero and in some traditional Canarian restaurants was partly responsible for the birth of civilisation. It’s true, honest.

It’s generally accepted that the cultivation of grain and therefore products like gofio, led to ancient man setting down roots and establishing permanent communities. Cheap, nutritious and easy to produce, grains have been an essential part of our diet for almost ten thousand years, with most cultures developing their own methods for transforming grain into food products. Tenerife’s rather unique example of this is gofio; a flour concocted by the island’s original inhabitants, the Guanche.

In truth gofio is a bit of an umbrella term as it can actually be derived from wheat, maize, barley or even a mix of these. Harvested grain is toasted before being milled to a fine powder; it’s a process which lends it a distinctive taste and aroma.
The Guanche prepared gofio by grinding grain by hand; a long laborious task. After the conquest of Tenerife, the island’s new multi-cultured settlers continued to use gofio but simplified the grinding process. They built water mills, often in a line so that the same water could be used to power each mill – obviously early environmentalists. A few of these mills exist today on Tenerife; although they’re no longer powered by water.
It’s not difficult to track them down in places like El Palmar, Tejina and especially in La Orotava where there are at least two mills filled from early morning with townsfolk seeking their ration of double toasted. The slightly nutty, sweet aroma emanating from their ovens guides noses straight to their doors.

There are a number of explanations why the consumption of gofio has remained a staple of the islanders’ diets since Guanche times. Throughout Tenerife’s history, the island has suffered periods of extreme hardship and poverty. When times were hard and food in short supply; gofio proved a cheap source of nutrients such as protein, fibre, magnesium, iron, calcium and sodium.
Interestingly it’s also claimed that gofio is good for helping lower cholesterol, regulate blood sugar levels and is also suitable for diabetes sufferers.

Gofio consumption is particularly popular in agricultural communities where its nutrients help give farmers the strength and energy required for a hard day’s toiling on those narrow terraces lining slopes; terraces that a Sherpa would have to think twice about before tackling. For similar reasons, it’s an essential part of the diet for practitioners of the Canarian sport Lucha Canario (wrestling).

Cooking with Gofio
Some Tinerfeños, like miller Jesús at La Maquina in La Orotava, call it the original power drink. He swears that a breakfast of a couple of teaspoons of gofio mixed with warm milk sets him up for the day, banishing hunger pangs for hours. Even children love it when it’s mixed with condensed milk, honey and mashed bananas (maize gofio has a flavour reminiscent of crushed ice cream wafers);
In Canarian cuisine it’s traditionally used to thicken and add flavour to traditional dishes such as escaldón and more recently Tenerife’s most imaginative chefs have been experimenting with it in desserts, ice creams and even chocolate.

One of the most popular methods of preparing gofio is gofio amasado. This is basically gofio mixed with nuts, dried fruit, cheese, honey and water that is rolled into a sausage shape and cut into discs. These are always handed out (i.e. thrown at you with force) at romérias. It’s the thing in aluminium foil that nobody wants.

If anyone is interested in going Guanche and trying gofio, every supermarket on the island stocks it so it isn’t difficult to find. However, before you develop too much of a taste for gofio make sure you check out pictures of Canarian wrestlers because that’s what you could end up looking like if you munch too much of the stuff.

Forget colourful decorations and chubby Santa Claus figures hanging from window ledges, there’s one sure sign in Tenerife that Christmas is closing in with the speed of a runaway bullet train – a whole aisle appears in supermarkets filled with boxes of a peculiarly Spanish Christmas speciality, turrón.

Usually made from a base of almonds and honey mixed to form a solid rectangular cake, turrón has the appearance of a very humble speciality. But its origins are mysterious and there are even fanciful tales about how it came to be a Spanish Christmas treat. It also tastes great.

One version suggests that it was the Ancient Greeks who first made turrón. Its dense mix of dried nuts and honey packed into cake form was used as nutritional food for Olympian athletes. It was the first energy bar.

Another story attributes its invention to nomadic Arabs. The cake was energy boosting, easy to carry and didn’t go off and stink out the Bedouin tent in hot temperatures. A bit like the Elven lembas bread in Lord of the Rings.

However the best and most fanciful story, so the one we’re going with, involves the tale of a Spanish king in Jijona who married a Scandinavian princess.

The princess was so terribly homesick for her snow covered Scandinavia that the king ordered thousands of almond trees to be planted around his castle.
In winter, when they blossomed, the landscape was transformed into a sea of white, just like snow, and hey presto the princess was happy as Larry again.
The townspeople collected the nuts from the almond trees and made a cake from them… just in time for Christmas.

Doesn’t that just make you want to rush out and buy some? Problem is the choice is overwhelming. There’s coconut, chocolate, roasted apple, pineapple, cream, truffle, whisky and even Irish coffee flavoured turrón.

Why not start out by trying the basic turrón yema tostada which is probably close to the original almond, sugar, honey and egg mixture and is still my favourite of them all. After that experiment with other flavours.

But take my advice, try turrón sooner rather than later. Like the blossoms on the almond trees which produce its main ingredient, turrón is a transient treat only here to be enjoyed for a very short time.

Did you know that Tenerife was Wallace and Gromit’s favourite holiday destination? No? I’m not surprised as I just made it up. But there’s one moon sized chunk of cheese reason why it’s a claim which wouldn’t be too wide of the mark.

In 2008, Queso Arico curado pimentón was crowned World Champion Cheese out of a field of over 2,400 cheeses at the prestigious World Cheese Awards in Ireland.
Winning the title of World Champion Cheese is an incredible accolade and well deserved as it has to be said that the cheese makers in Arico produce a damn fine cheese.

Their Queso Arico curado pimentón is a beautifully delicate tasting matured goat’s milk cheese with subtle, smooth flavours which positively seduce the taste buds. An attractive rusty paprika coating is more than window dressing, adding a deliciously smoky tang to the pot. In restaurants around Arico, on Tenerife’s eastern slopes, the ‘big cheese’ is served sliced and drizzled with rich, golden local honey – a simple combination, but one that definitely deserves a place on the list of ‘things that make you go mmmm’.

Tenerife’s finest went up against the World’s tastiest again during October 2009 when the World Cheese Awards took place outside of the UK for only the second time in their history, on Gran Canaria.

However, Tenerife’s cheeses didn’t win any prizes this year; the top award went to a Canadian cheese.
Hang on – world beating Canadian cheese? Does such a thing exist? You don’t think the judges accidentally wrote down the letter ‘d’ when it should have been an ‘r’?

(Arico’s award winning cheese can be picked up at most Tenerife supermarkets for around €6 a wheel. For other good Tenerife cheeses, try a taste of semi-cured smoked goat’s cheese in gofio from Benijos in La Orotava, or goat’s cheese flavoured by wild fennel in Teno Alto.)