🍽️ Food & drink

Xixona lends its name to the two turróns with Protected Geographical Indication status that come out of this province: Turrón de Jijona, a…

💡 Local tip: Buy from a workshop in Xixona rather than a supermarket, and look for the Protected Geographical Indication seal on the packaging; it guarantees the almond and honey meet the regulated standard.

A turrón-making dynasty that traces back to 1725, when Lorenzo Sirvent Ibáñez left farming to make turrón and passed the trade down through…

💡 Local tip: Book the factory visit ahead if you want to see production in progress; outside the production season only the adjoining museum can be toured.

A second-generation salazones stall inside Alicante's Central Market, specialising in mojama (cured tuna), hueva (fish roe) and hand-cured…

💡 Local tip: Ask to have the mojama sliced fresh and ask where the day's fish comes from; it varies with what has come in from the southern fish markets.

A thin pastry filled with tuna or melva, slow-cooked onion, pine nuts and aniseed, eaten on the night of 20 June, when the first Fogueres…

💡 Local tip: Alicante's bakeries start selling it days before the plantà; buy it fresh that same week — it doesn't keep well for more than a couple of days.

Opened in 1959 by Batiste Juan Torres, a former waiter at the Miramar, facing Santa Pola's fishing port.

💡 Local tip: Caldero is served as two courses and for a minimum of two diners; book ahead if you're going at the weekend.

The rice cooked in caldero broth and served on its own, 'a banda' (apart) from the fish.

💡 Local tip: Always ask for allioli on the side; the depth of flavour comes from the fish stock, not the sauce.

The version of caldero cooked on the only inhabited island of the region, settled in the 18th century by fishermen of Genoese-Tabarkin…

💡 Local tip: Eat it before the last boat back to Santa Pola or Alicante leaves; the island has no transport other than by sea.

A 19th-century roadside inn out in the Elche countryside, today a reference point for wood-fired arroz con costra, the baked rice dish with…

💡 Local tip: Arroz con costra is oven-baked and takes time; better to book a table than to turn up hoping for one.

The prawn fished off Dénia at depths of 600-800 metres and auctioned the very same afternoon at the port's fish market.

💡 Local tip: If you want to see it come in, head to the port in the mid-afternoon, when the trawlers return; the auction starts shortly after.

A cooperative founded in 1961 by small growers in Villena, in the Alto Vinalopó, built around the native Monastrell grape.

💡 Local tip: If you're interested in Fondillón, ask about the house's old soleras before buying; not every Monastrell from the bodega has that ageing.

The grape that gets hand-covered with a paper bag while it ripens on the vine, a technique documented in Novelda since 1919 and which today…

💡 Local tip: It's sold mainly in winter, timed to the twelve grapes eaten at midnight on New Year's Eve; look for the bunch still wearing its paper bag as a mark of origin.

A dried-pepper, salt-cod-and-garlic sauce-salad, pounded with olive oil and spread over toasted bread.

💡 Local tip: It's served cold or at room temperature over toasted bread; don't look for a hot version — that's not how it's eaten.

The toasted Marcona almond coated in a hard sugar shell that for generations was the obligatory sweet at weddings, christenings, communions…

💡 Local tip: The trade has been losing workshops; if you find hand-made peladilla in a confectionery in Alcoi, it's a piece of a craft that barely survives today.

A clay-pot stew of beans, lentils and rice or wheat, typical of the interior's mountain villages such as those in the Vall de Confrides.

💡 Local tip: It's a winter dish; in mountain villages like Confrides it's still cooked when the temperature drops, not year-round.

A pot stew of beans, potato, squash and salt cod, meat-free, typical of the Vega Baja and traditionally tied to Maundy Thursday.

💡 Local tip: It's served with allioli on the side for anyone who wants it; the cod already brings the salt, so taste before seasoning further.

A fisherman's stew of melva (a small tuna-family fish), potato and onion, one of the classic dishes of La Vila Joiosa's fishing-village…

💡 Local tip: It follows the melva season; if it's not on the menu, ask, because not every restaurant in the area has it year-round.

Opened in 1970 by the Devesa Santacreu family, next to La Vila Joiosa's yacht club.

💡 Local tip: Ask what came in at the market that day before ordering; the menu leans on fresh fish, which changes with the day's catch.