Lauren had made them macaroni and cheese with chunks of ham.
But two things top the charts: the green tomato chutney, which is at once acidic and almost rhubarb-sweet, and goes will with chunks of ham and harder cheeses.
The result is a cuisine based on the most elemental ingredients, like sopa de ajo, a broth made with water and garlic, and migas, a concoction of moistened bread crumbs cooked in olive oil and garlic and chunks of ham if available.
Stir the beans when you check them, rotating the bone as needed, and teasing off the chunks of ham as they come loose.
You can eat the pods and the fresh beans, and cook the dried ones with a chunk of smoked ham all afternoon on a winter's day.
Croquetas de jamón, creamy fritters filled with béchamel and chunks of ibérico ham, are served over an earthy quince paste.
I very much enjoyed two soups, a lemony Irish pea soup with chunks of smoky ham and a hearty Colombian vegetable broth with oats, potatoes and peas.
Superlative broth appears in some of the casserole dishes, as well, including a vigorous one that combines mysterious pig fragments with chunks of cured ham, bamboo shoots and ribbons of tofu skin tied into delicate knots.
Memories of dishes lingered for weeks afterward: an appetizer of heirloom tomatoes, all angles and preposterously bright, scattered with Sicilian pistachios, daubed with avocado, dressed with a hint of vanilla; an octopus terrine, made with pastrami spices and chunks of braised ham hock, meaty with an interesting aftertaste of brine.
