Juan Valera and the Turrolate

The turrolate is a typical sweet of the Cordoba Subbética, especially of Priego de Córdoba. Its origin lies in the fertile imagination of the artisanal confectionery industry of Priego, possibly began to be elaborated at the end of the 17th century. It is made of chocolate / cocoa and nuts. It has a cylindrical rod shape and is manufactured in different sizes and qualities.

We must highlight various literary reviews that treasure the fame of this typical product prieguense outside our locality.

At the end of the 19th century, Juan Valera in his novel Juanita la Larga named the famous chocolate bun several times, from which it can be deduced that the writer from Egabrense had to be a great aficionado to taste the genuine Priego product.

In a paragraph of the aforementioned novel, the author writes in this way:

"The next day, already decided Don Paco, went very early to the house of Juana la Larga and ordered him to make six beautiful madapolán shirts with cuffs and breastplates of thread, adjusting them to thirty reals each. To win the will and excite the zeal of both Juanas, Don Paco took them, wrapped in a handkerchief, and without the profane to see what he was carrying, a basket full of strawberries, very rare fruit in the place; and for greater generosity, she also took out of her pocket the loose coat she used to wear daily, no less than three scones of the exquisite chocolate, which Dona Ines used to make at home, and from which she had given her father a dozen buns four ounces each. Juana la Larga, who was very greedy and very fond of receiving it, accepted the present with gratitude and satisfaction, but as it was not only long body, but it was also foresight, and if you put it like that, mental smell , at the point he smelled and covered the intentions that Don Paco brought and about which he had already suspected something. "

And chocolate bun was considered a product so precious in those days, which served even to get the favors of the beloved.

Juan Valera in his literary recreation cites how the chocolate was made in the house of Doña Inés daughter of Don Paco, but in another paragraph of the novel where chocolate mentions again that there was a man from Córdoba who was expressly going to the house to do what. (Surely it should refer to the founder of the most prestigious company in the town "Turrolate Garcia" when he was riding on a donkey in the villages and neighboring towns selling the exquisite product)

We are therefore with a product that has exceeded the limits of gastronomy, which evokes those years of our childhood when we were desiring "Joyos de aceite con turrolate" with which all prunenses are sentimentally united, elevating it to a truly exceptional category.

Source:

- Adarve Newspaper

- Novela Juanita la Larga, author Juan Valera.