In Seville, when Christmas is in the air, carols float over walls when you roam the medieval streets. As you turn a corner, you might bump into the orchestra responsible for the melody, or the choir singing joyously all together.
Keep roaming and you’ll find yourself walking through — yes, through! — a giant Christmas tree to arrive at the cathedral. Mellow wafts of burning sage envelope you and you’re surrounded by people going to the market stalls displaying nativity sets. Families from around the region pour in to pore over and pick and choose from thousands of figurines.
Alongside the usual figurines is El Cagador. I did a double take when I saw him squatting, trousers around his ankles, doing his business. This can’t be Christmassy! Wrong. El Cagador, I’m informed, is a good luck symbol, fertilising the fields for the year ahead. He’s hidden in nativity scenes across the land, in a Christmas game, for children to find.
From Seville to Cádiz
During Christmas, evenings at the utterly charming Taberna La Manzanilla are lovely. Pepe, the owner, and I got talking. He was driving to Sanlúcar at 6 the next morning for his mosto, he said, as he led me into his atmospheric cellar to check the barrel he’d prepared for it. And he invited me to his upcoming fiesta del mosto.
Mosto is young wine that eventually becomes sherry. Some of it is drunk to see what the vintage is like, I’m told. I think it’s just another excuse for a Christmas party. Early December is mosto season; so if you see a sign outside a bar with ‘hay mosto’, definitely try some. On mosto afternoon, the taberna was packed. Pepe was doling out freshly-poured bottles, passing around juicy olives stuffed with vermouth and nutty pajarete cheese. His friend was spinning gorgeous flamenco records and everyone was swaying to the music.
The pièce de résistance was the fresh, garlicky, homemade ajo (traditionally served at a mosto fiesta) by Pepe’s friend, Juan Morales. I’m now of the opinion that all Christmas parties should be like this one.
Christmas isn’t Christmas without sweets, and for that we go to Arcos de la Frontera. An ancient, hilltop town, complete with picturesque old houses, winding medieval streets and benevolently crumbling churches, Arcos is one of the stunning pueblo blancos in this region.
But we’re not here for the scenery. We’re here to visit the cloistered nuns of the Convent of the Barefoot Mercedarian Order for their delectable Christmas goodies. It’s quite a rigmarole to get these sweetmeats. First, step in and ring the bell. A voice behind a metal cylinder with a black porthole asks your business. You speak your order and the cylinder rotates to an empty chamber. Place the cash and it trundles shut. Then it opens again and, hey presto, there’s your Christmas confectionery.
I have to admit that, even if the nuns’ baking wasn’t up to scratch (it’s faultless by the way), I’d still go back just for this quintessential Christmas experience.
Finally from Arcos to Jerez for the most wonderful time of the year. I was told: “If you don’t like Christmas, don’t go to Jerez.” Christmas in Jerez means zambombas.
A zambomba is a friction drum. It’s also a street party with a couple of men playing the said drum, perhaps with a flamenco guitarist, encircled by a crowd jangling tambourines and singing along to the drumbeat. The crowds surrounding the drummers sing carols, rude songs about nuns and priests, local folksongs.
People come from miles around and the streets and plazas are filled with groups singing, drinking sherry and eating Christmas food. As the crowds ebb and flow, to the next zambomba tent, taberna, or street corner, it’s impossible not to get sucked in. I’m now a shameless zambomba convert and would go so far as to say: it’s not Christmas without a good zambomba!
