Heather Trees on La Palma

Close up of tree heather on La Palma, Erica arborea


All the heather trees are in bloom along the road to the Roque de los Muchachos.

Yes, heather trees. Canarian heather (Erica arborea) is close relatives of English and Scottish heather, but it's a tree, growing anything up to 5 m tall. The tiny leaves are very like English heather, and the flowers are much the same shape, but always white. The wood's very dense and hard, so it's good for things like knife handles. It's also a favourite for wood-burning stoves, because it produces a lot of heat and not much smoke.

But mostly I like it because it's so pretty.

Canarian tree heather, Erica arborea

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Sopas de miel

This is a traditional recipe for Carnival in the Canary Islands. A literal translation would be “honey soup” but as you can see, this isn’t soup. It can be rather soggy, though.

I believe in some places they use honey, but on La Palma, it’s always “miel de cana”, which is like black treacle or molasses, but a little runnier.

Ingredients
Molasses (one small jar)
1 tsp cinnamon
anis 1 desertspoon
peel of one lemon
300g of toasted almonds (chopped)
Stale bread roll (standard Canarian size) cut into slices.

Some people like to use day-old bread, for soft “sopas” Others use week-old bread, so that it’s crunchier.

Put the molasses, lemon peel, anis and cinnamon in a pan and simmer. When the flavours have had chance to mix, add about half the almonds. Keep the mixture simmering, while you add the bread slices, one at a time. Make sure they’re well soaked with the mixture, and then fish them out onto a serving dish. When you’ve done all the bread (or run out of molasses mixture) sprinkle the rest of the almonds over, to decorate.

Personally I find them far too sweet, but there you go.

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