By: Kat Bein By: Kat Bein | July 6, 2022 | Food & Drink,
When you bite into a dish that’s extra delicious, it’s not just the technique and fresh ingredients you’re tasting. It’s the love you’re sensing, too, and that’s what makes Xixo’s Tortilla Española at Winona’s in New York City so noteworthy.
The family-run restaurant, cafe and natural wine bar opened in 2020, but the concept got its start when founding owners Cressida Greening and Emir Dupeyron started hosting supper clubs in their apartment. The restaurant is modeled as an extension of their dining room, and the team puts a lot of love into its menu.
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“Xixo’s Tortilla Española, named after our friend Albert Font (a.k.a. Xixo) whose recipe and method for a traditional Catalan tortilla we adapted for the restaurant, has been a mainstay on our menu ever since we opened,” Greening says. “During the height of the pandemic, Xixo started making and selling whole Tortillas straight from his apartment. Born partly out of needing some extra cash after losing his restaurant gig, but more so it became a means through which he could sustain connection with friends, even when we weren’t able to be physically close to one another.”
Greening and Dupeyron fell totally in love with Xixo’s tortillas, and they knew they needed to bring it to the Winona menu. A few months later, Xixo taught Winona’s head chef Kirstyn Brewer how to make them, and a new fan favorite was born.
“Chef Kirstyn has imparted her own culinary wisdom onto the process and has tweaked certain elements to allow us to scale the production, but at the heart of it, the recipe remains the same,” Greening says. “After asking Xixo whether he would be comfortable with us sharing his secret and much coveted tortilla recipe, and whether he had any wisdom to shed on what the secret is behind getting it just right, he said ‘the secret is, there is no secret. It’s super simple, anyone can do it. But if you don’t put love and time into each step, it’s not going to turn out right. This is a recipe passed down through my family and now on to yours at Winona’s, so it is all about love and family and without that it’s not a real tortilla.’”
Lucky for us, Xixo and the Winona team have agreed to share this refined family recipe, so all of us can taste the love and share it with our own friends and family. Make sure you follow the directions exactly, and add a heaping scoop of care.
For 1 tortilla
Ingredients:
Directions:
When prepping the tortilla, there are a few things that are very important. The recipe is very simple but the best results come from being diligent with the process.
Visit Winona’s in NYC and online for more delicious flavors and inspiration.
Photography by: Courtesy of Winona's