Chocolate & Pistachio Amaretti
A dispatch from the Sobremesa Retreat in Spain
What! A! week!
I’ve just arrived back in London after spending the week in Southern Spain at the Spring edition of Sobremesa, a culinary retreat hosted by Milli Taylor at the truly special Rancho Del Ingles in the foothills of Málaga.
From Sunday to Thursday, we hosted guests for a mix of workshops, tours, demonstrations, and, of course, lots and lots of eating. It was Milli’s idea to name the retreat ‘Sobremesa’, which translates as ‘over the table’, referring to the time spent at the table after a meal, talking, laughing, and enjoying the moment.
Our inaugural Sobremesa took place last August in the height of the summer heat, and we went into this retreat armed with knowledge and excitement to do it all over again, hosting a new group of people and seeing if the magic would happen again. I’m so pleased to say it did. Witnessing our twenty-four wonderful guests gather, starting as strangers and leaving as friends, with promises of reunions, genuine connections, and shared moments has left my cup feeling so full.
It was a pleasure to facilitate these moments through cooking, teaching, and doing our absolute best as a team to embody the true definition of hospitality whenever we could. I often say that the job I’ve chosen - cooking - is a bit of a cheat code. The act of plating up a slice of almond cake with vanilla macerated strawberries, or being Milli’s BBQ assistant, picking fig leaves from the huge Rancho tree to wrap around feta, brings me so much intrinsic happiness. That that cooking also brings our guests pleasure (we hope!) seems too good to be true. And all this with Rancho as the backdrop – a genuinely special corner in the world carved by the Taylor family – thank you to Miyuki and David for shaping it over the course of four decades, it’s an honour to contribute a little to the spirit of the place via my role at Sobremesa.
I’m so thrilled to share a round-up of what we ate and did at Sobremesa this year, as well as share my recipe for chocolate and pistachio amaretti cookies, one of the little sweet treats I prepared for elevenses, aka mid-morning snack, during the classes.
I actually developed this recipe on the fly during the retreat, based on my recipe in SIFT, so it was fun to take my notes and learnings from making these at Rancho and retest them at home!
What we ate at Sobremesa
While I’d love to regale you with the full AM to PM eating schedule, I’ll try to summarise (shout out to Gitai, who, along with months of prep and tireless efforts over the week, made fresh soda bread and blueberry muffins for breakfast in the mornings along with the most gorgeous spread) and focus on the evening meals.
On arrival day, we prepared a welcome tea for our guests: Milli made brownies, which were a delight, and I prepared a couple of almond cakes (Spain has GORGEOUS almonds) and served them simply with a showering of icing sugar, a spoonful of creme fraiche and strawberries macerated in sugar, vanilla and a little orange blossom (a tip from Marie Frank!). After settling in, our guests reconvened for a welcome drink, followed by a sherry tasting with the brilliantly knowledgeable Annie B, and then the most fantastic Paella prepared by Chef Paco, the head chef at Rancho, who is responsible for catering all the weddings and events that take place there throughout the year. I was genuinely wowed by it.
For pudding, I kept the tradition of a big sharing dessert served tableside – a chocolate mousse studded with Málaga wine-soaked prunes, prepared by Milli weeks before.
On the second night, there was a pre-aperitivio tortilla demonstration with Milli (which was then served on the terrace, complete with jalapeno tuna mayonnaise), followed by a more vegetable-focused meal.
Milli made sourdough discard seed crackers, which were served with slow-baked garlic and oregano cherry tomatoes and ricotta. Next came ajo blanco with asparagus and nasturtium from Miyuki’s garden, and Jordon prepared tomato butterbeans with harissa and ñora pepper, sticky roasted sweet potatoes with crunchy fennel salad with Aloreña purple olives and rancho oranges, as well as a green salad (cogollos al ajillo).
It was all rounded off with a Sobremesa favourite: morcilla with apricots. Dessert was Nispero Galette and Greek Yoghurt Semifreddo. I will say – preparing Nisperos, which my class had picked from the tree at Rancho (peeling, soaking, drying, seasoning, placing, and even baking!) took MANY HOURS longer than I thought it would, but the final result was worth it.
The third evening started with a grill demonstration with Milli and Jordon, featuring moutabal with pomegranate molasses, followed by squid, then dinner in the local town, with the most beautiful sunset, and a jaunt to the ice cream parlour.
For the last night, Milli set up THREE separate barbecues, including two right in front of the dinner table. We started by making fresh corn tortillas, cooked directly on the cast iron surrounding the BBQ (such a cool bit of kit!), filled with sticky, slow-cooked pork and topped with pickled onions. Our pescetarian guests had braised runner beans, cotija cheese and fresh herbs in their tacos.
This was followed by a BBQ dinner of dreams with whole fish and the most delicious Abanico Iberico pork, along with feta baked in fig leaves with crudite, Jordon’s braised artichokes, butterbeans and chickpeas, Sobremesa favourites Patatas a lo pobre and romesco to tie it all together.
I decided to bring back the combination of wobbly desserts that I’d loved so much last August. I won’t be bringing these back for the next retreat (though maybe some kind of flan will feature, we ARE in spain, afterall) but I loved these two, cold and creamy puddings so much that I wanted to share them again: The classic sweetly bitter Flan with Coconut Maple Praline (recipe here) and the Lemon Leaf Pannacotta (recipe here), infused with leaves from the tree just 30 seconds walk from the kitchen.
The baking workshop
For the 2026 Sobremesa retreat, I’ve designed a new class all about olive oil brioche dough. The workshop is sort of about finding that place between technique and creativity – after making the dough, it was all down to our attendees to make their own bun dreams come true. Stuff it before baking? Sure! Brulee it after? WHY NOT!
I organised about 40 different ingredients, from savoury to sweet, custards to home-made jams, pastes to spices, fresh to preserved, to pick from, and demonstrated a few techniques. I was absolutely blown away by the incredible combinations that were created, and it was so fun getting to taste them all. Experimentation was delicious, and even the buns that exploded a bit in the oven were fantastic. I also roped in my classes to help with dessert prep, from rolling out flaky galette dough to picking Nisperos, prepping lemons for candying or piping langues de chat. It was a genuinely helpful lift – so thank you very much!
For the last breakfast, I used the dough from the last day’s class to make buns with some of the leftover ingredients (we are a no waste retreat!) and fried the other half of it into donuts for goodbye snacks. We had to go out with a bang, after all! PHEW.
This year’s August Sobremesa retreat is at capacity, but if this sounds right up your street, you can head to www.ranchoretreat.co.uk to sign up to the mailing list for future events. You should also follow Milli on substack — When in Rome — as she’ll be sharing recipes, details and stories from Sobremesa in the coming weeks. Milli has also just set-up an Instagram page for Sobremesa where you can follow updates here: https://www.instagram.com/sobremesaretreat/
The importance of elevenses
At Sobremesa ehis year, right about 11:30, Gitai would arrive promptly at mine and Jordon’s classes (Milli would be at Málaga market around this time, showing her favourite spots to eat, drink and shop from) with hot coffee (or wine, if you so desired). Served alongside was a freshly baked snack. One such snack was a little chocolate and pistachio amaretti.
I love my recipe for classic amaretti, which is in my book SIFT. I decided to adapt it for Sobremesa, making the most of the cacao nibs and Original beans chocolate I’d brought in my suitcase along with lots of other ingredients (it was 24kg on the way out, 17kg on the way back…). I rolled half in sugar and the other half in cocoa powder, which reacted a bit strangely in the oven. Noticing this, I rolled them in sugar as soon as they came out of the oven, which actually looked lovely. I’m not sure which I prefer – the cocoa-rolled ones certainly are more dramatic, but I sort of love how chic the sugar-only ones are, though they are less obviously chocolate-flavoured!
Here’s the recipe below, which I’ve since refined and made at home and you decide which finish you want to do.