Since my visit to Asturias, Spain, last October, I’ve been dreaming about a rustic chicken dish I was served there. I was visiting for the natural paradise that is Asturias, with hiking, climbing, horseback riding, kayaking, even coal mining on my itinerary. But all that exercise led me to explore the fantastic kitchens of the region too.

The clouds of Asturias roll in over the rocky shore from the Cantabrian Sea like fog, filling the valleys and cascading over the low hills to butt against the spikey ridgelines of the Pico de Europa mountains in the interior, causing them to look like islands in an inland cotton sea. We drove to this view early one morning on a winding mountain road, the only traffic a herd of cows coming down from their summer pasture, nonplussed by our presence, yet they skitter by, their cowbells echoing the change of seasons through the valleys long after they pass.