First catch your pig! Many families keep a pig in a small shed on their land. Foreigners are often horrified when the pig's fate is known, but for older Spaniards, the pig was the only form of meat they would have in the cold winter months, and its value was undeniable.
Between catching your pig and killing it, there are a few steps you need to take and some equipment you'll need to find. One piece of equipment is a bowl which is used to collect the blood, which is then turned into morcilla (black sausage).
The bowls come in all sizes, from 2 feet across (big enough for a Piglet), to 5 feet (big enough for Porky Pig). The bowls are glazed terracotta and have unique regional colours and decorations.
Keeping and killing pigs isn't as popular as it used to be, so the potters who make the bowls have shifted from traditional markets to new ones, including the decorative ceramic sinks below. These are traditional blood bowls but with a hole for the plumbing.
The photographs on this blog were taken by me, unless otherwise noted. If you'd like to share them with friends or use them in some way, please let people know where you found them, or send me an 
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I remember coming to Norway,my aunts and grandmother made blood pancakes,but not from these practical sinks!
ReplyDeleteinteresting! i love the bowl with the blue and the gorgeous tile behind it...
ReplyDeletein iceland (husbands homeland) they have blood pudding derived from lambs blood
Nice bowls but I'll probably never be able to look at them the same way again!
ReplyDeleteWell, I guess some of the cultural history lessons are harder for me to take than others:\
ReplyDelete