A pilgrimage to food heaven in Santiago de Compostela

It’s best known for its walking trail but Emma Henderson discovers culinary treasures in the capital of Spain’s Galicia

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Light plumes of steam gently billow from the oval silver tray the waiter presents to our table, accompanied by a salty aroma.

Compared with the enthusiasm that greeted our previous dishes - cockles drenched in buttery olive oil mopped up with bread, and mussels in orangey pernod sauce - its contents are now being met with slightly quizzical looks.

We wait with bated breath for someone else to dig in first. And it’s not because we’re being polite. It’s because the plate of percebes – goose barnacles – has us well and truly stumped. To the uninitiated (as I was mere minutes before), they’re filterfeeding crustaceans harvested from rocks. From a quick glance, they appear totally prehistoric, with triangular silvery-grey shells at one end and cylindrical leathery stalks at the other, hiding the fleshy stem.

Luckily, there’s an expert on hand to help us with this Galician delicacy. I'm sitting next to the godfather of Spanish cooking: chef, author and owner of seven restaurants José Pizarro, who is with us in the small but mighty historic city of Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain.

“Make sure the pointy bit is facing away from you, pinch the leathery stalk to tear it, then twist it and pull it off,” he quickly demonstrates. José bites the little bit of iridescent pinky meat that looks every so slightly gelatinous from the bottom piece he's still holding. After insisting on a few more demos in slower motion, we all follow suit. Once we get the hang of opening them, we’re rewarded with their gloriously sweet meat, which has a good dose of salinity, akin to the best bits of a langoustine or crab.