Made in Spain

23. Inside The Royal Andalusian School Of Equestrian Art

• Made in Spain • Season 4 • Episode 5

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Step through the gates of Jerez and into a world where horses dance, leather is stitched by hand, and a French‑style palace shelters Spain’s living equestrian heritage. We head to the Royal Andalusian School of Equestrian Art to see how classical dressage and Doma Vaquera are taught, preserved, and performed with precision and heart. From the first moments on the grounds, the details floored us: spotless stables, braids like artwork, and a team that treats horsemanship as a craft worth a lifetime.

We tour the carriage museum inside a former sherry bodega and discover how engineering and elegance once ruled the streets: royal wedding coaches, ingenious suspensions, and the right‑hand driving legacy that still shapes the UK. In the saddlery room, students work leather the old way, building saddles layer by layer with natural stuffing and careful stitching. This is a real school with five disciplines—dressage, saddlery, grooming, vet, and carriage driving—offering multi‑year training to a select few. For riders, bespoke clinics put you on schoolmaster horses that feel like professors, compressing years of learning into focused sessions.

Then the music starts. Como Bailan Los Caballos Andaluces unfolds like a ballet: pirouettes, lateral work, airs above the ground, and synchronised patterns that make a 600‑kilo stallion look weightless. It’s not spectacle for spectacle’s sake; it’s trust, timing, and quiet aids in perfect balance. Along the way we connect the dots between Jerez and sherry—why the region led early electrification, how British merchants and Spanish producers built a global trade, and what makes Pedro Ximénez taste like sunshine concentrated in a glass.

If you love travel, craftsmanship, or horses, this journey belongs on your list. Hit play, get inspired, and share the episode with someone who needs a little Andalusian magic. Subscribe for more Spanish stories, leave a review to help others find us, and tell us: would you ride, study, or just sit back and watch the dance?

SPEAKER_00:

This episode of the Maiden Spain podcast is powered by GoCo Energy, clean natural energy for life at the speed of Go.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, Laura, we've got a really exciting episode ahead. This is episode five, season four, and we were so fortunate to be able to head south. And we are going to introduce to our audience the Royal Andalusian School of Equestrian Art based in Jerez. I'm Nalini Sharma.

SPEAKER_00:

And I am Laura Senior Garcia. We are delighted to be here with you as the co-host of the Maiden Spain podcast. Please, please, please remember to subscribe, follow, interact with us, do your ratings, your recommendations. We really appreciate it. All your interactions with this podcast allow us to continue to make this project a reality and continue to improve it as we go along.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and also just to interact with our audience. Would love to get some questions. So of course. Yeah, please reach out on all our socials. All right. So um, would you say this was a highlight going to the school?

SPEAKER_00:

Oh my goodness. I think uh I was thinking about it because it's been a lot. Uh we have, you know, done so much on this little trip, and we have another episode that we're doing about some of the other things we have done. But we truly believed that the visit to the royal school or the royal equestrian school, and yes, as Nalini said, I'm gonna say it one more time. It's Royal Andalusian School of Equestrian Art or in Spanish. In Spanish, it is La Real Escuela Andaluza del Arte Cuestre. Right.

SPEAKER_02:

So they say it's where the horses dance. Exactly. Um okay, so let's get into it. We were staying in Cadiz for the couple of days that we were there after a brief stop in Sevilla.

SPEAKER_00:

We could have stayed in Jerez. We could have. However, the one thing is that as many things that we do, you know, I think we had the trip planned, but not the not the accommodation fully. Because we got, you know, you think about it, you think, oh, you know, we're going in October. We actually visited on October 10th. Yeah. And you think, well, it's not the high season anymore. We'll be fine. And all of a sudden we start looking at hotels in Seville, uh, etc. etc. And it's fully booked.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, fully booked.

SPEAKER_00:

Everywhere.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, thankfully, we had accommodations in Caddies, which was actually that we're gonna cover that in the next couple of episodes because that's a whole other topic. But today it's just horses, horses, and horses, which is our sort of new hobby that Laura and I have. We really enjoy it.

SPEAKER_00:

I think it's kind of becoming more than a hobby, but I do think I want to say, if you're sitting there thinking, like, okay, what's this got to do with you know, made in Spain and you know, this podcast? And it really has everything to do because it is something that I think a lot of people don't know about. You know, people ask us since we do the podcast, oh, you know, if I visit Spain, where should I go? And people always think of Barcelona, Madrid, and we still have resisted doing that Barcelona episode, which is coming later on in the next season. Uh, but I don't think a lot of people know about the school, and I don't think it could be any more Spanish. You know, it's the equestrian side, right? But there's so much about there, which we'll get into in a moment, that is so representative of Spain, whatever way you look at it.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, it is a real um project that they've undertaken, and it's a real love that they have for the equestrian art, the tradition, uh, and everything that really surrounds it to promote you know, equine the that whole industry, because it's something that maybe is not necessarily falling off, but how do you keep these traditions going unless you actually have a school like that that highlight highlights and showcases the entire process of it? So we drove from Caddi's to Jerez, which wasn't maybe like a 40-minute drive, super easy. And I mean, again, because we haven't gone to these places, we don't have a reference in terms of what it's going to look like. So, in our minds, or at least in my mind, I was picturing something maybe a little bit more rural, like a ranch, like a ranch, or maybe just a not necessarily outside of the city, but maybe on the edge of it with um, yeah, like what you would just picture horses being at. It is not like that. It is directly in the center of the town. It is, and it's in a neighborhood, actually.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, it is, and there's a number of reasons for that. Uh, and we'll we'll get more into you know the history of the royal equestrian school uh in in a bit. I do think it's very important. You know, we are extremely grateful to have the opportunities that we have, and I'd like to do just some shout-outs, yes, please, some gratitude moments uh for the people of the Royal Equestrian School. First of all, they are beyond nice, and I know there is a tendency, uh, I know that people here believe that too, is that the people from the south of Spain tend to be very welcoming and very friendly. And my goodness, that was an accurate representation of what we saw. So we reached out to Sandra, who's the press director uh from the school a few months ago, and we said, you know, we are you know doing this project which is very near and dear to our hearts, and you know, would like to be able to speak with you and just to get a little bit of the behind the scenes about the school. And they were so open, they were so nice. Uh, we got to meet the director of the school, and I want to shout out to Rafael, who's the school director to Javier, uh, who actually was our tour guide. He did so good.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh my goodness. Yeah, fantastic. So taking him home in my pocket, right?

SPEAKER_00:

And his English was perfect, yeah. And then we had Rocío, which we'll talk a little bit more later. Uh, so shout out to Rocío, who is one of the only employed uh writers that's a female currently at the school. And also we had Serena, who is the director of education. Yeah. So thank you very much for the staff for having us, for hosting us.

SPEAKER_02:

It was uh, I mean, a real unbelievable day. And I've people uh since we've come back, I've been telling people about our trip, and we've said the same thing that even if you're not necessarily interested in equestrian arts, which to be honest, up until I don't know, last week, I wasn't that interested in it. However, you get there and you are so captivated by the whole experience. So the school is in the center of the town. Um you enter through, you know, we went through the parking uh entrance, but you can go through the the main entrance. I would say parking seemed readily available, so that wasn't an issue. It has been around the school itself since the mid-70s, about 1973. Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

Um that's the year actually that it was founded.

SPEAKER_02:

That it was founded and then eventually became a public institution in the early 80s. The official head of the school is uh on the board, is the King of Spain, uh sort of the honorary head of the school. Um the first thing that Javier told us is that yes, there is a museum and there's a show, but what's I think one of the most important things about the school is that it is actually a school. It's a university. It's a university with five disciplines. So you have TAC, you have grooming, you have the vet program, you have the dressage, and you have uh what's the last one?

SPEAKER_00:

Uh Tac grooming. The carriages, the carriage.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so it's carriage driving. Okay, so you have carriage driving, tack, grooming, vet, and dressage. Every year they have in total about 40 students that they take in for the entire all for all the disciplines. So imagine that maybe per discipline it's like six people. Six people, and it's an application process. So you have to apply, they're only taking the best of the best into the school.

SPEAKER_00:

And most of the programs are four-year programs. Yeah. So that's why in my head it is a university because you're like going to this university to understand how to make a saddle, how to work with leather, how to preserve tradition around certain things. So, a couple of things I just wanted to mention in terms of the years. So in 1973, this the school was formed by Alvaro Domek Romero, and it was under the decree of the King Juan Carlos. Yes. Uh, so that's why it's called Royal, because they do have the royal decree, and the mission is to preserve Spain equestrian heritage, particularly the classical dressage and the Doma Vaquera.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes. And the Spanish horses are prized for their just their overall their physicality, their um temperament, the breeding. So that was a big part of it as well, is to preserve that sort of purebred Spanish horse trade and keep it alive because the horses are so well suited for many disciplines. And that's what Javier was telling us. The school itself has about um 140 horses, most of them stallions, some of them are geldings, which look up what that means.

SPEAKER_00:

So there's I think 120 of them are uh from the 140, 120 or so are purebred horses.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, stallion and uh so and I asked him, is that difficult, you know, to have stallions that many? And he said, actually, no, just because of their breeding, they're a really lovely horse to be around.

SPEAKER_00:

So it was funny, and I'm just gonna come out and say this because Nalane and I noticed that the horses are not being castrated, let's just put it that way. And it's very obvious. Uh, but apparently, because the breed is friendly and because they are, you know, not you could say um aggressive or whatever you want to call it, they can get away with uh, you know, letting them not be castrated. Right. And I'm sure there's also good reasons as well to do that because obviously afterwards they make a lot of money, right? With uh being able to use them as studs. But what was funny is, you know, I think at one point I always say, sometimes I have these blonde moments. I'm allowed to say that because I am blonde. Uh, you know, we I I actually said, like, what about the Yewas? You know, the female horses. Why is there no female horses here? And uh, and the gentleman kind of looked at me and went, you know, there's uh 140 stallions, 120 of them are not castrated. Lady, do you know what would happen if a female horse walked in here? And I'm like, oops, yeah, that makes sense. Mayhem. That kind of makes sense. So let's kind of walk step by step. We get there, we get met by Javier, and there are some specific areas that I think are worth mentioning about the school. There's uh palace, formal gardens, training arena, stables, saddlery, and two museums.

SPEAKER_02:

Two museums. So we started, he took us first to the uh carriage museum. So what's interesting about the carriage museum is that it's located across the street from the school itself, but it was an old sherry uh uh production facility, you would say, uh, or where they would they house the sherry in there. So the because um sherry is stored in barrels and it has to be obviously kept, you know, like most alcohol at a certain temperature, the buildings tend to have a certain feel and look to it. So they're longer, they have the wooden beams, the very high ceilings. And they have carriages from pretty much all over the world, some from Spain, some from England, just different parts, and very interesting to look at the how they're they've been preserved.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, exquisite. I mean, they're just like one of them, for example, was the one that has been used for multiple Spanish royal weddings. Yeah. And they even have like the videos of the royal weddings being shown. But I think, you know, I've seen carriages before in museums and different places, but it didn't hit me until we were in that museum of how much these carriages were kind of like sports cars in a way. And status symbols. Oh, yeah. It's like, oh my god, look, you know, it's like I thought this is like the Ferrari or the Lamborghini or the carriages, you know.

SPEAKER_02:

And he I actually, which was when you get these little bits of history, is super cool. When he was showing us uh a particular carriage, and he said, Do you see that the brake is on the right hand side? And he then explained, he's like, the reason that the driver, the carriage driver, was on the right hand side, because this way when you were passing on the street, you would be and you have your the whip or the you know for the crop for the horses. Um, you're on the right, you're passing, and the other driver is furthest away from you, so you wouldn't accidentally, you know, hit the other person. Yeah, you guys whip him in the face. And he said, the reason that they still drop with the cars with the right hand steering in the UK. In the UK is because they kept it from the carriages. That's where it was, and it never sort of changed over to the other side. And it was such a mind-blowing, I'm like, oh, and you know what I I couldn't tell you because we were just all talking and getting our history lesson. But one of the carriages that were that he was showing us, it was a smaller carriage and just the way that it was built. So he was actually showing us the under part of it, you know, the mechanism. It's called, that's actually what the carriage is called. And then they have the springs, you know. So the springs that hook onto the the front part, you know, so that would pull the horses. If you go to a Pilates class, it is exactly like a carriage. A reformer. Or that is what they call it, the carriage. Oh, that's so funny. That's actually the terminology in a Pilates class, and it looks exactly the same. It's a rectangular shape, and they have the springs with the hooks. And I looked at it and it was almost like PTSD, like, oh, I know what that is.

SPEAKER_01:

It's a Pilates reformer. But that's what it comes from.

SPEAKER_00:

In the carriage museum, actually, they call it to be precise, El Museo del Engante. Yes, because it includes all. It includes all the things, not just the actual carriage, but I don't think there is a word for engante as such in in English. But engante basically means the carriage, the clothing that the people would wear driving the carriage, the poles that separate the horses, the whole thing. All of it. A couple of like interesting ones that we saw in there. One of them was built for one of the kings, I can't remember which one, who was very overweight.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, yes.

SPEAKER_00:

And he kind of had it built so that he could go in and out easily. Yeah. Uh, because it was hard to get into like the little doors of the other one. So we kind of had it custom fit because he liked to eat a little bit too much. Um then I think the other thing that's interesting about that particular museum and also the rest of the whole installation, the level of cleanliness and pride in detail of everything, it's just mind-blowing.

SPEAKER_02:

It really is. I mean, you would be if you if somebody were to blindfold you and take you inside the grounds, you would not think there were horses around. No. Because it does not smell as if there are horses around. Right.

SPEAKER_00:

Exactly. And you do get to see some of the horses up close. They are absolutely gorgeous. So let's continue our little visit. So first we went to the museum and then um and then where do we go next?

SPEAKER_02:

We went into the the palace. We went to the palace. We went to the tack room.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, we went to the tack room, and in the tack room, we saw the teacher who was instructing three students on the art of tack from again, there they were actually working with bits of leather. And I just thought it was so cool because I thought to myself, this is what people want to think about is happening. Like, let's say when you're making a Hermaise bag or making a Louis Vuitton bag, is someone sitting there in an artisan way is working with the letter and putting things together, and that may not be exactly what is happening, but in this case, these are these kids are learning how to make, and I say kids, they may have been like early 20s from what we saw, and they were learning, you know, how to do everything from scratch by hand, no kind of machinery, nothing. No, it's a three-year program.

SPEAKER_02:

It's incredible. It's a three-year program to learn how to how to do it. And we were able to see the the construction of a saddle from um the beginning all the way to the end of it. The and they had Western saddles there as well. But it was very interesting that they used the um inside the saddle. That blew my mind. Yeah. That it's like, what do you call it? Like hay. Yeah, it's the hay that's inside, that's actually inside the construction of the saddle, the the part that kind of fills it out before you start to build the layers up with the padding and the leather, etc. So we were able to see that. Um, we also got to go into the room where they keep all the gear, like the saddles and the bits for the horses, which in itself to me looked like it could have been a museum. And I actually asked Javier, is this a working room? And he said, Yes, this is where all the equipment is stored. But again, completely spotless.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, and there you can kind of get that beeswax and leather smell. Unbelievable. It's that smell of saddlery, you could say. And then the other thing there as well that's really cool is the Museo del Arte Cuestre. That's where they have all the different riding costumes, all the bits. And I mean, some of the, and I, you know, I couldn't help myself. I was like, how much is one of these saddles? Like, you know, you have a saddle that's taken God knows how long to make, and you know, they range from a thousand and something to multiple thousand euros. But if you think about it, I'm like, yeah, I can see that. I can 100% see that. It's so expensive to make these things. And I thought one cool thing going to the tack, uh, there was a student that went through it who then opened, he's a now a handbag designer in Jedith. He opened his own shop. We need to look up the brand and we'll maybe put it in the episode notes. Uh, and he basically makes these beautiful handmade handbags, yeah. And one of them, which is a saddle. Like, yeah, it looks like a saddle look to it. It's really cool. Very, very cool and super high quality. Imagine, you know, finding those kind of things, very non-commercial, you could say. Uh, so so that was the other part of the visit. And then we then went on to the palace, which I was very impressed by.

SPEAKER_02:

So the palace was originally um I because I was trying to figure out the location of the school itself, because it's in the center of the town. It I asked, this means that either it came from royalty or a family owned it. And he said yes. It was so it was originally owned by a French gentleman, which he and then when you see the actual palace, you can see the French influence. It really does look like a chateau. Yes. So, and then it was passed down to an English family, and they, I mean, it was a person's house. It's where they lived and raised their family, and you know, through so pretty, and through generations, um, then basically became a public institution.

SPEAKER_00:

I think what's cool about the palace, there's there's a few things that really stand out. The actual place is called Recreo de las Cadenas.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

It is attributed to the architect Charles Garnier. And I cannot remember now, but they did tell us he's very famous for another construction building that is in France. So, more to be said, there was so much information on that trip. But anyway, so Charles Garnier's the attribution. I thought it was pretty cool that supposedly the first family that owned it, it was a present from the husband to the wife. Like, oh, you know, it's like, man, why don't we get presents like that? What? You know, I want a palace in Andaluthia with nice little horsies. You know, it was absolutely gorgeous. And then the other thing that was pretty cool about the palace, one of the rooms, so intricate in terms of the artwork. We actually took some pictures, which we'll put on socials, had each door was a different star sign. Yeah. So you can, and they I mean, we're looking, but they're definitely the star sign. So you can actually take a picture underneath your star sign. And apparently a lot of people do that. But the palace is very, very beautiful.

SPEAKER_02:

And they also it also has a two-way mirror. Yes. Oddly enough. Yes. So that if you were entertaining, you have a great room, and then you have sort of the ante-rooms to the side where you know the overflow for a party would be through the this huge, you know, beautiful, intricate looking mirror. When you look through it, you can actually see into the other, it's sort of like an optical illusion. You can see into the other room to know what was happening. I guess it's probably for the staff to make sure to refill drinks, etc.

SPEAKER_00:

What we discuss that Nalina and I, I think kind of you know reflected on is people used to put a lot of investment, of effort and time into their social events before.

SPEAKER_02:

Right. Because they didn't have phones. Yes. To doom scroll.

SPEAKER_00:

Exactly. So they had to do something. So one of the things that we learned also during the visit is that, and Nalina's gonna talk to us a little bit more about Sherry, but that Jerez was one of the first cities in Spain, which if you haven't been, it's hard to realize. Like you think, why? You know, like so southern, blah, blah, blah. Why not Madrid? Why not Barcelona? One of the first cities in Spain to have electricity, like electrical installation. And the reason being it was very wealthy, and there was a lot of tourism, I guess, from back in the day. I mean, this, you know, palace was built for a French family, then it went to a British family.

SPEAKER_02:

But it's because of the sherry export.

unknown:

Right.

SPEAKER_02:

So, and the, I mean, we we'll talk about it, but just when you see the names of certain sherry producers, it has a Spanish name hyphenated with an English name. Which seems very unique. Yeah, it seems odd, but it was just part or g organically that if you know the English uh family lived there and got into sherry production, the names became hyphenated. So it seems strange, but completely normal in that area. And everybody drinks sherry down there.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, which is interesting because I have to say, we're gonna try it. We're gonna have it for the slice of life, but I do not know how you can have more than one sherry. I s I'm still trying to figure that out. Yeah, that's a difficult one.

SPEAKER_02:

Um, all right, so we've done oh, and we also got to see the horses being sort of exercised. Yes, which is funny. There's a horse gym. There's a horse gym. Which I mean, maybe it's normal in these equestrian centers. I've never seen that, but it was really cool. Yeah. And then I asked, actually, my son asked uh the heavier, how do you, when you stop, because they have to go in the opposite direction. Air AirT asked them, how how do they know to turn around? And he's like, Oh, they know. They know, they just know. So when the machine stops, they automatically just turn themselves around and start walking in the opposite direction.

SPEAKER_00:

It's their little routine. I I will say that now we're gonna talk about the show itself, but give yourself time when you go to look around, to go to the museums. I would recommend don't just go for the show.

SPEAKER_02:

No, because I mean it's so much beautiful place. And it's the grounds are beautiful. Yes. I mean, it's like stepping into they actually just filmed young Sherlock there. It's literally like stepping into a they do a bunch of movie recordings. Yeah, like a whole other world. You go behind the gates, you're in the center of this little ancient town, and you have this French palace, you have the most magnificent stallions. I mean, you couldn't make it up. You couldn't make it up in your mind. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And for those of you who are equestrians and who happen to not have heard about it, uh, you know, if you're willing to make the investment and your level is high enough, apart from the former programs, they do customize clinics. Right. Uh, which Serena, the director of education, told us about. So you can send a video and you know, they see where you're at in your journey as a rider, and they make either one week or two-week programs uh that you then go and perfect your riding. And what I said to her, which is so quite funny, is you know, it's almost like doing a course with a horse that has a PhD. Right. Because these horses are not only used obviously for training, they're also used for the show.

SPEAKER_02:

The show, which is okay, so we they were kind enough to give us um uh we got to sit. I mean, I sound it's okay. I feel bad.

SPEAKER_00:

We're embracing it. Sounds very bougie, but we're bougie.

SPEAKER_02:

That's a bad they they gave us seats in the VIP box. And we were the only four people in the VIP box. And people are looking at us like, so who are those people? So if you think of a an arena, the way, you know, it's like an oval in a in a way. And we were sitting uh at the top of it or in front, the way the show plays. So the horses come in from the back and they basically ride up to the box to kind of start the show. So whoever's in the VIP box, you get the best view. They do obviously play to the crowd. The arena is not, it's a big arena, but it's not so massive. Any seat in there is good to appreciate the show.

SPEAKER_00:

I I do want to say that, you know, like I say, you know, we are bougie and kind of embrace it. We are so grateful to have the opportunities that we have to do this stuff. And it was hilarious when at one point Javier said, Yeah, you know, we've had Sports Illustrated here, Times magazine, The New Yorker. I'm like, and the Maid in Spain podcast. Here we come. But we are super grateful for these experiences. I and I do think uh this particular one, it is like a memory-making.

SPEAKER_02:

No, I mean really, but the show, the best way to sum up the entire show is that you watch horses dance.

SPEAKER_00:

Their dancing. The show itself is called Como Bailan Los Caballos Andaluces.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_00:

So how the horses, how the Andalusian horses dance. Yes. And if you've never seen anything like it, which again, if you haven't been there, you probably haven't, because it's very, very specific. It is like watching a ballet with horses.

SPEAKER_02:

A thousand percent. I mean a thousand percent. The the the choreography that they do with the these animals that are how many uh whatever kilos and the they're stallions, so they're already tall and big, powerful animals. Um, and a lot of the riders, they're not I mean, just by the nature of what they do, the fact that they have control over these horses is so unbelievable. I mean, they make them even jump.

SPEAKER_00:

So I I've got it written here that, you know, when they do the pirouettes, yes, which again a pirouette like a ballet, yes, uh, where the horse is fully off the ground, yes, with you know, all four legs like it's just fully off. It is like your breath gets taken away. And what was interesting to me is that after the show, my face hurt from smiling. Like I smiled the whole time just watching because I was like, oh my goodness, oh my goodness, oh my goodness. That you know, I I just I my cheeks hurt.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it was uh unbelievable. And the the attention to the detail, the horses are so clean. I I have a specialized person braiding them. They have exactly they have um their own groomers, they are so well trained, and I mean, maybe some people might say, Oh, this is the same as a circus, but it is I'm telling you now, it is not the same as a circus. It is an art form, and these people have dedicated their lives to preserving it. They have respect for the animals. The animals are treated. I mean, I'm very kings. The stables that each individual stable, I think it's cleaner than some teenagers' rooms. Absolutely. They they're spotless, they are so well looked after, well exercised, well taken care of. There is a great respect that the rider has medically taken care of. They're they're animal, you know, their canvas, yes, and that's what Javier said. He said some it's like a a painter, you know, and every show is a little bit different.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes.

SPEAKER_02:

So if you Go, I mean, we went in October. Maybe we'll go back next year. We'll we will see a completely different show.

SPEAKER_00:

We have to go back. Because I mean, to me, it's like the first time it's almost like you're seeing it, you start taking it in. The next time you can watch for different things because it is so intricate. At one point, they have like 10 horses out on the arena doing you know steps at the same time. Coordinated. Coordinated.

SPEAKER_02:

It's like synchronized. If you think of synchronized swimming, think of that with horses in an arena.

SPEAKER_00:

With music. So they're actually coordinated to the music. So what I would say is check out our socials. I have like a thousand horse videos on my phone now because of the show. But we are going to be, you know, putting out some videos of the experience and definitely, definitely recommend it. Today I'm actually wearing a shirt that uh I bought at the gift shop. Yeah, yeah. And it's from the Royal Equestion School. I think it's a men's shirt, but I still I just love it. No, I got the little logo and everything here. And I told Nelene, now I have a dream to look forward to, which is like one day being able to go to one of their clinics, which I'm sure is ex, you know, I'm sure it's expensive, whatever, but it's such a beautiful thing to be able to be a part of. And like you said, actually my husband asked me afterwards what was your biggest takeaway or what what kind of you know really hit you. And my comment was the respect between the animal and the rider. And I just want to mention we did interview Rocío, uh, who is this uh female rider, and you know, she talked about, and you can we'll be able to see the interview on socials as well, but she talked about how she grew up as a kid uh from Jerez going to the school and watching the show and thinking, Oh, I wish one day I could be there, I could do that. It was like her dream growing up, and then she said, you know, to then you know, she got accepted as a student, which was already a huge thing, and then a year ago, uh Spot became available to be one of the riders that's there all the time and be employed by the school. So I I asked her, it's like, so what does this feel like to you? And she's you know, I come and live my dream here every day. I'm surrounded by horses, I'm doing what I wanted to do as a kid, and that's one thing that I really feel when you walk in there. People who are there love what they're doing. I'm sure, like anything, there'll be days that are better, days that are worse, but they love what they're doing, and I have so much respect for that.

SPEAKER_02:

So do I. It's it's honestly a little slice of magic in this little town in the southern part of Spain that is very difficult to get to, but it is well worth the trip. If you respect institution and culture and tradition, it is alive and well.

SPEAKER_00:

Awesome. On to our slice of life. So before we dive into our slice of life, a quick shout out to our amazing partner, Goco Energy. You have to try this.

SPEAKER_02:

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SPEAKER_00:

So hydrating, refreshing, and honestly, it just makes everything flow better.

SPEAKER_02:

Welcome to our Slice of Life. All right, so we've just wrapped up what we spent the morning doing in Jerez at the Royal Andalusian School of Equestrian Art. We'll get it. We'll we will get it eventually. That was right. I just checked, that's right. Okay, so what are we drinking, Laura?

SPEAKER_00:

Something very strong called Sherry.

SPEAKER_02:

Sherry. Or in in Spanish, it is Jerez. Named after the town. The town where it's produced, or I'll talk about that in a second. But this particular one is um Pedro Jimenez.

SPEAKER_00:

And you want to just turn it around slightly so I can see it. And because so this supposedly actually won some golden sherry award or something like that. Uh Pedro Jimenez is actually used a lot for cooking as well. Right. So it's used for like fillet with foie gras.

SPEAKER_02:

But this is actually the sweetest sherry because the grapes have been dried in the sun.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, so it's like raisins almost.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so this is the sweetest of the sherries that are available.

SPEAKER_00:

So it kind of smells like honey. It smells like honey, which Nalini hates.

SPEAKER_02:

So okay, I'm telling you now, this one is a lot better.

SPEAKER_00:

Let's see.

SPEAKER_02:

That's a lot better.

SPEAKER_00:

Holy smokes, that's nice. Yeah, I could do this. The other day, I thought my eyelashes were gonna fall off with the one we have.

SPEAKER_02:

It's like you have uh you sort of try to smell the bouquet, and it's very sweet. It's strong. This one's sweet. Okay, so a little bit about uh sherry. So it to be called sherry, can classified as sherry or here, it has to come from a particular triangle.

SPEAKER_00:

So look at the back of the bottle, yeah, and you'll see it there. Yes, can you see it? A little triangle there.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh yeah. That's cool. Um, so the triangle is here. San Lucar de Barrameda. Oh my god. All right. Just do it. Don't worry. El Puerto de Santa Maria. Muy bien. Puerto de Santa Maria, okay. Don't cancel me. Don't cancel me. I'm trying. All right. So sherry winemakers, they only use the Palomino grape, Moscatel, and Pedro Imenez grape varieties. Um, so to be just like champagne, it has to come from that region. There are, all sherry, first of all, is aged in barrels. So the different years give you a different taste, flavor, profile. The youngest drinkable sherry wine is about three years old. It can be either sherry, can be either dry, naturally sweet, or sweet. There are seven types of sherry. And this kind of a joke. There's one for every day of the week. You have the fino de Herez, which is very dry. You have the manzania. Oh my god, that's really hot in Cali. That's a that's for the strong of heart. This is the amontillo. That's a different one. And it tends to be a little bit uh aged. You have olor rosso, which is a young one, palo cortado, you have cream sherry, which is like Bailey's. It's not. It is actually Harvey's Bristol cream. So any English person would know Harvey's Bristol cream. It's like a Christmas tipple. You know, you would typically have like a, you know, those little sherry glasses, you know, something like that.

SPEAKER_00:

I think that's what my granddaddy used to do.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, like a little tipple at Christmas. But it's that's a the most popular one amongst the I would say foreign crowd. Um, and then this particular type, which is the sweetest. And apparently the reason it's so sweet is because the grapes are again dry in the Spanish sun, which is so violent in the summer. And it becomes very concentrated. So you can even see it in the color.

SPEAKER_00:

It's that it's very, it looks like actually it kind of looks like Jaegermeiser, which is scary, right? It's not, obviously. It's it's it's actually very delicious. I have to say that. So slice of life, we went after the Royal Equestrian School. There were a couple of options. We could have gone to a tabanco, which is like uh cold uh tapas and where they kind of serve sherry and that kind of thing. Uh, but we decided to go to what's voted as one of the better restaurants, yeah. And this is called La Carbona in Jerez. Very recommended. It's actually in an old sherry, like I think most nice businesses in Jerez are in old sherry wineries, like in one way or another.

SPEAKER_02:

That's what you call it, because I don't consider sherry to be a wine, but it is. It is kind of a wine. It's from the grape.

SPEAKER_00:

So I think of it as like a fortified wine. That's what they call it. Fortified wine. Okay, I'm kind of strong. Meaning like strong. Here, do you want to give me that?

SPEAKER_01:

Okay, hold on.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay, here. So, what we have here, which I'm not exactly sure it goes with it, but we wanted to bring something from the trip and from the south. This is the legitimate and accredited 1910 Inés Rosales Tortas de Aceite de Oliva Virgen Extra. So, for those of you who have been following the podcast for a while, we know you know we like our crunch. So, we're gonna open these. And I'm gonna give one to Nalini. I've never had this. Okay, so I'm excited. Here you go. Your legitimate and accredited torta de Inez Rochale. Look how it's not pretty, it's really nice. Right. So, what do you eat this with? You eat it at breakfast, uh, for coffee, you name it. Oh, the sherry. These are good. They are now trying a little bit of the sherry with it.

SPEAKER_01:

Wow, these are really nice. So good.

SPEAKER_02:

It's actually if you if people are curious, it's sweet. There's a little bit of sugar on it.

SPEAKER_00:

They're actually really nice. So I believe these are from Seville. The reason what inspired me to suggest that we use it for this particular show is that I was starving in the room, doing some work meetings, and the hotels in the south tend to leave one of these in the room for the city. Oh, do they? Nice. So uh so this is actually I've got the box right in front of me, and it is produced in which I think is very cool. Calle de la Mujer Trabajadora. So the street of the working woman uh in Guevar de Al Jarafe Seville. Oh, very cool. This is where they're from. Yeah, they're pretty good.

SPEAKER_02:

They're really good. And can I just say that the uh restaurant that we ate at, or just I would when you eat in the south, please expect bigger portions, way bigger portions. I mean, the girl, she uh I think she might have wanted us to leave when we're gonna be able to do it.

SPEAKER_00:

He looked at us weird and kind of said, Okay, so we said we're gonna share a few things. We wanted to try the tuna, and we'll get into that a little bit more in the Calieth episode. But you know, we wanted to try the red tuna there is amazing. So we ordered a couple of starters to share, and she looked at us and went, Are you sure that's enough?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, because she said she kept saying, you know, the starter is just for one person, it's very small, and of course it shows up at the table.

SPEAKER_00:

We couldn't finish it, it was you know, way too much. But we also tried this sherry there because you know, Nalini asked, like, okay, what sherry do you recommend? And they brought it out to the table. Um, we were actually uh with Nalini's son and with my husband, so we had three glasses for my husband, obviously. Not for my son, no, and the two of us. Our son's 13 years old, so we're not giving him sherry. So, you know, we served the glasses, and I just looked at both of their faces after they served them, and Naline's like, I'm not drinking this. I'm like, okay, you know, I'll I'll drink it, I'll drink it after like half of mine. I'm like, I'm not doing this. No, like we will not get to wherever we're going.

SPEAKER_02:

And this is not anything against sherry or their production. It's really strong. It's just something that we are not used to. So it would be the same as if, you know, people, you know, wherever you're from, and that's a particular drink that you either fireball in Canada. You grow up with or you're used to. I mean, there's a huge listen, it built that part of the world.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, yeah. So And that was, I think, one of the outside of the Royal Equestrian School, the one kind of big fascination and takeaway for me is oh my goodness, the Sherry built this part of the world. Yes. They have, you know, all the infrastructure, the electricity, all of the things that, you know, initially they didn't have in the other part of the country. So I and also I think that what's worth mentioning as well that we found out was the way it was explained to us is the people there knew how to make the sherry. Yes. They knew how to make it, and it was so popular in the UK. The people who came from the UK and why you have these hyphenated names, they knew how to sell it. Right. So it was the difference between the production and manufacturing process and the commercialization that I think really kind of made the marriage made in heaven, you could say.

SPEAKER_02:

But it's also the fact that the I think producers have retained their ways of producing things, and so it has that very distinct, you know, flavor and the different types of sherries, they still exist because it's still being produced the way it was, you know, a thousand years ago. Tradition, tradition, tradition.

SPEAKER_00:

That's what we're learning. So, sentence of the day. Yes, I have a glass of sherry for this, not beer. And it had to be horse related. You know it had to. So the sentence of the day is a caballo regalado, no le mires el diente.

SPEAKER_02:

Don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes! My first sentence of the day translation.

SPEAKER_00:

Appreciate a gift without judgment. So it comes from, hey, someone's giving you a horse, don't start checking if its teeth are good. Right. You know, how is it a good horse? If it's a gift, it's a gift. You're gonna have to deal with it afterwards. Now, in this day and age, you wouldn't want anyone to gift you a horse because then it costs you a fortune to actually have to upkeep it. But that was the census of the day. So well done.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you. All right. Thank you for watching. Looking forward to our next episode, we are off to Alicante Gastronomic. Bye for now. Bye for now. The Made in Spain podcast is fueled by Goco Energy, refreshingly real energy that keeps the good vibes going.