I thought I had never heard of Oviedo. But I was wrong. Years ago, I watched a silly Woody Allen called ‘Vicky Cristina Barcelona’. In one scene, Javier Bardem tells two American women that they will fly with him that evening from Barcelona to Oviedo and then make passionate love. The Americans rolled their eyes and said ‘Where’s Oviedo?’

That movie brought 15 minutes of fame to the capital city of Asturias. And the city acknowledged Woody by making a statue of him. It deserves a lot more fame than that. Padma and I spent the afternoon strolling the city and were enchanted with its calm, cleanliness, interesting architecture and great food.

We found an al fresco café and ordered a ‘menu del dia’. We started with fabada asturiana (a faba bean stew) and followed by fried fish and a desert. The waiter brought a bottle of wine and some bubbly water as a mixer (lunch wines – and cheap wines – almost always need to be watered down). All that for 12 euros.

In the Woody Allen film, the American women were glad they took a chance with a stranger. Padma and I were equally glad we had a chance to get to know this, until now for us, little known capital city of Asturias.