Restaurante Levante: Benisanó

Levante is a classic of Valencian traditional cuisine, and as you enter you are regaled with photos of the celebrities who has dined there in the past.

It has been modernised extensively, perhaps excessively, although the pervading smell of burning wood pays homage to the fact that they still cook their paellas in the time-honoured way.

There are various dining rooms, and social distancing means that you cannot eavesdrop on the conversations at other tables, however much you try.

As part of the Cuina Oberta initiative, where restaurants normally out of the price range of normal people offer accessibly priced closed menus, we partook of a series of starters, of which the excellent and freshly made croquettes were the stars, followed by the traditional paella with its traditional vegetables and a selection of desserts.

Beforehand we had wandered the streets, as we are wont to do, taking in the castle and the old gateways to the original town, one of which has been turned (historically) into someone’s garage.

The 15^th century castle, open only at weekends, was once the unwilling home to the King of France. Following his defeat at the Battle of Pavia in 1525, Francis I was held prisoner there, a fact that is celebrated annually with a re-enactment.

No doubt Francis would have enjoyed a traditional paella or two at the Levante, except for the fact that it only opened in 1968, although, now on its third generation of family owners, you can listen to the annecdotes of owner Victor telling stories, most of which seem to be aimed at his mortal enemies from Madrid.