“Well it goes, thank you! It is a pleasure to have made this rice for you. Let’s eat! “Go get it, go!” Nandu Jubany can’t stand it when the food he has prepared stays cold. He didn’t have time. The hundred diners who attended his meeting at the Ha’il camp, on the rest day of the Dakar rally, gave a good taste of an exquisite paella, with seafood and fish (prawns, prawns and cuttlefish).
It was the gift, his detail of generosity, that the chef from Calldetenes, with a Michelin star (from Can Jubany), and now piloting an MD buggy, gave to his colleagues on Dakar adventures to celebrate, in passing, the great performance he is having: Nandu, an amateur driver, is the best Spaniard in the general car classification, 29th. An outrage.
Ingredients for 100
10 kilos of rice, 4 kilos of prawns, 8 kilos of cuttlefish and good homemade sauce to make an excellent paella
The chef from Calldetenes had been cooking up the idea of cooking a paella on a rest day for a long time. He already did it in his first Dakar, in January 2018, on the rest day in La Paz (Bolivia). Now he was repeating his specialty, but those who have repeated say that this Saudi paella It was better.
“I went to buy the ingredients at a supermarket in Ha’il. There was everything, it was perfect. But all very expensive. We bought 4 kilos of prawns, they look like prawns from Sant Carles de la Ràpita, 8 kg of cuttlefish, and we have already brought the good sofrito prepared from home and 10 kg of rice. We just have to make a good bite and that’s it. First we will make a paella for the mechanics and another for the others,” he explained to The Vanguard while he cut the sipia with Marc Solà, his co-pilot, and Xavi Padrós, his friend and collaborator.
As a starter, a good pica-pica could not be missed, combining local cuisine such as hummus and pistachios or olives, with other more nostrades such as fuet and cellar ham from Catalonia (here called jam beef), or fries.
-What do you think? I will cook with this paella. “Solà, take her out so they can see her,” Jubany orders with the knife in his hand. I copied.
Nandu Jubany, preparing the paella with the help of his co-pilot Marc Solà and his friend and collaborator Xavi Padrós
The others There ended up being 100 people, most of them friends and acquaintances, including sponsors such as KH-7, journalists, pilots and co-pilots (there were his inseparable colleague Nani Roma; Isidre Esteve, the veterans Jordi Juvanteny and José Luis Criado, Àlex Haro, Eduard Pons , Jaume Betriu or the very young Edgar Canet, among others), but also some rival pilots or caravan neighbors, members of the ASO, the organization, and some spontaneous.
“Today everyone is celebrating,” says Jubany, aware of the good vibes that these social events create after a week of competition, with almost 4,000 km behind them.
Cook a good race
In his second Dakar, first by car, Nandu Jubany is killing it: he is the best Spaniard, 29th overall
In his second participation in the Dakar rally (the first was in 2018, on a motorcycle, through Bolivia, Argentina and Peru), Nandu Jubany preferred the car. “I no longer have the age, the physique, or the time to prepare to ride a motorcycle,” the cook from Calldetenes explained to La Vanguardia. He bought a buggy-type car from MD, hired Marc Solà as co-driver, and allowed himself to be advised by his friend Nani Roma… and there he is: 29th overall in the cars, the best Spaniard in the race.
“Yes, the truth is that the race is going well for us, we have the number one navigator, Marc Solà. Two days ago almost everyone was lost, and much less of us. What is the most determining thing? Well, what are we doing? Those in front have to run a lot to be ahead, and I’m doing another race, mine, wanting to get to the end and we watch a little more than those who run so much. Going at my pace is already quite good, but we risk less and we have angels who take care of us, let’s hope that we don’t make any croquettes until the end, because it is very easy to suffer what Loeb, Laia Sanz or Nani experienced,” he explains as he goes cutting the sipia.
We risk less and we have angels who take care of us, let’s hope that we don’t make any croquettes until the end, because it is very easy to suffer what Loeb, Laia Sanz or Nani experienced.”
“You go a little off the route, get some camel grass and do a cartwheel. I hope I’m lucky and make it to the end, because if not this race has no meaning,” explains Nandu, who has survived the first 3,677 km timed in seven days with hardly any mishaps; 32 and a half hours behind the wheel.
“You have scares every day, someone who says they haven’t had anything… We’ve had a puncture, we’ve gotten lost, we’ve had some small problem with the car. But we have stopped very little, the less you stop, the better,” he reprints the words that Nani Roma, his best advisor, repeats to him.
Nandu is having a super run. I told him: ‘What you have to do in the Dakar is not stop at all. You, shoot, at your own pace. If one comes behind, let him pass, you will find him standing ahead.”
“Nandu is doing a super race. When he told me he would race by car, I told him: ‘What you have to do in the Dakar is not stop at all. You, drive, at your own pace. If someone comes behind, let him pass, let him pass you.’ You will find him stopped later. He is doing an impeccable race. But be careful, everything can still be turned around. But for now, impeccable,” says Nani in conversation with. The Vanguard.
“That’s the important thing about this race: go forward, don’t stop, don’t stop. If you start to stop, to get lost… fatal. Yesterday, the problem was that I had a puncture in the third kilometer, I didn’t believe it,” Nandu Jubany resumes, proud of his performance.
Respect for professionals
“I don’t like being the first Spaniard in cars, because I see how hard it is for professionals to get here. In the kitchen I can demonstrate every day that I can do it well; “They have to do well every day in a race, in which they put a lot at stake.”
And being the first Spaniard in the general classification in cars, being an amateur, against professional drivers, is not something to be taken as a joke. He could stick out his chest, but Nandu is very respectful: “I don’t like this, because I see how hard it is for professionals to get here, it’s a bad job: in the kitchen I can demonstrate every day that I can do it well; They have to do well every day in a race, in which they risk a lot, they train all year, and they leave with a scare. Look at Nani; I train with him and I know the effort he makes, it’s a blow (running out of options) that people can’t imagine, what a shame it is to work all year long only to have everything go to hell due to a mistake or bad luck.”
There are eight days left in the race and Jubany’s options are intact, although he knows that he will not aspire to (absolute) victory by any means. Nandu remains on his initial objective:
“I already told you that I wanted to be among the top 20, I sign with it; to be 22nd, no. But I have to get to the end. If we reach the end we will be up there. We have to try not to let things happen to us. Getting to the end will be success. I was also suffering because I had brought all this to make the rice, imagine that we didn’t make it to the rest day: I would have had to throw it all away. It wouldn’t have gone well…”
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