Letter: Briefly

MICHAEL BATEMAN says the "socarrat", the burnt part of the bottom of the paella, is possibly named after a village on the coast of Valencia ("Grain in Spain", Review, 9 August). "Socarrat" is actually the past participle in Catalan of socarrar meaning "to burn on the outside". The people from Xativa (40 miles south of Valencia) are nicknamed "socarrats" in memory of the fact that their town was burnt by the French-Castillian army in the early 18th century.

NICOLA OEHL, Hull