What's different about the Tenerife African Market in Santa Cruz?

The Tenerife African Market that is called by the locals Recova or Mercado de Nuestra Señora de Africa has the largest open and closed indoor Market space on its island. It also includes a large basement for seafood with a bar for eating out.

Its bronze sculpture of a fishing boat pushed by two fisherman is giving homage to their hard profession outside its main gate that depicts La Recova S/C de Tenerife. 

The top Tenerife international fresh produce market with nothing from Africa and Latin America amiss

Not true? So, kindly contact us telling us what you can't find there...

Rare mushrooms and other perishables is to be bought inside the market. A shop from La Gomera even has breadfruit for sale. 

Huge round chunks of various cheese from all Canary Islands as well as bread and pastries smell so tempting that just walking past is impossible.  Meat, poultry, home-made Italian Pasta, eggs, herbs, but also  flowers and pot plants are adding to the color kaleidoscope. Spices,  coffee beans and the fresh Mint Hierba Buena give off their own aroma. All that's missing is somebody toasting endemic Gofio to make a delicious dish with honey and almonds.  Taste some freshly made take-away food by the chefs of various nationalities in more than one semi-open market kitchen.   

  

More outside street scenes of the African Market Nuestra Señora de África

Each and every of the unusual African Market morning street stalls greets you with its own charming detail by a painted little dog in a door, a cat, a duck or a guise. These mini shops in Calle Guïmar sell all sorts with often  cheap junk but also good antiques and sometimes unusual clothes. An amazing assortment of hunting knives seem to be the craze right now.

Pizzaria Agua y Harina with value for money, as is portrayed above, is ideal for a quick bite and refreshment after the market inside has closed its morning business or after visiting exhibitions of the T E A art spaces  over the road.

Forget the huff and the puff in the Santa Cruz streets outside La Recova and enjoy watching people of all ways of life doing their errands in the market inside. 

Women and men are busy by tables under the shade of the pink sandstone arches around an indoor yard. They are making colorful custom jewelry and small gifts for all tastes.

Socializing is more than often done in the basement section by the seafood bar. There, wine and Oysters are no real luxuries for such occasions. By the way once on Christmas, I saw a fish of such a huge size, as never seen in my life, on sale there.

Address:
La Recova Mercado de Nuestra Señora de África
Avda. San Sebastian 51/Corner C/José Guïmera
38003 Santa Cruz de Tenerife
Tel: 0034 922214743
3800 Santa Cruz de Tenerife

This Tenerife African Market Nuestra Señora de África is now the oldest city market on the biggest Canary Island, as Garachico's was destroyed by a volcanic eruption.

This Tenerife African Market with flair took really off after WW2.  Its prominent, semi-round main gate is  indeed unique in the Canary archipelago and is unlike any Spanish architecture.

Don't arrive before 10 a.m. or after lunch when the market buzz is over, while stalls close by 3.p.m.

First Tenerife African market impressions

Also discover an African root vegetable which is not easily seen in Tenerife. The edible Yuca from West Africa depicted below is not to be mistaken for  Manioc or Casava.  Tapioca Bread is baked with Yuca, for example. However preparing Yuca root requires care, as described by an article of www.livestrong.com

 

All the potato varieties almost set a base theme with the stalls. There are so many types of them. Most are shown off up front at certain times of the year.

Want to learn how potatoes came to Tenerife and what sorts there are?

Tenerife Shop of 1000 herbs

A Tenerife African market has to have a herbal shop. The one of Mercado Nuestra Señora de Africa is called Herboristeria Mil Variedades. That means herbal shop of 1000 varieties. Indeed, so far I have never seen a place which stocks that many herbs.

Spot the helpful way of displaying shop merchandise in this herbal shop

The shop front has two entrances and hides most treasures inside. Many of them are medicinal herbs. The Tenerife Neolithic Guanche must have known some of them, already. Mind they also used plants for mummyfying their Aristocratic dead.

Herbs of alternative medicine for:

• making teas to stop fever,
• against rheumatism
• to cleanse the blood
• against urinary infections
• gall bladder and liver problems,
• stomach tensions or cramps,
• head aches and depressions
• pregnancy discomfort, you name it.

I couldn't list all 1000 of them, as I didn't take stock.

Go to the African market shop of herbs and spices with a good electronic pocket translator, unless you are already familiar with Spanish expressions for healing herbs.

As said, there are also spices, while the precious Saffron is known to be cheap in Tenerife. What is so brilliant with the herbs of this corner of the African Market of Tenerife is again the way in which it is shown off.

Poppies, seed cake and opium at the Santa Cruz capital Tenerife market?

Notice display tags in this alternative medicine shop of the Tenerife African market. Depicted beside are two such tags, one of which reads Amapola that cures common colds,  Asthma, head aches, migraine, insomnia and nerve issues You can bake delicious Amapola poppy seed cake or find it at a German bakery at the Recova market. Opium however is made from a blue poppy flower.

Want rare produce,condiments or spices?

Oriental shop Alimenzano Debin Wei
at Local 02 and 03
Tel: 922 210613 Movil: 608669689

You can even buy the hottest chilly in yellow, red, or green, usually frozen and much more, at the Oriental shop  of the new Recova African Market in Santa Cruz.

Gomeran Produce corner shop

It is  almost beside the Oriental shop. There, Gomerans sell the best Garlic, Ghadra beans also known as Borlotti or Granberry beans,  dainty Shallots and even Breadfruit, as mentioned before.

What's not African with this Tenerife African market?

Bartering is not the norm there. You miss the snake man. No reptile is dancing to the tunes of a flute. Also, no camels remind the desert. No women are sitting on the bare ground with produce for sale spread in front and around them. Unroasted peanuts are unheard of. Indeed, the Tenerife holiday home insider has experienced all this in African countries.

How find this main Tenerife African Market?

Consult the handy Map central market district with 5 more attractions.

Also check how easy you get there from the Titsa Main bus station...

The Tenerife African market Nuestra Señora de Africa is located near by the bridge with the lion sculptures that leads over the gorge Barranco de los Santos next to La Noria the Tenerife capital party street. It's opposite  T.E.A the Tenerife Espacio de Arte that sometimes has museum exhibition events. Indeed our Mercado of Africa complements  T.E.A in a charming way. Here again, the traditional and the modern join hands.

Tenerife capital Sunday street Flea Market

Only the usual street stall i.e.the blue cabin vendors operate also on Sunday mornings during Tenerife's oldest flea market in Calle Guïmar, as depicted further up this page.  In 1944, this new Recova Tenerife African market replaced the architect Oraá's Recova of Plaza de Madera and made it the better and bigger place.

From Tenerife African Market back to shopping in Tenerife where the flea market of Nuestra Senora de Africa is part of.

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