WHAT ARE TAPAS"
A tapa (Spanish pronunciation: tapa) is an appetizer or snack in Spanish cuisine. It may be cold (such as mixed olives and cheese) or hot (such as chopitos, which are battered, fried baby squid) and other hot tapas. In select bars in Spain, tapas have evolved into an entire, sophisticated cuisine. In Spain, patrons of tapas can order many different tapas and combine them to make a full meal.  

Today you hear restaurants serving "small plates".  This would be like a tapas plate.

 I have chosen three popular areas to feature in this post:  

Basque (North central Spain & South central France) Madrid (central Spain)Catalonia (Barcelonia) (North eastern Spain)
In some Central American countries, such snacks are known as bocas. In parts of Mexico, similar dishes are called botanas.

According to The Joy of Cooking , the original tapas were thin slices of bread or meat which sherry drinkers in Andalusian taverns used to cover their glasses between sips. This was a practical measure meant to prevent fruit flies from hovering over the sweet sherry. The meat used to cover the sherry was normally ham or chorizo, which are both very salty and activate thirst. Because of this, bartenders and restaurant owners created a variety of snacks to serve with sherry, thus increasing their alcohol sales. The tapas eventually became a...