My Jordanian father once told me a story; we were visiting Vienna when I was a toddler and we were refused service at a restaurant because of me. Because I was a child. “But there is a dog in here!” he protested (Remember I said he is Jordanian, so letting in a dog and not a child is kind of carazy!). “Yes, dogs are allowed. Children are not.” Discussion closed.  Although children at mealtimes can still be a contentious issue in Northern Europe, in Southern Europe and Spain in particular it’s no big deal.  Where are your children supposed to be if not with you?  And no, you are not expected to wait until they are 18 before going out to eat.  Which means there isn’t really this niche of “children friendly” restaurants.  All people, of all sizes and ages are welcome in all restaurants.

Every now and then though, there is a place that makes special accommodations for little people.  Like Somewhere Cafe in San Cugat.  They’ve gone ahead and made a small corridor full of windows and stacked with colouring print outs and tubs of crayons.  From the moment I walked in with all my three, that’s where they remained.  Poking their faces through the windows when they needed to be fed before getting back to the business of colouring in.

Which gave us grown ups time to eat our food while it was still hot! We were there for brunch so we had eggs.  Mine were scrambled with mixed mushrooms and some leggy asparagus.  My husband had black sausage and sweet roast tomatoes on his.  It was something I would make at home, if I had the time, which for breakfast I never do.  They are up and they want to eat and then they don’t and then they do again.  (Half eaten plates of food everywhere.)

I’m told the chef at this place used to work at Enoteca.  And that he is English (or is he Irish?).  Our brunch is delicious and healthy in the ‘there are lots of tasty vegetables in here cooked right’ rather than here is a defrosted seitan patty that makes me wonder where my free bundle of incense is.

The coffee is excellent.  (I had a feeling it would be since Jordi of Nomad coffee recommended Somewhere to me).  The owners are really into it.  By which I mean, they spent some time in Berlin and were just recently back from Copenhagen with a view to visit London in April.  All to get inspiration and improve Somehwere.  Oh and soon they will have an outdoor terrace!  Meanwhile the town of Sant Cugat del Vallès is so charming.  I kind of want to move there.

Somewhere
San Antonio 56,
Sant Cugat del Vallès
08172
www.somewherecafe.com

When I moved to Bucharest from Kuwait – I must have been about 3 – I was struck by the smell of our local bakery.  It smelled sour, not yeasty like the commercial bread of today.  Baluard in Barceloneta has that same smell, sharp, sour – natural yeast fermenting slowly.  Actually, I had already tried Baluard bread before coming to the shop.  I bought some from the food hall at the Corte Ingles up in Pedralbes.  I was surprised that I had managed to get such good bread for only €3 or so.  Especially since I had found the bread at Reykjavik so expensive (I think somewhere around €7 for a similar amount).Baluard isn’t hip, I don’t think they use organic flour they just make exceedingly good bread.  I would say real bread, how it ought to be made.  And it’s available in a dizzying array of flavours and shapes.  It’s very much a neighborhood place, with the shop assistants knowing their wizened customers by name.

Inside, there is only a slim bench for temporary respite.  This is not an eat in operation.  You will have to take your sandwich to the beach front of Barceloneta or at the lovely square just in front.

Baluard
Carrer del Baluart, 38
Barceloneta 08003
www.baluardbarceloneta.com

The coffee theme has snowballed on this blog.  I am not as obsessed with coffee as all these coffee centric posts may suggest.  However, that a diverse city like Barcelona might be missing a trick is intriguing to me.  Is it that all the expats that come to Barcelona are only here for the sun and lifestyle and they don’t work?  Is opening a place up here prohibitive in some way (doubtful given the density of independent shops)?  Or is the Cafe con Leche too ingrained to try anything new (I mean Parisians seem to be fine with that stuff they call coffee over there).

I haven’t figured it out.  But through word of mouth, I have a handful of places that take the stuff seriously and make a good cup.  (I’ve rounded them up all in one place on the BEST EATS: BARCELONA page).  The Skye Coffee Truck is one such place.  Since it’s a truck, an iconic 1972 citroen HY, I initially assumed that it travels around Barcelona but from what I have seen, it is to be found in the fantastic open spaced studios of Castel Veciana Architects from 9:00 to 13:30 on weekdays.  They also do events but the gal there seemed harried that day and didn’t expand much.  Still, 4.5  hours of guaranteed great coffee in a space large enough to put my house into is ok with me.  And this warehouse living in Poblenou merits further investigation.  I am sure those original spaces will spawn further interesting concepts.  I’m looking forward to it. 

Skye Coffee Co
pamplona 88
08018 Poblenou
Facebook Page: www.facebook.com/skyecoffeeco

One of the first things I did when I moved to Barcelona was to attend a baking course at Espai Sucre.  Not because I need to learn how to bake but to get a glimpse at who might be doing that kind of course.  I loved my baking teacher, Betina Montagne, a woman who wears brightly coloured dangly cupcake earrings without a hint of self-consciousness.  At some point she mentioned she was starting her own bakery so I made sure to get all her details, follow her on all the social media available and sure enough, right on time, she’s opened her bijou store.
La Blanca has only been opened for a couple of weeks but that’s been plenty of time for Betina to fill its shelves with mini bundt cakes in a dizzying array of flavours; pumpkin, chocolate, coffee, lemon-poppyseed. Lots and lots of cake. And a few savoury ones too. All retailing somewhere just under €4.00.  There are also larger cakes, biscuits and brownies with homemade marshmallow that has been torched to fireside hue.
This is a ‘para llevar’ establishment so it’s all to go. Although there are two tiny, stamp sized stools should you wish to have a Nespresso, peak into the kitchen and watch a pro at work.

La Blanca
Carrer Diputació 207, amb Aribau
08011
www.lablanca.es
www.facebook.com/lablancabakery

Yesterday I went to the inaugural ‘street food festival’ organised by BCN Mes and held at CREC in Poble Sec. The reason I am using inverted comas is that the majority of the food stands have a bricks and mortar location in Barcelona.  Which is unlike street food at say Broadway Market (London) or Street Food Thursday (Berlin). All this is relevant because the line of people waiting to get into Eat Street is 3 people wide and two blocks deep (Barcelona blocks are big). It’s epic.Which is what I am thinking when I approach the girl with the worst job in the world (explaining to the sweaty hungry people that “No, she can’t let them in because there is a crowd control issue.”) I’ve got two hours before the twins are up from their afternoon nap, tentatively I explain that I write a blog and could I please get in to take some pictures? “Press was at 13:30.” she turns away. I bite my lip and hover a moment until an actual photographer turns up, towering above the both of us, pointing his massive lens menacingly at her and waving his press card – “your choice, let me in or you don’t get covered.” He’s obnoxious, he wears her down, I duck in behind him.
And so it is, sometimes another person’s hard time is another’s lucky break. Good thing too. I am amazed at the turn out. At how ready everyone seems to be for something just like this. And why wouldn’t they be, everyone else has been doing the food truck thing for ages?  (I get the impression that setting up a food truck or a temporary stand at one of the many markets may be difficult?  And perhaps the food culture in Barcelona is too ingrained compared to that of Berlin which in the last few years has exploded in the most impressive way?)
Also there is this; I feel that new food businesses in Barcelona are looking to monetize a.s.a.p. (a lot are thinking ‘franchise’ from day one), in the same way I feel that in London everyone’s after the book deal - in Berlin, it seemed different.  There was an altruism to a lot of places and money was often seen to be a dirty word.  These are unfounded impressions but I am an instinctive person.  All this to say  finding excellent places in Barcelona can be challenging.  All the more because there are so many places, it’s a swamp of restaurants out here but who is doing it well?  Whose food would I eat over my own? Not many.
And that is the treat at Eat Street. They’ve found some of the better places and in effect done the hard work for you. I will do a roll call for you following the article. I think the best way to find out about similar upcoming events is to follow BCN Mes on Twitter and CREC. But also – you can just go to the actual restaurant since as I said most of the stands have one!

Rooftop Smokehouse
Caravan Made
Lukumas
Melocomo
Spice Cafe
Tlaxcal
Tonka
Negro Cabron
Banh Mi Amb Tu
La Cocina Palpita
La Sopera
Galanga Atelier de Cocina
Caravelle
Bar Seco
Bread and Circuses
Aouatef
Guillermo & Cristina
Merquen
Feast BCN
Mosquito

The Tragaluz Group is a name that you need to know in Barcelona.  I will readily admit that restaurant groups in Europe can conjure negative associations: laminated menus in 7 languages, busking waiters impeding your journey, iceberg lettuce and shredded carrot in the salad – it’s not pretty or tasty. While the Tragaluz restaurants do have menus in 5 languages – they also have great locations, appealing design and food that is usually good if on the pricy side.  Unlike the Albert Adria restaurants, they are spread all over the city so you are usually not far from one.

With Marguerite in town for the weekend, we duck off the tacky Ramblas as fast as we can, onto C/ Pintor Fortuny stopping for a brief minute in Chök to appease my daughter with a chocolate donut before continuing.  Bar Lobo does market fresh tapas and some main dishes.  We select 5 tapas.  Some for flavour: like the fried eggplant (€6.50), the tuna tataki with guacamole (€8.65) and the artichokes with jamon (€8.00).  Others for bulk and to temper the bill to a more acceptable level- patatas bravas (€4.50) and padron peppers (€5.60).  Two coca colas brings the bill to €20 a head which is quite an accomplishment for Barcelona (it’s so much more expensive here than in Berlin).

The waiters are sprightly young things, that hum like sports cars at a red light when they stop to tap your order into an electronic screen, before they are off again, laying down paper table mats, handing out menus, seating fleshy bridesmaids parties. (Ah the joy of being on the Ryanair bad taste route).

For coffee, we opt to walk down to Caravelle (at number 31) and take a to go to watch the skateboarders do their stuff in front of the MACBA.

Bar Lobo
C/ Pintor Fortuny 3
08001
http://www.grupotragaluz.com

I lived in Paris for 4 years and never went to the top of the Eiffel tower, 13 years in London- I never saw the changing of the guard. Because you don’t, do you? I live in Paella land now but it’s so much a part of daily life here that it’s already been relegated to familiar and uninteresting without me knowing anything about it.  So it’s surprising to find myself really caring about the origins of Paella and snorting out loud at the comedy act that is our teacher chef Javier Morón Uceda at Barcelona Cooking.  “If the rice does not sing, if it does not do this…” claps his hands and cheers enthusiastically “when the liquid hits the pan, stop the paella, start stirring and you will make an excellent risotto – instead of a mediocre paella.”  Javier is full of these one liners. About ham he advises us not to go for the most expensive one and assume it’s the best because “like everything in this life, the best is the one you like.”

If you take the morning class at Barcelona Cooking, it starts off with a trip to the Boqueria to buy the ingredients for the day. Javier excitedly points out the 3 essential dried peppers to Catalan food (Pebrot “Choricero”, Nyores & Guindilla Picant).  He recounts, as we gather round the salted cod stand, how his great grandmother used to give him a piece of salted cod (with the salt flakes very much still on) and an orange for his merenda every day, “I would take a bite of one and then the other.” he rolls his eyes heavenward with pleasure at the memory.  He tells us how if you cook cocochas (hake chin) at 80ºC and swirl it around ever so gently, you release the gelatin and are left with a dish that has a velvety mouthfeel. Javier is indefatigable, funny and enthusiastic but he is also a chef with twenty years of experience having worked at Michelin starred Miramar, Escriba and in any free time he has had, learned to make bread from Anna Bellsolá of Baluard.  Barcelona Cooking is one of the highest rated cooking courses on Tripadvisor and is most popular with Americans and Australians.  My experience with similar “get to know about the local food way” cooking courses is they are watered down to a level that it’s not worth attending.  Barcelona Cooking steers clear of this short-sighted strategy.  Started by three Galician friends, Emma, Candido and Tony, in 2012 in an apartment overlooking the Rambla – by 2013, demand was such that they installed a second kitchen.  Candido is also one of the teachers and is joined by 3 other chefs during the week; Javier (who I want on speed dial), Kindra and Svetlana (who sometimes teaches in Russian).  The wine we drink on the course comes from Emma’s family vineyard; Rias Baixas.  The olive oil is almost sweet, coming from 100 year old Arbequina trees grown on the Trenca wild life reserve. (I buy both the wine €15 and the olive oil €12).

The 6 other people on the course are all American. They come from California, Texas & Tennessee. They are visiting Barcelona for less than a week but they have made time and allocated part of their budget for this course. I live here, I assumed I had absorbed my knowledge of (certain) Catalan food through osmosis or the Catalan chapter in Culinaria Spain.  6 hours have taught me that I know little, that this region’s recipes and traditions are multifaceted and complex with plenty of anecdotes to accompany every ingredient and recipe.  And that I want to know more – this was a good place to start.

Barcelona Cooking
La Rambla, 58, ppal 2 (2nd floor)
08002
www.barcelonacooking.net
Morning Classes including a visit to La Boqueria: €78
Evening Classes (18:00 – 21:00): €65

Menu Cooked
Pumpkin and Pear soup with Roncari blue cheese and edible flowers
Calçots with Romesco sauce
Paella
Crema Catalana
Red & White wine from

***I was invited to attend this cooking course by Barcelona Cooking.  I bought my wine and olive oil to take home.***

We’ve had three consecutive weekends of friends visiting. After 7 months in Barcelona, we know where to take visitors.  Still, Easter weekend proved a challenge, the city was practically boiling over with visitors and yet many places were closed.  Including the crown jewels in the Albert Adria crown (Tickets, Pakta, 41º Experience & Bodega 1900). Which left the places without the pictures on the Bcn 5.0 website – the ones missing personalised social media buttons; Rias de Galicias (fish restaurant), Espai Kru (modern fish with emphasis on raw fish & seafood), Casa de Tapes.  Long winded introduction – true – but I am fascinated by the marketing.  (Why do the latter 3 fall in a different category with less promotion than the former?)On my last visit to Pakta, the waitress had enthusiastically recommended Espai Kru to me: a la carte instead of Prix Fix, laid back with delicious food. Espai Kru it was, a table for two, for lunch on Saturday. And then we got there.  We climbed the stairs up to the first floor where we were confronted with a big, glossy poster advertising a Range Rover. Martini branding in Bodega 1900 – it works – but Range Rover? And then there was the music. 3 songs in we started wondering if the staff had left their own music playing by accident?  I asked our waitress, Anna (the best waitress I’ve had in 10 years) if what we were listening to was the restaurant playlist (tunes like Bonny M’s Sunny, September from Earth Wind and Fire, Chaka Khan – Ain’t Nobody) – perplexed she answered yes.After a glass of the fantastic Blue Fin Mestres Cava it all started to make sense, the poster, the music, the friendly waitress. What is often missing in these big name restaurants is silliness, humor, getting some things wrong – like having a big Range Rover poster to greet guests.

We had some incredible dishes – a wonderfully presented ceviche of red mullet, presented whole with its body sliced into slivers and marinated in vivid lime and cilantro.  When Anna saw us hesitate, trying to do the math while ordering she helpfully arranged (with no judgment – something I have noticed many a time in Barcelona) for us to have say 1/2 a dish.  So normally the tuna belly with miso and radish would cost €18.00 but we had half a portion so it worked out at €9.00.  Similarly, she insisted we try the marinated pineapple but we were thinking “Yeah?  Really?  How is that going to be worth €8.00?”  so she gave us 0.33% of a portion which worked out at €2.64 (I’m happy Anna insisted). As with most of Albert Adria’s places, the desserts are out of this world. We ordered (again directed by Anna) Torrija with turrón ice cream.  Torrija is French Toast.  We weren’t expecting to be wowed by something so simple.  But. It. Was. Incredible – Sublime – Insane.  A light brioche on the inside with parts of it soft like custard, on the outside it was toasted and covered in caremelised sugar like on a crema catalana.  And the turrón ice cream, so smooth.

We had such a wonderful afternoon.  Four hours passed in a giggle.  The food was outstanding and there were only two other tables besides our own so it was relaxed and so much fun.  I recommend – if ever you can’t get into the blockbuster Albert Adria places, try Espai Kru.  It’s true that it is not as strong a concept as some of the more famous ones but it is exceedingly good.

Espai Kru
Carrer Lleida, 7
08004 Poble Sec

I avoid making bread. Cake, cookies, tarts? Yes, yes and yes. Work clean, measure accurately, get the oven temperature right and with a good recipe, success can always be achieved. Bread on the other hand requires time, commitment, nurturing and being open and receptive to what it’s telling you. Bread making is like taking care of a child. And I have 3 of those so my patience and intuition are worn thin, I am full to the point of bursting in the deciphering mercurial temperaments department.

So bread? Not so much in my house.

I do like to eat it though and watch Anna Bellsolà make it on Youtube. All topsy turvy and not the way I do it at all (the way I do it is stick everything into the Kitchen Aid, mix, put cling film on top and wait for it to rise – no art or beauty in the process. But Anna, to make a ciabatta, she starts by mixing flour, water and salt. She works that dough. She rests it. Later she adds crumbled yeast to it. (!!!) She rests it. Then she pours green olive oil on and somehow coaxes the bread to suck it all in. By the end, having worked with a dough so wet, it would have intimidated me into adding an avalanche of flour  (but not her) –  she has a dough so round, pert and perfect that when she slaps it, it sounds like she is slapping a baby’s bottom.

She’s also got that super-mujer thing going that they manage to do over here. (Like Elena Arzak, named the best female chef on the planet and somehow mother of two, who doesn’t look like a crazy bag lady but you know – no big deal.)   They can do cute as a button and be tough as nails.  I know this by now but I am still surprised.

I recognize Anna as she walks out from the kitchen and in what is my standard protocol of not thinking before I speak – I blurt out “Anna?”.  “Yes?” she answers – should she know me?  She is small and pretty and totally absorbed in the running of her second premises at some point she smells smoke and has to rush off before returning to give me her email. How is it that everyone is not talking about her?  About this great second location the shared breakfast room of the newly opened Praktik hotel off the Passeo de Gracia and past the big Pain Quotidien.  (She is confident Anna – as she should be.)  The drill is, you order something from the vast counter, pay at the till and go sit under the skylight or in a dark nook somewhere.  Inevitably, what you have is so good that you go back and order just a little something more.  And then on your way out, an armload of things to share with your family back home.

Hotel Praktik Bakery
Provença, 279
08037 Dreta de L’Eixample
www.hotelpraktikbakery.com

My sister was visiting me from London last weekend and it coincided with a weekend of fun events in Barcelona. A pop up brunch at Espacio 88, the 2nd Eat Street by BCNmes and a weekend of open artist studios in Gracia and Poble Nou.  My perfect day begins with a great coffee so the two of us were there, cup in hand by 10:30 a.m.  I had a bagel from the guys at Cloud Street Bakery, split down the middle with two fat slices of foie gras, a drizzle of maple syrup and a fried egg, topped with shaggy rocket and some crumbs of briny feta cheese.

Barcelona starts late, even on a weekday some shops only roll up their shutters at 10am so getting there early (yes 10:30 on a saturday is early here) was a brain wave.  We lingered at the table.  I told Donna – the pop up florist – how much I liked her banana leaf display in Espacio 88 and bought a gorgeous bouquet of peonies (her day job is florist to the Ritz).This Must Be The Place was playing at some point.  It was all kind of perfect.

Skye Coffee
At Espacio 88
Poble Nou

On page 16 of June’s Elle Gourmet there is a tiny picture of some pallid churros with an insert about how they come salty and sweet.   The picture does not induce even minor pangs of hunger but the text is intriguing.

I set off on a mission to a little visited part of town. The street didn’t say much to me, sometimes a new address is just the thing to get me discovering a whole host of charming places and this wasn’t going to be one of those times. The flourescent sign of Comaxurros was easy enough to spot, though the light did nothing to enhance the few churros they had in the window in pink, yellow and brown. Still, I had come all the way to try so I dutifully went in. I ordered a raspberry one and my sister had the passion fruit one.

They look like sharp edged eclaires but taste nothing like them. I like love eclaires but these churros eclaire things are possibly even better. There’s a chew, a tug. There is the vague savouriness that churro pastry always has and when that is coupled with sour and sweet – it’s an addiction in the making. That is without mentioning that it’s fried and fried tastes better.   You only have to have a taste and all of a sudden, it turns out it’s not so much that you want it as you need it. Right. Now.

My biggest regret?  That I didn’t take any home with me.  (What was I thinking?)  There is more to tell you like these churro are fried in olive oil, specially selected because it has a high smoking point, higher than that of sunflower oil.  It is available to buy.  They sell beautiful hand-made ceramic chocolate pots from Apparatu. The funny churro doodles you see all over the place are the work of Brosmind.

But none of that matters right now because I am here without takeaway Comaxurros. Bumming hard.

Comaxurros
Muntaner 562
08022
www.comaxurros.com
Tuesday to Sunday 9:30 – 13:30 and 16:00 – 20:30 closed Monday

I have been to Chök a dozen times since I moved to Barcelona. I love their doughnut display: I mean, whatever is the hole there for if not for hooking it up on the wall?

They have a distinctive doughnut.  Extremely light: almost soapy in flavour.  They employ a special (secret) technique that makes it possible.  It’s not my thing.  I favour a hint of grease and the crispness in a doughnut.  I’m probably happiest with a sugared Krispy Kreme and a cup of black coffee (or in Barcelona, a Lukumas).Still my oldest daughter seems smitten with chocolate dipped doughnut covered with hundreds and thousands sprinkles. (As I write this I realise that I like their not too sweet creative toppings a lot more than the doughnut it adorns.) So much so that I am a regular customer.
I find it to be a beautiful shop. And I am always pleased when there is someone decorating doughnuts in the back room.

Chök
C/del Carme, 3
www.chokbarcelona.com

Bon Appetit did a small Barcelona feature in it’s May edition. I was delighted to see that I have hit most of their recommended spots (so this blog’s move to Spain is starting to get somewhere).  And then I read about how Carles Abellan – whose Tapas 24 I love (and posh restaurant Comerç 24 I visited for my last birthday), has a Chirringuito. And, and… He serves ice cream from Rocambolesc. Which is great because until now, I had been planning to travel to Girona for the day to try it.
You can see the W hotel from La Guingueta.  The waiters are dressed in identical nautical themed shirts, enough of them have tattoos and patches of hair shaved off in weird places for it to seem a conscious part of the look.  I recognise 2 waiters from Tapas 24, one seems to have been promoted to manager, a charismatic girl with strange zig zagging hair cuts, who once whisked me to the front of the line at 24 when she realised that I was dining alone.The menu is made up of things between bread, slightly unusual (for Barcelona) things like chicken burgers, fresh pressed juices (€6) and guacamole (€12) or nachos.  The pricing is – well I find myself thinking, I can see the W but does that mean I have to pay W prices?I order a fresh pressed granny smith apple juice. A peculiar choice in retrospect since they are the usual suspects, heavily waxed from down under. I receive a glass of warm juice that is too bitter to drink. I send it back without any fuss from our pretty waitress and the next one is just fine. The €12 guac is so salty it’s gone from titter tottering on the edge of being too salty and plunked itself right in to – so salty I want to gulp sea water to tone it down. The chef might be in love – since I have already sent back the juice, I feel like saying the guacamole is inedible might be pushing things slightly. The chicken burger is good, also salty but still edible.

As for the Rocambolesc ice cream. Well – it’s a frozen custard. It comes in chocolate, vanilla or raspberry – or a combination of those 2. A cup is €5. It’s good…it’s just missing all that great stuff they put in over at Shake Shack - you know like in the Shack Attack, the fudge sauce, chocolate truffle cookie dough and Mast Brothers Shake Shack dark chocolate chunks – oh and the chocolate sprinkles

So it looks like I am driving to Girona for ice cream after all…

La Guingueta
Playa de San Sebastián
Barceloneta
08001
www.carlesabellan.es/la-guingueta-de-la-barceloneta

Tarannà is the kind of place you find a lot in London, New York and even Berlin but in Barcelona, where traditional cafes are still endearing, it is more of a rare find.  They do seasonal food (yawn I know, how many times have you heard that but places here sometimes serve Asparagus in December) and although the context (and the principal language)  of the menu is very much Catalan, the approach is light and refreshing.  The pricing is easy on the wallet too – which (again) in Barcelona is a rare thing. I have a cor de bou tomato salad.  A simple affair, the tomato “heart of the bull” I think it is.  An onions, splayed open like a flower, some olives, nice canned tuna.  No dressing.  Simple stuff.  For around €8.  Quite girly actually.  In fact as I look around, I see that that particular afternoon is running at around a 95% female customer occupancy (good tip for you boys that are trying to find Ms. Right – do men actually do that or is it primarily a girl thing?  My now husband had an entire list – a la Don Tillman but without the excuse of Asperger’s).They are mostly having the watermelon gazpacho. They are elegant women, the kind that ride in on a folding bike and (I guess) order the watermelon gazpacho.  It’s a lovely place, Sant Antoni at its best. 
Tarannà
Viladomat 23
08015 Sant Antoni
www.tarannacafe.com

My friend Giulia and her family were in town a couple of weeks back.  I whizzed them through some of the best streets in Barcelona, with a snack in mind for practically every street.  Regardless, when it was lunch time, we were all famished.  I quickly decided on our spot – a quick tour beneath the stunning undulating roof of Santa Caterina Market and then we would grab a table at Cuines Santa Caterina (From the Tragaluz group).Regular readers will know I am not fond of eclectic menus. Mostly because it is hard to get everything right but also because it dilutes the whole experience.  They also know I tend to avoid restaurant groups, preferring to pay a little extra and go out of my way for something independent.  Then, when you want the tomato salad but without the goats cheese say – it can be arranged whereas in a place like this: it can’t.  Because the waiter needs to type the dish number into their palm pilot, there is no box for “extra comments”.  Then again, what is great about a place like this is you don’t have to plan it in advance.  You don’t even have to show up at an awkward time to save yourself an uncomfortably long wait wedged up against a wall somewhere like at Tapas 24.  You can just show up hungry and you will be seated swiftly.  They won’t even make a big deal when you show up with 3 kids and two buggies during the rush.  And if you excel at ordering (which I kind of do – sorry eating humble pie later) you can eat really really well.  Like the Santa Pau beans with baby squid and asparagus (€13.60) – which was enough to inspire me to recreate it at home (high praise indeed) - from the Mediterranean section of the menu.  I would generally avoid the Japanese stuff and the desserts (there are so many ice cream shops around like Gelateria Gocce di Latte.  I’ve eaten well here over a course of 10 years and I love that is easy on the eye with a bonus of good service (even if they can’t tweak the dishes for the ordering of the menu challenged).

Cuines Santa Caterina
Francesc Cambó 16 (next to Santa Caterina Market)
08003, Barri Gòtic
http://grupotragaluz.com/restaurante/cuines_caterina/

It’s getting so hot now. August in Barcelona – it’s not so much about the temperatures as it is about the humidity. It’s wet and sticky.  You think – “I couldn’t possibly eat in this heat.” What you actually mean is “I couldn’t possibly cook.”  And you don’t have to if you are in Gracia, where you have Teicawey with its fat aluminium wrapped burritos and its clusters of hot sauces boasting varying degrees of spiciness.  In the chiller cabinet there is almond milk and fresh lemonade with chia seeds swirling around. Rather uncommon here the combination of healthy and not so healthy.  Normally if you see chia then it’s likely that seitan sausages are not too far behind. Nor are the strangely coloured nut pates. Mercifully, none of that here.  
Teicawey
Calle Torrijos 50
www.cantinamachito.com/teicawey

One of the reasons I find food interesting is that the people behind food can be so engrossing.  And there is the added bonus that they are a lot more accessible than say a gallery curator or fashion designer. With food as a subject, a conversation with a stranger can erupt and gallop away with an afternoon.  Where you come from – where they come from, it doesn’t matter.  You are speaking the same language (even if some of the time you don’t speak the same language).   Cloudstreet had been on my radar ever since the brunch they co-hosted with Skye Coffee at Espacio 88.   Yesterday I set out to find their shop.

Initially I walk right past them because it simply says Forn de Pa in old-fashioned lettering.  I double back and take a closer look at the window display, it’s obvious then that this is what I am looking for.  Tonatiuh (one of the bakers at Cloudstreet), with whom I have an instant affinity, explains that they bought the bakery from the original owner.  The former owner is in his 70’s now and was born in a small room over the 100-year-old wood burning ovens  that Cloudstreet have gratefully inherited.

“You want to know more?” Tonatiuh asks me.  Taking me into the kitchen to take a look.  He starts to open different sized oven doors and explains to me the importance of air flow.   A quick glance at my face makes him (correctly) believe that he is losing me “which is why” he summarizes “you can not burn fire while you are baking bread.”  Meaning that they are baking with residual heat and that (along with the natural fermentation and the longer proving times they employ) makes for a very particular type of bread.   “And also” he quickly adds “the baking floor is fixed – not rotating as in other bakeries.” he is referring to Baluard not in a malicious way but full of pride that they are carrying out a more laboured and nuanced kind of baking. This artisanal approach extends to the kind of flour they use for their traditional Catalan Pages bread. It comes from France and costs about €1,000 a ton compared to the €200 flour other bakers use.  For their spelt bread, they have found a local supplier called La Garbiana that is reclaiming land and returning it to organic farming methods.  They use La Garbiana’s spelt flour in a lot of their loaves.  Loaves of which there are not a tremendous amounts because it is only a small place that has only recently started wholesaling to three restaurants in Barcelona.  As I am leaving, I joke with Tonatiuh that they* should open up a coffee shop in Barcelona because right now there are only a handful which are not centrally located nor do they have realistic opening times.  I am not sure he’s convinced.

*The people behind Cloudstreet are the same ones who opened Federal Cafe in Barcelona and Madrid (they’ve sold the one in Barcelona), they then went on to open the hand-made candy stores Papabubble and most recently Cloudstreet.

Cloudstreet Bakery
Rosello 112
08036 L’Esquerra de L’Eixample
www.cloudstreet.es
www.facebook.com/CloudstreetBakery

It’s coming to a year now since I moved to Barcelona.  It’s been a lonely year online.  Don’t get me wrong, I’ve made friends in the real world but I have missed the online camaraderie that I had in Berlin.

I did manage to find one blog with a URL that sounds a lot like mine – FoodBarcelona. The Fodor’s writer seemed to know all about Calςots and I was just discovering them so I asked if he wanted to meet for lunch. Six months passed, he forgot, I forgot, then one of us remembered and we met at his recommendation – Bardeni, a meat bar.

And I had SO much fun!  First of all he picked a place I would probably not have chosen (I can be kind of girlie in my predilection for fish, vegetables and sustainable humane meat sources).  And then he ordered something I lacked the…insight, courage…I’m not sure what actually?  But while I asked for Sardines (€5), ox tail ravioli (€6) and patatas bravas (safe, safe, safe) he went for Nebraskan Angus steak tartar piquante (€8) (Ha Ha, Barcelona is in exactly the same category as Berlin when they say hot, they mean sweet paprika), the Charolais beef (€10) cooked blue and brawn and tripe (€6).

Brawn and tripe. I mean – I was just reading an extended article celebrating 20 years of Fergus Henderson and his championing of ‘nose to tail culinary revolution‘ and in Barcelona it’s not laudable at all, it’s lunch.  In a lot of places.

At Bardeni’s though – it’s particularly good.  And it comes with a soft mess of egg, the white still snotty in places. As it turns out, Catalans are as fond of unusual textures as the Chinese.  The Charolais too is just, well makes meat worth eating – most of the time I can’t be bothered to eat meat because it lacks taste.

Bardeni is the add-on informal bar of next door Caldeni.  It’s owned by Dani Lechuga (his last name means lettuce and I can’t think of a suitable joke right now but it will come to me) and he specializes in meat cooking.  From what I understand, his father is a meat importer/exporter which would go some ways to explaining the eclectic meats on offer.  It’s painted bright red and coupled with lots of shiny black surfaces, not a pretty space.  Quite nineties I thought, which when they started playing their eighties mix tape sort of worked and when I tucked into the meat I stopped caring about.  Which is what it’s all about

Meanwhile, I strongly recommend Steve’s site.  He’s been here since 1997, speaks Spanish and Catalan, is an authentic and thorough food lover and orders really well.

Bardeni
c/ Valencia 454
08013 Sagrada Família
www.caldeni.com/bardeni

Niño Viejo

Albert Adria is coming close to having more restaurants than I have fingers on my hands.   Just a couple of weeks ago a new one opened.  A fancy taqueria called Niño Viejo (a collaboration with Paco Méndez).  It will soon be joined by an even fancier Mexican restaurant.

Not unusually, Niño Viejo is located within the small perimeter of all the other Adria restaurants in the unloved area of Sant Antoni.  In true Nancy Drew style, I plotted the addresses of all the restaurants on Google maps.  A geriatric with a zimmer frame would have no trouble at all scooting in between these restaurants.Which makes me wonder?  How much is the current expansion about restaurants and how much is it about property development?  You think I am over thinking things?  With the opening of Union Square cafe in 1985 – Danny Meyer helped regenerate an entire area.   The Adria brothers in partnership with the Iglesias brothers, restaurateurs themselves, are putting all their chips within one square mile.  Their restaurants are all booked (less so the Iglesias ones, the ones without the pictures on the BCN 5.0 website) but think what unimaginable riches they could attain with a nice property portfolio tacked on to those restaurants?

Anyway so Niño Viejo.  Adorable.  From the brightly coloured Mexican style oil cloths on the table to the red neon “Taqueria” sign inside.  You are supposed to mark off your orders on a sheet of paper and give it to the waiter.  But that evening our waiter seems to be Niño Viejo’s biggest fan and he hovers over us while we decide pushing us to order the whole menu because it is all so good.  “They even have a nopal (cactus) salad – my mother used to turn it into smoothies when she was dieting.”  Aha – talk about too much information.  If anything,  he oversells the whole thing.

All the accessories I have come to expect from the Adria group are there.  For example, the guacamole comes in an immaculate pestle and mortar, in which it was not made, with the pesky pestle still in the bowl resting against a clean avocado stone – making it an ordeal to get at the guacamole.  The tacos(€3.10 – €3.50) are all very delicate and probably filled with those long tweezers that Grant Achatz keeps in his collar.  Unless you are a die-hard Mexican food fan, I suggest you give the Huitlacoche (corn fungus) taco wide berth.

It was all nice.  The packaging even if it was on the excessive side was probably more impressive than the food but overall nice.  I was disappointed with the flavour vs price ratio for the Pico de Gallo (€8.50).  It was 2 scant tablespoons worth of diced tomato with lime zest running through it and not enough salt – not worth it at all.  The Cajeta filled mini donuts (€7.10) were not worth it either but the corn flan (€3.80) more than made up for that. 

Overall? Happy and excited to have a new Albert Adria restaurant in town. Looking for flats on the very pretty Avenida Mistral just in case my conspiracy theory is correct. And thinking of checking out Paco Méndez (the chef’s) recommendation for Mexican in Barcelona: Tlaxcal.

Niño Viejo
Avenida Mistral 54
08015
reservations: +34 933 482 194
No Website yet

I’ve been on Satan’s heels for almost a year now. I showed up to a cute shop he was supposed to have a corner in only to find out he’d left. Then I heard he was opening up in a bike shop around the corner. And finally I found the shop in a kind of worm hole location I would never accidentally stumble across, even though it is a moments away from Mercer hotel and minutes from Las Ramblas.

What a shop.  Wall to ceiling windows, thick glass, black Tolix stools – pivoted at an angle.  A shop that could easily be selling expensive leather goods.

When I arrive, the yellow bench in front of the La Marzocco machine is occupied by 4 Australians (have you ever noticed that they travel in packs?).  Behind the La Marzocco is a petit girl, struggling with an Aeropress. A battle that continues for a few more minutes before she gives up and lets her customers know it’s not going to happen. Profuse apologies ensue, to the English couple that ordered the Aeropress, to the 4 Australians waiting on the bench, to me. 10 minutes later I have a flat white in a takeaway cup rather than the cappuccino to have in that I ordered. I perch on a Tolix and take it all in.

The chalk board menu says in capitals – NO WIFI, NO DECAF. This polemic tone sometimes goes hand in hand with third wave coffee places. The bouncer at the door so to speak making sure that the right kind of people get in. There is a ontrend chia pudding which is served from a large Kilner jar.  There are large fat homemade donuts with a pale ring round their middle.  They sell some obscure magazine titles, the kind of niche niche print where you aren’t sure what the subject matter is. But again, you have to be the right kind of person to get it and to want it.

Which is important.  To be the right kind of person, to appreciate it, to be willing to wait (to be willing to drink out of a coffee cup that has an illustration of a figure exposing its anus).  This quality of coffee is still extremely rare in Barcelona.  In London, you can get an extraordinary coffee and free wifi and a stripey straw if you go to Timberyard at Seven Dials in Covent Garden or about 60 other addresses in the capital.

I am willing to wait.  I am.  It’s a desert out here in terms of this kind of thing.  And compared to its companions, Satan’s has wonderful opening hours.  From 08:00 – 18:30.  Every. Single. Day.  Madness.  But also.  Happiness.

Satan’s Coffee Corner
Carrer de l’Arc de Sant Ramon del Call, 11,
www.facebook.com/SatansCoffeeCorner
www.satanscoffee.com