Return to Barcelona

[robert brown]

In early April my wife and I spent a week in Roses and Barcelona and environs. Below is my seperate report. However, the text is soon to be included in a new, expanded, revised second edition of the "El Gullet Guide to Barcelona" which is our snowball-like experiment in on-line gastronomic travel info. There you will find addresses, phone numbers, etc. The El Bulli part, slaved over by me and Jonathan Day, will appear in The Daily Gullet right after Easter.

Ca L'Isidre. An exception that may possibly prove the rule? One man’s meat another man’s poison? Ca L’Isidre, which we were much looking forward to in light of the above comments, left us disappointed. We were met with a frosty welcome. Isidre and his wife barely spoke to us. Our waiter proposed bad to mediocre wines, and other than the renown roasted baby goat that two of the four of us ordered, the rest of the food was either undercooked (a rack of lamb, which when further cooked was also delicious. We encountered the same situation at Can Fabes; the Spanish must like their lamb chops raw) or not impeccably fresh. (A complimentary plate of four unadorned “cigales” had been in the refrigerator too long and had lost their freshness). We don’t know if the perfunctory treatment was because we were bombing the shit out of Iraq or if some kind of weariness set in on the Isidriites. The décor was bland, the art of questionable taste, and a sense of the personnel going through the motions pervaded our visit. The clientele was old; they rushed through their meal (and this on a Saturday night) and we were about the first to arrive and the last to leave, early by Spanish standards. Maybe old Isidre was depressed, as the restaurant was less than full.

Cal Pep. At first blush you may think you have walked into a Spanish luncheonette at night; brightly-lit at that. Everyone sits at the counter, although there is a restaurant-by-reservation behind. Somehow it seems like more fun to sit at the counter and ask the servers, who also put each order on your plate, what you want. They all seem to speak adequate English. In our particular case, our travel mates by coincidence appeared with a fellow German who is a long-time resident of Barcelona and we let him order for us. The ubiquitous "pa amb tomaquet" ( toast rubbed with fresh tomato and olive oil added);' tiny roasted green peppers, tiny clams found in the sand; sensational warm, thin slices of Serrano ham; and a terrific house-made sausage made with foie gras, served with qarbanzo beans ham were all delicious among the ten or so small dishes we had. We, like just about everyone else, had to wait an hour in the line that forms against the wall. This is a popular, revered classic worth waiting for, however.

Restaurante Hispania. Arenys del Mar.That near-perfection in restaurant-going is not limited to the lairs of revered chefs and culinary prestidigitation is brought home at Ristorante Hispania: This in spite of going with the better half suffering from a bout of nausea. Even if I had dined alone, I would have clearly recognized the restaurant's greatness. While Hispania is a quite large family restaurant serving many middle-class clients, this 51-year-old establishment cares passionately about impeccably-fresh ingredients and the their careful preparation according strict tenets of Catalan cuisine. One test of a restaurant's integrity is the way it prepares complimentary dishes, humble as they may be. Hispania serves everyone two pieces of " pa amb tomaquet", but unlike the ones we received at other stops, this one was made on a thin, crispy flatbread, not the usual thick piece of toasted leaven bread. It put to shame all others we had. With dessert you receive a piece of the most moist and fresh sponge cake imaginable. A "humble" tomato salad we ordered, due to the exigencies of my wife's stomach, was sublime. The tomatoes from Almeria were sweet and delicious and strewn with slices of white, sweet spring onions and green chilies ( hot, but not the least bit painful). As her main course, my wife tried to eat a fish soup, but simply was unable to consume anything more. I had a few spoonfuls to compare with the shellfish soup I had as an appetizer (made with a species slightly resembling crab, but still a type of langoustine. I read that Catalunya has between 2000 and 3000 varieties of shellfish). Both were among the very greatest I have eaten, making me realize that of all the ones I have had on the Cote d'Azur, none were as good.The various "white" fish in my wife's order melted in my mouth from their freshness. As my main course I had the delicacy of black baby eels in garlic and olive oil. These were perfect, but at 50 euros I think I should have tried a dish that had more latitute of flavor. Although we were reduced to one dessert, I had a serving of mint sorbet that was thick and intense; a magnificent example. Service did not miss a beat and everyone who took care of us from the woman of the house to the busboys was endearing. To echo Bux's refrain, it took as as long to find the restaurant, once we penetrated the center of Arenas del Mar, as it took to get to that point from Barcelona. The key to finding it once you get off the toll road is to get on the National II ("dos"), direction Barcelona. You will come to a traffic circle which you turn off at the second right after a sign for the restaurant. If you turn at the first right, you will end up where Bux and I did: at the beach. The restaurant is on a narrow service road parallel to the NII. It's worth going around in "circles" twice to make certain you find the right turn-off. Now that I have invested the time in finding Hispania, I am going back every time I visit Barcelona.

Casa Calvet. Casa Calvet is likely to be a restaurant difficult to forget, as Arthur Lubow implies. The dining room (once the offices of the owner's textile business) is one of the more sober Gaudi houses given its narrowness and zoning requirements of the neighborhood. Yet its tile walls and carved benches and partitions are arresting; a rare experience to have dined in such classic, genuine surroundings of a giant of early 20th-century design. The lunch we had was surprisingly good. My garbanzo bean soup with cod and whitebait was intensely-flavored as was squab in a Sherry reduction. My wife had one dish, a marvelous and fresh roasted hake in a watercress sauce. A fruit soup with ice cream and a chocolate cake with walnuts topped it off in a refreshing fashion. A wine from the Navarre from Izar de Nekeas (1995) was one of the more complex and enjoyable Spanish wines we have had in recent memory.

Pla de la Garsa. . We selected this restaurant because it sounded as though my wife's stomach, now in a recovery phase, could handle it. The room and the general cadre did not strike us as exactly elegant. While the neighborhood is interesting-narrow streets in a very old part of town due east of La Rambla-the restaurant is not. Our waiter, one of a small staff of young people reminiscent of the struggling actor variety, confirmed our hunch that the place was in British guidebooks since we were surrounded by either holiday-goers or academic conventioneers. Here the prices are cheap, befitting the clientele, but only adequate food. I had a carpaccio of cod with pulverized olives and lamb sausage with "flageots": both edible, not much more. My wife had a vegetable cous-cous and beans with ham, both of which she could do without. We were out in under an hour.

Mercat de la Boqueria. I have been to dozens of markets in France and Italy including some really good ones such as Joigny, Lyon, Cannes and Genoa. None of those has the scope and excitement of La Boqueria. I never saw so many varieties of seafood ( so fresh that they dare display the fish with the gills open) and hams, for example. The hall is immense and you feel overwhelmed at first. That it is open 12 hours a day, six days a week makes a vivid statement about Catalunians’ love of food, We had lunch at what looked like the most serious food counter, Bar Central. It had a good selection of seafood and various meat dishes. The food was tasty and what one would expect in a market that cuts across all class lines.

Edited April 18, 2003 by robert brown (log)

[Chazzy]

Great stuff, but I gotta say it's almost evil holding back the El Bulli stuff.

[robert brown]

Chazzy, it's out of our hands and in Fat Guy's. It has been torture finishing it. Collaborative efforts seem to take twice as long.

[Bux]

Robert -- I really enjoyed that post for many reasons. It made me want to be there sharing your meals and discoveries, even at the disappointing meals. It seems you are excited about the region and its food and that the learning experience is almost as valuable as the reward of finding the right meals. I suppose we share a background of having our palates honed in France and that eating in Catalonia is having similar effects on both our palates.

Your post also causes some reflection on recommending restaurants to others based on personal experience. We enjoyed Hispania, we loved Ca L'Isidre. It's clear your experience varied in the reverse. I can't say if our tastes vary from each other's or if it's just been a matter of luck and how each of us ordered that particular day, but I stress the unreasonablity of anyone expecting someone else's one dinner experiences of providing a surefire set of recommendations for dining on a trip. I appreciate it that you provide enough information based on impersonal factors and that you include places and dishes that left you unsatisfied. I think that helps us all evaluate your tastes and provides the kind of information about a region that helps us deal with restaurants we see that have not been mentioned or listed anywhere.

Regarding La Boqueria market, I have a few things to say. If you haven't seen it during hunting season you have a treat to experience. The butcher shops are festooned with furred game and wild birds with colorful plummage. I have never experienced such a show in France. I know the outdoor market in Cannes and the indoor one in Lyon. The one in Lyon is a favorite of ours, but the markets that best compare with La Boqueria may be the other two markets we've explored within Barcelona. There was one other market in northeastern Spain that was memorable. Esilda and I have a clear picture of the market, but cannot place it in a particular city at the moment.

Thanks again for that evocative post. I look forward to your El Bulli feature with renewed interest.

[CyN]

Based on what I've read on eGullet, I had booked Ca L'isidre for our openg night dinner on our forthcoming trip in May.

Based on your report I am unbooking it .

I put my confidence in you because you belong to the old-timers club:))

[thelastsupper]

That seems a bit reactionary. I might reconsider.

[vserna]

Based on your report I am unbooking it .

Book at Gaig instead. Very hard to be disappointed by Carles' cooking.

[robert brown]

CyN, we'll never know if I give you a bum piece of avoidance advice, which I suppose is better than being given a bum steer to a restaurant you find stinky. I appreciate the implicit faith, but I would hate to think I hit Ca L'Isidre on a bad night. It's tough to buck the consensus. We recently had a discuss on Symposium about dispensing restaurant advice, though I can't recall if it encompassed web-based advice to those yoou have never met. All I can say is, yes, I am a veteran eater along with you and if you think experience counts for a lot, then I hope I spared you the kind of experience I had there. All I can do is say that the four of us (all art dealers, so of course we have terrific taste!!!!), did not have a very festive evening nor a meal that was good all the way through.

How long will you be in the Barcelona area and where do you plan to dine?

[CyN]

Robert,You needn't worry that you may have done me a disservice. True, I'll never know what I am missing, but so what, there is another one that I would have missed instead( in this case, El Raco d'en Freixa, which I am substituting for Isidre.)I'm very happy to kiss Isidre or any place else, goodbye, where anyone on eGullet that I respect has had a bad recent experience. The hell with them. Why go there when there are so many other places available?

I have to except El Bulli from that concept, because Lizziee's famous negative report is keepng no-one, including me, away:))

We will be in Barcelona a week. Going to El Raco d'en Freixa,Can Fabes by train for lunch,Drolma, Abac, Botafumeiro(a Sunday, when there are few choices) Cal Pep(meeting Steve Plotnicki there, an eGullett- created meeting) and Neichel.

Then renting a car, off to Sant Celoni for dinner at Can Fabes,(an encore) then on to El Bulli. Then by train into France, Jardin des Sens at Montpellier, then by train to Roanne and Troisgros( he is fixing us a special old-timers menu,duplicating what his uncle used to prepare 35 years ago) and then on to Paris, where we are booked into the Bristol(a Sunday), then Jamin and final day Astrance, if they will lower themselves to accept us, otherwise Laperouse.Original idea for final day was Ledoyen, but I refuse to pay their prices(I've been around the block too many times to still get a thrill which is commensurate with the prices:))

[robert brown]

CyN, I'm glad your program is so ambitious that my recommendation to avoid Ca'LIsidre hardly causes a ripple. You should consider Restaurante Hispania if you can get to it. I didn't comment on Can Fabes (yet), but it just may be worth having one meal at each as opposed to two at Can Fabes. In a nutshell, we liked Can Fabes very much, but it wasn't transcendental like El Bulli, Troisgros in its heyday, Chapel, Guerard,etc. Rather it was highly-competent cuisine cooked in the French/International haute-cusine style with great regional produce. Hispania is at the other end: classic Catalan dishes with mouth-watering freshness and no stabs at pretense. If you are not bowled over at Can Fabes, that's what I would do: have one meal at each.

Several of us like Ledoyen very much. The prices are fair for what you get both in terms of quality and portions, and as an old-timer, the style of cuisine should resonate with you as it did with me. I don't want to start talking France's restaurants on the Spain/Portugal board, so I will leave it at that for now.

[CyN]

Robert:

Now you,ve given me something to chew on:))

I respect your judgment, and if you say I'm better off doing Can Fabes once and Hispania once, believe me I'm ready to do it!

However, its too complicated to explain in detail, but I can only replace my lunch date at Can Fabes, not the dinner one.And on the day I had scheduled for lunch, I wont have the rental car yet, it was a train excursion.

So to switch to Hispania, I would have to go there for lunch by .train.

Is this possible??And then take a taxi from the train station at Arenys de Mar? Do they even have taxis at a tiny town like Arenys de Mar?

I realize that these details may be outside your field of expertise. But perhaps the hotel can help me , if necessary, altho I doubt that they would have any knowledge of such a situation.

What do you think?

A couple more comments.: I am pleased to see you refer to dinners at El Bulli as "transcendental". This is a welcome sneak preview of your upcoming post, which every one is waiting for in such suspense:)

Secondly, you are giving me second thoughts on Ledoyen. I went there several times in the 60s, was always enthralled,, but just hate to give in to their prices, or any Paris 3-star's prices today. But I will think it over, maybe I'll call them and get the price of their taster's menu, if they have one.

[Bux]

Can Roca in Girona, is perhaps the one you might miss the most, but perhaps it's a little out of the way. All in all, it is hard to recommend restaurants on the basis of one visit, but our meal here was a surprisingly compelling meal that was both tasty and very creative. It's hardly undiscovered. We heard English being spoken and there was a large party of rather too splendidly suntanned (that sort of perennial suntan) French men and women. I also thought Girona was a most interesting place to spend a day sightseeing.

[Bux]

Hispania, I would have to go there for lunch by .train.

Is this possible??And then take a taxi from the train station at Arenys de Mar? Do they even have taxis at a tiny town like Arenys de Mar?

These are good questions. There are frequent and quiet (I believe they are all electric) trains running along the coast north from Barcelona. The easiest restaurant to access from Barcelona must be the two star Sant Pau in Sant Pol de Mar. The restaurant backs on to the train platform. On the other side of the platform is the beach. There's no direct entrance to the restaurant from the platform, you have to walk around the block, but it's a short walk.

I don't know where the train station is in Arenys de Mar and Hispania is a bit isolated, so there's little chance you could walk there. My guess is that there are taxis in Arenys, but it might be wise to call ahead. It's hard to remember exactly in which ot these three towns -- Arenys de Mar, Sant Pol de Mar or San Andreu de Llavaneres -- we got the most lost, retraced our tracks, or spent the most time looking for the restaurant of our choice, but Hispania stands out for eventually coming so close and then missing a turn that was just meters away and winding up on unpaved roads in an abandoned industrial sector before finding our way back via a nude beach. I'll bet the local taxis all know where it is. As one travels abroad, some things seem very expensive by comparison to home and others seem very cheap. Taxis in Spain seemed to be a bargain. For all that I enjoyed Hispania, I don't think of it as a destination restaurant, although because it's exactly the sort of place that doesn't cater to tourists, probably gets very few and serves traditional food, it may be worth seeking out. The problem I have is not in deciding where I want to eat, but in eliminating too many choices.

[CyN]

I knew about Sant Pau and had planned to go there for lunch(rather than Can Fabes)but for some crazy reason they are closed from May6 to May22, so that idea went up in smoke.

I also knew about Can Roca near Girona and was planning to go there if El Bulli had dumped me. But since I hit the lottery, it takes precedence and I cant fit them both in.

You suggest that I call ahead about a taxi in Arenys de Mar. That sounds sensible, but who do you think I should call? The restaurant? The train station?A taxi company?

Altho Hispania may not be a destination restaurant, it sounds so intriguing, and in such contrast to all the starred places scheduled on my trip, that I would really like to try it, if only I can get there.

Thanks for your input. You are a friend in need.

[robert brown]

Bux is a friend always in need of a good meal. I have a vague recollection that the train station in Arenas del Mar is near the restaurant. I think both are just about on the beach. I should remember since I must have driven on every street and road in the town trying to find the restaurant. It is better to find out before you head out.

Let me try this: Dining at Hispania is comparable to a no-star or one star restaurant you used to be able to go to in the French provences between meals at the "big name" places; restaurants from which you would walk out singing the praises of a thick, melt-in-the-mouth portion of calf's liver or jambon persille (two dishes I still remember from Burgundy). When your trip was finished, you would remember those dishes as vividly as the best ones from the three-star chefs and long for them with the same intensity.

[sumac]

Probably among the most exciting things happening in Barcelona is Alkimia. Chef Jordi Vilas is amazing and doing some Adria with his own take. I am surprised you are not even mentioning it on egullet. A very special chef clued me in and we went there in March. I know I am new here, trust this. I think you would like to read:

www.departures.com/ep/ep_0103-barcelona.html

[Bux]

You suggest that I call ahead about a taxi in Arenys de Mar. That sounds sensible, but who do you think  I should call? The restaurant? The train station?A taxi company?

The taxi company sounds like a good idea, assuming there is a taxi company and you can get the phone number. The restaurant would know how to call a taxi. As I recall, there was no one at the restaurant who spoke English. If there's a concierge at your hotel in Barcelona, he might be your best bet, but it you're calling or faxing the restaurant from here for a reservation, you might let them know you intend to come by taxi and enquire about getting a cab at the same time. You're going to need a cab to get back to the train station anyway.

I'm full of smart ass answers this evening, but I just Googled "Arenys de Mar" and got a link to Come to Arenys! where I learned Arenys has a (1) hotel and a school for chicken farming (more in Spanish at http://www.avicultura.com/) but couldn't find any mention of a taxi company. There was however an invitation to "ask for any further information you might wish to obtain concerning Arenys," by e-mailing <arenys@partal.com> That's my final answer.

As a side note for those with a pedantic interest in languages, this site is available not only in English, the local Catalan, Spanish, Basque and Gallego, but in a number of other languages. Off hand I can't think of another European country that supports four official languages, although three of them are official in different semi autonomous regions. I'm not surprised to see pages in all three of these languages, but I am suprised to see pages in "asturià-bable," "aragonès," and "occità-aranès" although I don't know if the last is a form of Occitan spoken north of the Pyrenees or if aranès refers to something local. Esperanto is there too.

[CyN]

I'm one step ahead of you, Bux. I already found that spot on Google and already e-mailed them about the taxi situation. It seems to be a sort of Chamber of Commerce.

Now we'll see if and when they answer.

If thats a dead end, I will have the hotel call the restaurant.

Thanks again to both you and Robert.

[sumac]

just realised it is better not to interrupt the regulars here. sorry......i will just peruse this site and not add to it as it always just gets ignored anyway.

[CyN]

Sumac, didnt mean to ignore you. I am not one of the "regulars" anyway.

Your recommendation on that restaurant is probably first-rate-- but as you can see, my whole week is completely booked. Also, I'm not too thrilled with Adria-style chefs. I'm going to El Bulli itself, so I have no hankering to seek out his disciples.

[vserna]

All these exchanges are fun, and I do love the Reixach sisters' recipes at Hispania as much as anyone, but comparing them with Carles Gaig's cuisine is approximately like comparing the Union Square Cafe to Daniel - both are good, but not really in the same league.

[robert brown]

Victor, thanks for jumpng in. Do you mean that someone was comparing Gaig's cuisine to that of the Reixach Sisters? I'm trying to reply with one arm tied behind my back, never having dined at Can Gaig. The point that I was trying to make was shortly after my visiting El Bulli and Can Fabes, Hispania was a most welcome change, being blown away with the experience of tasting relatively unadorned products that, unlike both Union Square and Daniel much of the time, taste the way Mother Nature intended them. If you are suggesting that one should go to Can Gaig instead of Hispania as a welcome contrast or antidote to two and three-star dining in the region, then I withdraw my enthusiastic suggestion of eating at Hispania, sparing the members the schlepp out there and back.

[CyN]

Victor(I am clued into your name from Robert's post) you are the first one to my knowledge who has really trumpeted Can Gaig.

Now you have weighed in in the same vein twice and you have my undivided attention.

This is my first trip to Spain,(after 40 years of trips thru France) and I am ready and willing to be guided by anyone with previous experience and strong convictions.Thus I am ready to exchange one of my previous reservations for Can Gaig, if you advise it in strong enough language:)).

I cant swap Botafumeiro, because thats a Sunday. I cant swap Cal Pep, because we have a date there with Steve Plotnicki, and I wouldnt want to miss the tapas anyway.

Likewise, I will under no circumstances give up the schlep to Hispania. My wife is gung-ho, and so am I, for this somehat bizarre excursion, altho I dont know yet exactly how we are going to execute it.

However I am ready to exchange any of the following four for Gaig if you feel strongly that I should:El Raco d'en Freixa, Drolma, Abac or Neichel.

Speak up, I'm ready to do business!!

[Bux]

just realised it is better not to interrupt the regulars here.  sorry......i will just peruse this site and not add to it as it always just gets ignored anyway.

I'm sorry you feel that way. There's a lot of fast paced posting here and sometimes a new member may feel it's hard to break into the conversation. I assure you that most of us are interested in what you have to say. It's often easier to reply to older members because their tone and style is known and we can read much into each post. I recall when you posted the departures.com link on restaurants in Barcelona and at the time, as an affiliate of the site, my greatest concern was to be sure you hadn't compromised your ID and password on what appears to be a site reserved for AmEx Platinum members. Although that home page for that site asks for ID and password, it also seems to welcome directory spiders and bots and leave the side door open for all to read what's on the site. Once I was assured the URL didn't abuse a private account, I should have come back to the thread and noted the value of the URL. I can only say that I have been very busy since I returned from my recent trip to the south of Spain and much of my time has been spent on administrative issues here at eGullet. I'm way behind schedule in posting the details of my trip and if you want to see posts that are ignored, see what kind of reaction my comments are getting on the Madrid - Al Andalus thread. I've followed your posts and value your contribution here. Please continue to post as well as read.

[Bux]

Interesting turn of this thread. First I believe Victor suggested Can Gaig in lieu of Ca L'Isidre, not Hispania. All of this is interesting because I believe I first came to Ca L'Isidre on Victor's recommendation. Can Gaig was on the same list, but in another category, or so I thought, and I haven't been there yet. Ca L'Isidre is somewhat traditional although hardly hidebound and I see the daughter, Nuria Gironés, who is pastry chef at the restaurant, just got a nice mention in a Spanish high fashion magazine with a recipe for an infusion of red fruit with coconut foam. Don't know fashion magazines, our Fat Guy is now writing for Elle.

For someone looking for honest Catalan cooking, willing to restrict the menu to fresh seafood as well as willing to partake of it in the presence of tourists and a view of the beach and its distractions, I'll suggest Can Majo in the corner of the Barcelonetta section. It's in Barcelona and is but a short and pleasant walk from the bottom of the Ramblas. I'm not sure I don't overrate this in my mind, but it was, for us, the counterpoint to our first meal at El Bulli and both restaurants came out the better in our memory for the proximity of the meals to each other. Perhaps Victor has some late word on this spot. Is it as good as ever. Have tourists ruined it, or was it never as good as I thought it was. Simple fresh seafood and seafood rice dishes are what I suggest there along with a nice local rose or white, or better yet a good Albariño from Galicia. Then again, we really enjoyed Hispania but weren't as wowed as Robert and Susan were by it.

I first "met" Victor many years ago on the Internet and he's had my undivided attention ever since, even after a bum steer or two. There's been barely a trip to Spain since where his recommendations have not been my primary influence. A comment he made in another thread before we left, made us change our plans for getting to Andalusia from Madrid and the detour resulted in the best meal of the trip at an underrated one star restaurant.