• Neighborhoods
• Sights
• Restaurants
• Hotels
• Entertainment
• Shopping
• Travel Tips
• Features

Restaurants Overview

As with all other artistic endeavors in Catalonia, Catalan cuisine is more eclectic and cosmopolitan, more experimental and less tradition-bound than is generally true in other parts of Spain. In the late 1970s, chefs such as Santi Santamaria and Ferran Adrià and a host of others burst onto the Barcelona scene with fresh energy and éclat informed by a nationalistic pro-Catalan intent. Even Madrid's hottest new restaurants are presently run by Catalans from the radically inventive Santamaria and Adrià schools. Barcelona now boils over with cuina d'autor (designer cuisine: chefs with original recipes) and a combination of traditional and experimental dining that is a challenge (though a delicious one) to keep abreast of.

Combinations of tastes such as sweet and salty have found their way into Catalan cuisine from the Moorish tenure in the Balearic Islands, while French influence from what was once Northern Catalonia makes duck and rabbit and sauces such as allioli more prevalent in Barcelona than in Bilbao or Madrid. Italian influence has also been present in a corner of the Mediterranean that was historically closer to Milan by sea than to Madrid over the Castilian meseta. All in all, though everything from Japanese to Syrian to Cuban cuisine is available in Barcelona, expect radical and innovative tastes and ingredients in Catalonia.

Whether it's a classical lenguado a la plancha (grilled sole) or a dark and savory arroç negre amb sepia en su tinta (black rice with squid in its ink), everything here comes loaded with taste (read salt, read garlic, read fresh, read hot). The new Mediterranean cuisine has been found to be so intrinsically good for health (stressing olive oil, garlic, wine, vegetables, fish) that nobody has time to worry about the taste-stealing restrictions (such as salt) that other, less pleasure-crazed, more health-wary cultures have embraced.

Barcelona's hot spots change quickly in a constantly self-renewing succession of leapfrogging chefs and sous-chefs. Restaurants are so numerous and so exciting that keeping up with them is an ongoing hobby for many Barcelona food lovers. Indeed, the main problem with food and wine in the city may be their very abundance. Dining heartily twice a day and taking full advantage of the tapas hour requires some management. The Spanish, looking forward to a substantial midday meal after having finished dinner late the previous night, breakfast on little more than coffee. A mid-morning snack might include a small tortilla de patata sandwich. Lunch, served between 2 and 4 in the afternoon -- preceded by an aperitivo -- is generally considered the main meal of the day. The workday lasts until at least 8, after which it's time for the itinerant tapeo. Finally, at 9:30 or 10, comes dinner, which is often festive and can last into the wee hours.

The traveler's key to surviving this delicious but demanding regimen is to partake judiciously of tapas in the early evening -- roam freely but try to avoid filling up on the tasty morsels displayed on counters. Above and after all, Spain is the ultimate movable feast, so keep moving. Walking is the secret to being able to take advantage of the profusion of culinary temptations without serious gastric stress or distress.

Stick with local produce and local cuisine: Castilian specialties such as roast suckling pig, for example, are better in Castile (where the best and freshest piglets prevail). Here, look instead for mar i muntanya (surf-and-turf) specialties such as rabbit and prawns, or dark meat with fruits or sweets, as in duck or goose with pears or prunes, or rabbit with figs.