Barcelona’s bold new food frontier

Hemingway once wrote And Barcelona You should see Barcelona It is all still comic opera Barcelona makes you laugh He wasn t wrong The city has consistently marched to its own beat a little louder a little more irreverent than the rest of Spain he so adored When I revisit my one-time hometown I carry this quote with me It frames the way I look at the food here how Catalan chefs toy with tradition nudging it just far enough to feel fresh but never so far that it becomes unrecognizable Innovative but not molecular still warm-blooded On a latest return I ate well Morning in Spain welcomes fried pastry I ducked into Artchur in Eixample a bright corner shop busy challenging the humble churro Related years later The Sun Also Rises is still delicious Yes they make the sugar-dusted classics you dunk into thick warm chocolate but here churros cosplay as dinner Tripe stew nachos even mac and cheese arrive with ridged cut-up fried dough standing in for potatoes tortilla chips or pasta In the end a churro is like bread co-owner Adri Gracia advised me and once you accept that the universe tilts I ordered the mac and cheese molten and sharp the crunch of the churro cutting through the cream like it had something to prove One bite and that boxed orange stuff was a distant shameful memory I took a scarce hours to digest the meaning of mac and cheese for breakfast then it was time for lunch At Granja Elena in Zona Franca I enjoyed a tomato and scallop tartare that could entice even the staunchest carnivore Diced and seasoned tomato red sweet alive stacked under finely chopped lightly cured and anointed scallop and a drizzle of creamy soy dressing It arrived at the table like a jewel its colors shimmering as if coy about its own perfection When I stirred and spread the mixture on bread the texture echoed beef and I half-expected it to bleed Patricia Sierra who owns the place with her brothers Guillermo and Chef Borja declared If the tomato isn t perfect it s off the menu We wait for the tomato You could taste the waiting It made you sit up straighter Summer itself locked in a bite Down a busy street in Sants Maleducat was rewriting Catalan home cooking with a straight face Billed as a modern casa de menjars a house of meals the restaurant applies precision to Grandma s recipes without stripping out the soul Their peque o arroz seco arrived like a culinary magic trick a flawless disc of rice each grain glistening as if individually coached Sandwiched inside was braised chilled and improbably thin-sliced carpaccio of pig trotters tender enough to vanish on contact On top sat red shrimp tartare and a few final dollops of shrimp-head emulsion tied the dish together like a well-written ending A traditional understandable dish with a twist co-owner Marc Garcia recounted me It wasn t paella and it wasn t the surf-and-turf rice you d find down the block but it carried the same heartbeat Louder Want more great food writing and recipes Sign up for Salon s free food newsletter The Bite That same thump carried me back to Eixample and Batea a sleek bistro where Catalan and Galician food dance until closing time Chef-owners Carles Ram n and Manu Nu ez reworked the classic Galician dish vieira a la gallega which usually tosses scallop jam n and breadcrumbs into a shell and bakes it all into submission At Batea each part was prepared separately then layered a sofrito base sea-water-cured then lightly smoked scallop jam n whipped into a silky mousse The cooking points are different the textures are much better Chef Manu explained and we respect the ingredients much more Respect tasted lush and elemental The kind of bite you close your eyes for partly to enjoy a private moment and partly to ignore the envy from the table next to you Howie Southworth Vieras a la Gallega at Batea Franca in the same hood takes a subtler tack The dining room glowed like a film set its gently arched brick and brass softening Barcelona s usual edge Fran Baixas Marco Greci and Chef Josh McCardy an American import had taken the beloved and traditional winter stew escudella and turned it into a salad That last word alone might turn heads but at Franca it draws you in Chickpeas root vegetables and the stew s usual cuts of braised meat and offal were cooked to the individual ideal diced scattered over greens and dressed with a mustard vinaigrette privileged by specific of the stew s cooking liquid Putting the broth in arrangement of the meats rather than the other way around according to Baixas A dish that felt like a wink nostalgic yet altogether new Not far away at Pepa Bar a Vins irreverence was the raison d tre I couldn t resist their stacked ensaimada a coiled Mallorcan pastry enriched with lard usually powdered with sugar and served for breakfast Not here It arrived and as owner Camila Espinoza instructed we want you to see the layered colors topped with smoky red sobrassada soft Mallorcan sausage whipped ricotta and a drizzle of honey It was a lot Sweet savory silken like a food group that shouldn t exist but somehow does By all reports there s an ensaimada on every table every night They can t take it off the menu I understood why and ordered a glass of DO Tarragona red to help pass the evening We need your help to stay independent Subscribe at present to assistance Salon s progressive journalism Jordi Brullas a friend and restaurant guru once advised me Chefs in Barcelona are reinterpreting tradition with great respect but without fear Looking back on my stay the surprise and the indulgence and the whimsy proved him right Howie Southworth Ensaimada at Pepa Bar a Vins By nightfall my table sat above the city at the NH Collection Calder n rooftop over Rambla de Catalunya Barcelona stretched out in every direction a mosaic of old stone glass and spire Gaud s Sagrada Familia standing like an undone sentry among the rest There s a Catalan phrase seny i rauxa reason and impulse It explains a lot The city has inevitably been at ease with contrast old and new shoulder to shoulder solemn tradition twisted into something unexpected without apology I thought of Patricia s tomato at Granja Elena how she waits for it to be perfect before letting it sing Barcelona is like that too It knows when its creative bones are ready for prime time and when they are it hands them a mic where nobody expected to hear them the day before today You d be a fool not to listen Read more about Spanish food Chasing Spain through tomato bread Quicos a Spanish snack worth the noise Seamus Mullen s love affair with tortilla espa ola The post Barcelona s bold new food frontier appeared first on Salon com