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Chefs revel in the sheer pleasure of food Chefs in Spain's culture
capital are turning the tables on food scientists and getting back to
basics. Well, almost. Anya Von Bremzen puts foie gras dust behind her and
takes a bite of things to come.
When it comes to the sport of divining the next great food trend all bets
are off in experiment-driven
Spain, where traditional notions of dining are being pushed to their
limits. Is there life after liquid nitrogen caipirinhas and calcium chloride
ravioli?
Barcelona hotel restaurants might hold the answer. Though it's home to
El Bulli Taller, the lab where Ferran Adrià develops new dishes, the
Catalan capital never truly bought into alchemical cooking. This is a
city as practical as it is playful, and restaurateurs here understand the
need to reconcile progress with profit. So recently, when some of the
country's most visionary chefs opened informal places at local hotels, they
had to reexamine their cooking in order to please crowds and give those
avant-garde–obsessed critics something to chew on. At other hotel dining
rooms, restrained neoclassical cooking is the taste of the moment, while
young chefs at casual restaurants are busy coining a new urban style. And
the crowds? They couldn't be more delighted—happy to revel in the sheer
pleasure of food instead of trying to figure out by which miracle of alchemy
a block of lemon granita got inside a tea bubble. A return to tradition?
Well, that would be radical. Let's just say that the foam is subsiding.
Hot Tables
She is Rosa María Esteva, the legendary dueña of the Tragaluz restaurant
group, whose establishments have defined the Barcelona look since the
eighties. They are the burningly creative Roca brothers, the
chef/sommelier/dessert whiz trio behind Celler de Can Roca, Catalonia's most
innovative restaurant after El Bulli. When the two parties teamed up at
Moo—the design-centric restaurant at Esteva's Hotel Omm—the result was a
perfect union of style and substance. The dinnerware was created for Esteva
by local artists; the expansive slate-and-steel space dead-ends into a
glassed-in bamboo garden. And did we mention the marriage of cocina y vino?
Famous for desserts that replicate the fragrances of well-known perfumes,
the Rocas have channeled their obsession with scents into revolutionizing
wine and food pairings.
At Moo, a sommelier doesn't match a wine to a dish devised by a chef
independently; instead, the Rocas create flavors that not only complement
the wine but actually riff on its aromas. A salad called Verdejo, after a
white Rueda grape, echoes the wine's delicate, grassy nose by layering
lamb's lettuce, mango, fennel, chervil, rhubarb, and dill oil. The smoky
coarseness of the Clos ManyetesPriorat strikes a harmonious chord with the
slow-cooked baby goat in a rosemary honey glaze and served alongside a
bubbly herb-infused sheep's-milk air. After sniffing out the citrus,
vanilla, and saffron notes in your Château Doisy DaeneSauternes, marvel at
the uncanny precision with which they are mimicked in a dessert that
combines orange cream, saffron flan, honey gelée, brioche cubes, and apricot
sorbet. Then again, this streamlined version of the high-minded food the
Rocas serve at Celler would taste terrific even with a glass of Vichy
Catalan mineral water. Hotel Omm, 265 Carrer Rosselló; 34/93-445-4000;
tasting menu for two $167.
With its cushion-strewn banquettes, Jetsons-like chairs, and small plates
on the menu, Arola seems to recall a dozen other sceney hotel restaurants
from Hong Kong to Hawaii where the DJ outshines the chef. Then you actually
taste these tidbits. Having earned two Michelin macaroons and rock-star
status for his conceptual cuisine at La Broche in Madrid, the Catalan-born,
El Bulli–trained Sergi Arola took a populist route at Hotel Arts, offering
his whimsical interpretation of tapas. He's succeeding spectacularly with
dishes like faux jamón (tuna carpaccio drizzled with jamón ibérico–infused
oil), wood-smoked sardines with a complex seaweed romesco, or a glass of
partridge gelée accented with pickled wild mushrooms. One can't help but
notice the care that has been lavished on something as basic as pa amb
tomàquet: the iconic Catalan tomato-rubbed bread is presented here as a
rub-it-yourself affair, with chewy bread, flaky sea salt, olive oil, and
those wildly flavorful Canario tomatoes. Even in a city that worships its
bar staples—white beans with butifarra sausage at Cal Pep, baby squid with
fried eggs at Quim de la Boquería—Arola's reinvented patatas bravas deserve
to be enshrined. Instead of the classic fried spuds with tomato sauce,
diners are treated to a row of twice-cooked potato "cylinders": soft within,
crisp outside, and hollowed out to hold spicy tomato sauce and garlicky
aioli. Everyone in Spain can make frozen foie gras dust. To dazzle with
patatas bravas—that's genius.
Hotel Arts, 19–21 Marina; 34/93-483-8090; dinner for two $154.
In the Lap of Luxury
In the late 20th century B.A. (Before Adrià), Catalan haute cuisine was
brown, brawny, and bourgeois: pig's feet and veal cheeks, potatoes and
bacalao, with an occasional flourish of foie gras and truffles. Its greatest
practitioner was Carles Gaig, a chef with an easy-to-love style and an
annoyingly out-of-the-way restaurant. Last fall, when Restaurant Gaig opened
with a central L'Eixample address in jazzy new digs at Hotel Cram,
Barcelonans turned out in such numbers, they seemed to be saying basta with
deconstructive cuisine. Decked out in rich reds, blacks, and gauzy
metallics, the room evokes a mod Christmas present. The kitchen, however,
remains a foam-free zone, sending out retro treats like airy salt-cod cakes,
cubes of rare salt-cooked salmon atop a velvety zucchini cream, and
brittle-skinned suckling pig accentuated with seared strawberries. My dinner
date, the renowned cava maker and bon vivant Augustí Torelló, raised a glass
to the "sublime simplicity" of the potato Parmentier topped with poached egg
and white truffles. Then he toasted the lushness of the gratinéed cannelloni
(a Barcelona classic borrowed from Italy), with a densely flavorful filling
of roast turkey, beef, and foie gras. Gaig's cuisine might be old-fashioned,
but downstairs, he's got the swankiest-looking restaurant lounge in town.
Hotel Cram, 214 Carrer Aragó; 34/93-429-1017; dinner for two $141.
A meal at Caelis, the recently renovated and renamed dining room at the
Ritz, proves that these days, neoclassicism comes in many flavors. Fluent in
Spanish nueva cocina but respectful of his solid French training at
Taillevent and Ducasse, Romain Fornell, the 29-year-old chef,
demonstrates—brilliantly—that modern doesn't have to mean cutting-edge. His
asparagus royal (custard) is a revelation, so vibrant it tastes like a gulp
of vegetable-infused air. Tiny batons of rhubarb and a discreet touch of
date purée elevate an already perfect fillet of sea bass. By applying a
trendy sous vide (vacuum-packed) method to a leg of Pyrenean lamb, Fornell
produces a meat that is both taut and soft enough to eat with a spoon. The
cool opulence of the ballroom-like space borders on chilly (note to
designers: table lamps would go a long way). But for cooking this
articulate, fresh, and refined, one can forgive much worse sins. Hotel Ritz
Barcelona, 668 Gran Vía de Corts Catalanes; 34/93-510-1205; lunch for two
$116.
If the dramatic plunge of the dollar won't stand between you and an
exquisite meal, make a beeline for the breathtakingly expensive Drolma, at
the Majestic hotel, where I had an unforgettable game dinner presented on
Versace china. A specialist in grand, traditional dishes—lièvre à la royale,
whole roasted jarret de veau—Drolma's Fermí Puig is among Spain's greatest
chefs. In a sumptuous salon that seems plucked from an old master painting,
he pampers local businessmen and politicos with seasonal menus that might
include langoustines with artichokes, potatoes, and a surprise hint of
caramel, or ventresca (buttery tuna belly) enlivened with caviar and a
palate-cleansing Chantilly. If formal dining is your cup of consommé, this
is the place for that epic five-hour meal. Smelling salts with your bill?
We're sure the well-drilled staff will oblige.
Hotel Majestic, 68 Passeig de Gràcia; 34/93-496-7710; dinner for two
$385.
Catalan Contemporary
A few years ago Barcelona saw an explosion of small chef-run
restaurants—Saüc, Colibrí, Hisop—withchic-on-a-shoestring looks and kitchens
determined to innovate without scaring the masses. You'll eat well in each
of these spots, but Alkimia offers the best glimpse of where post-Adrià
cooking is headed. The white-on-white room is a testament to the effects of
good lighting and is packed with architect types sporting the latest
fashionable eyewear. They are so busy enjoying themselves, the inventiveness
behind chef Jordi Vilá's seemingly easy-eating cuisine probably passes them
by. The bracingly bitter cocoa broth that accompanied my seared foie gras
was an inspired touch that offset the richness of the liver. Beneath the
salad of cèpes and potatoes lurked a layer of lentil "meringue" dotted with
pork cracklings—amplifying the earthiness of the dish.Tradition? Vilá
delivered with capipota, Catalan calf's head, completely free of gristle and
sauced with brown butter and capers. Pastry chef David Inglada is justly
winning awards for triumphs like peach gazpacho veiled with yogurt mousse
and fruity olive oil. All this at bistro prices. A table mañana? Good luck.
79 Carrer Indústria; 34/93-207-6115; dinner for two $154.
It takes chutzpah to open a restaurant in a food-obsessed city like
Barcelona without having had a stint at El Bulli or Can Fabes. And if the
aspiring restaurateur is a norteamericano who worked in Silicon Valley and
has no deeper culinary credentials than cooking for dinner parties? Well, in
the case of Jordi Artal—a young Canadian of Catalan origins who moved to
Barcelona and opened Cinc Sentits a year ago—he lands on a hit. Locals,
tourists, and even those grouchy Madrid restaurant critics adore the place,
and not just for the modestly stylish look and the gracious multilingual
service, courtesy of Artal's charming sister and mom. The opening shooter of
maple syrup and cava sabayon with a crunchy accent of sea salt; the dreamy
pumpkin velouté intensified with sliced quail breast, chanterelles, and
drizzles of organic hazelnut oil; the beautifully moist fillet of sea bass
poised on an orzo risotto enriched with shellfish reduction and
mascarpone—Artal's creations comfortably hold their own against those of his
more pedigreed competitors. "How do you do it?" I ask. Artal just smiles and
shrugs. 58 Carrer Aribau; 34/93-323-9490; dinner for two $102.
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