A fairly new restaurant which prepares good food and makes you feel right at home.

Entrance:


Interior:

Very modern and minimalistic but very comfortable as well. It actually reminded me of my apartment in NYC, part of the reason why I felt so much like I was sitting in my own dining room at home. The restaurant is small with only a few tables, so reservations are definitely a good idea. I made a reservation half a week before for Valentine’s Day.

The waiter first presented us with their menu but after we had already decided what we wanted, he came back and told us that only the Valentine’s Day set menu was available! I was a little bummed because I had really wanted to try their fried egg and potato foam, a creative twist on the traditional Spanish potato omelette which seemed to be popular that winter at various restaurants. So…

Valentine Special €50 per person.

3 types of super thin freshly fried chips.

From left to right: sweet yam chips, some radish? chip, and ultra thin banana chips. I have no idea how they would be able to cut such thin slices of vegetables and fry them to such a crunchy state! Very interesting.

4 dips.

We weren’t told how to eat this, so we just dipped our bread in it and sprinkled some on the chips. From top left clockwise: sour cream and chives flavored veggie dip. Curry, poprocks, and popcorn bits– yes, poprocks! This I could eat alone– it was quite random actually– pebbles of sugar popping in your mouth while you chew on curry powder and popcorn! Next, thick, natural peanut oil. And lastly, really thick and salty soy sauce. Overall the dips were a bit random but interesting as well.

Crispy bread.

We were offered several choices of bread, I chose this grainy whole wheat one. Comes with a little thing of sea salt.

The waiter who served us was very nice, and tried his best speaking in English, and it seemed that before he served each dish, he was in the kitchen anxiously memorizing how to present them in English! Very personalized and courteous service.

“Champagne with grape juice”

Bubbly sweet and fruity.

“Oysters with lemon ice cream and pepper”

I think the waiter meant lemon sorbet, as that is what was on the oysters. This was my very first experience ever eating raw oysters! Not a bad first time, as the oyster was very fresh and plump and slipped right into my mouth easily. There were tiny bits of pepper on top also. The whole thing tasted a bit like the ocean, but the lemon sorbet really made it nice; it gave it a cold, sweet, and refreshing lemon flavor, which I think I would prefer over squeezed lemon juice.

“Shot of orange foam, spinach, and asparagus”

I really had no idea where to start! As we were given a little spoon, I alternated between taking a bite of the veggies and taking a spoon of the foam, trying to mix the flavors. The orange foam was very airy and bubbly and it felt like I was breathing in a rosy, fragrant and sweet blood orange. The flavor was very strong and then quickly bubbled and melted away into a grapefruity flavor. To the left is a neatly stacked pile of lightly salted baby spinach leaves and a rose petal. The white and green asparagus to the right was also light and salty, buttered up with a bit of olive oil.

“Fish from the beach, baby vegetables and apple cucumber sauce”

I am guessing that “fish from the beach” means very fresh fish! The fish was a soft but dense and thick white fish, the meat slippery and easily sectioned. The baby vegetables consisted of a very soft and cute baby carrot, baby corn grilled and buttered deliciously, a really soft and juicy radish, and a leafy veggie. The green sauce to the right tasted like a gazpacho with cool cucumber veggie flavors and olive oil.

Baby lamb chops.

Poor baby lamb, but as it was a set menu, the hungry Chicken didn’t want to let good food go to waste and gave it a try. The flavor was actually quite good, no lamby/woolly/wet dog/fishy flavors that I normally can’t stand in lamb meat and goat cheese. The honey and chocolate sauce drizzled on top really made the meat nice and sweet, I never knew meat and chocolate matched so well! The meat itself was soft and a bit fatty. Accompanying the lamb were crispy grilled potato slices.

Cafe con leche (Caffe latte or coffee with milk).

At first I didn’t want the creamy coffee, but after the waiter said “Are you sure?? It’s included…” I said “Ok then!!”

“Chocolate coulant with raspberries”

A memorable and pretty heart-shaped chocolate coulant, currently my favorite dessert, and luckily for me, very popular among the restaurants in Barcelona. Hot right out of the oven, the outside of the cake was crisp like a brownie top, oozing with hot melting chocolate insides. The sweetness of the moist chocolate cake was very subtle, and the chocolate liquid filling surprisingly very light, like a pudding flavor. Even though I’m an extreme sweet tooth, I loved this dessert! It wasn’t heavy at all, and was just sweet enough to satisfy my cravings of sweet things after dinner. The warm and sweet raspberries also went very well with the chocolate. A perfect end to a great meal!

I really enjoyed the dinner that evening. Everything from the faint clangings coming from the kitchen in the back, to the quiet atmosphere (the walls seemed to suck in all the noise and let you have a private dinner at each table), to the perfect timing of the dishes (we were always served the next dish only a few minutes after finishing another and never before), made you feel like an honored guest at someone’s home. Chef Omar Mosquera (formerly of Sketch, in London) deserves all the good reviews he can get!

Receipt:
Valentine menux2= 100€
Font dor 1.80
total+tax= €108.93 (dinner for 2)

This entry was posted by chicken on Tuesday, July 18th, 2006 at 6:56 pm and is filed under Barcelona, Eixample Esquerra, Mediterranean. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.