Cerveseria Catalana, Eixample, Barcelona > Reviews (1)

Tapas? If I have to

I’ve never been a big fan of the concept of tapas, tending to see it as an expensive way of eating lots of little bits and pieces, paying way over the odds and eventually feeling like you’ve not really had a proper meal at all. I’ve been invited to UK tapas restaurants and been forced to think up really creative reasons why I can’t (or don’t want) to go. “My dog ate my homework” doesn’t work for eating out, but I’ve come close up with some outlandish excuses. However if you’re in Spain, it’s a different kettle of ‘small deep fried fish and octopus bits’ altogether and I’m a little more open minded especially when I’m by the sea. Doubly so when I’m there for work and someone else is paying – the best kind of eating out.

I got a new colleague for my team at the beginning of March and went over to our office in Barcelona to get involved with her induction. I asked her to choose a restaurant and she picked the Cerveseria Catalana (or the Catalan ‘beer house’ if you prefer). She told me roughly where it was and my memory antennae were twitching. I told her I knew a Cerveseria a couple of blocks off the Diagonal, close to Las Ramblas and she said it was unlikely to be the same one, and that there were lots of such places. I remained optimistic as I had very good memories of a place where I used to eat with colleagues a few employers ago and which had long been a favourite of mine. I think Isabel was absolutely shocked when it turned out that of the thousands of eateries in that part of the city, she’d picked one that I knew and also loved. I'm not the only one - on a certain well known travel review site, it scores at something like the 26th most popular restaurant out of over 3000 in Barcelona.

A Fine 'Eixample' of a tapas restaurant

Cerveseria Catalana is in the Eixample area of the city on Carrer de Mallorca. It’s just off the Rambla Catalunya at it’s ‘top’ end (i.e. the end furthest from the sea). If you start from La Pedrera, the famous Gaudi building with the ‘stormtrooper’ chimneys and head one block towards the sea, turn right and go one and a half blocks, you’ll find it. It’ll be the place that’s full to bursting even at an unfashionably early hour when any self-respecting local wouldn’t dream of going for dinner. It’s busy for two good reasons – firstly it’s in ALL the guidebooks and online guides, and secondly it’s very good value. They stock an impressive array of world beers though I have to admit we didn’t indulge very much.

Spain’s been in a mess for a few years now and you’d expect that restaurants might be struggling. In the last 18 months I’ve not really noticed this although I did once think times must be hard when a popular restaurant was nearly empty but that turned out to be because there was a big football match on and everyone was home watching. Despite the hard times, eating out in Barca really isn’t cheap. A rather ordinary meal for two can easily cost close to 100 euros which I think is pretty crazy.

Prepare to Squeeeeeze

A taxi dropped us outside and we squeezed through the door.

Isabel sharpened her elbows and shuffled to the podium where a lady was taking table bookings. She was told that there would be a wait of about 20 minutes but in the meantime we could get a drink and maybe start on the food. The vestibule area of the restaurant was full to bursting with people waiting for tables or just grabbing a beer or a quick snack before heading home. There are long display counters down each side of the room – one showing ingredients that can be made up into dishes and the other displaying ready to eat snacks including ‘montaditos’ – little mountains of stuff perched on top of bread that are almost guaranteed to fall down the front of your shirt. There are lots of little fried rissoles of various kinds and plenty of things to tempt your taste-buds.

Alternatively you can eat outside on the pavement and at really busy times this can be the quickest way to get a place to sit, however it was far too cold in early March for us to risk 'al fresco'.

Isabel ordered us each a beer and we’d barely started sipping when they call us to say our table was ready. The barman had insisted she pay him when she asked for the beers which had surprised her as normally they just add them to your bill. She interpreted this as “a sign of the crisis” as if Barcelona restaurants were living in fear of people running out the door without paying after necking a few beers and eating lots of squid.

How do you choose?

The restaurant has been refurbished since I was last there and it’s more modern, fresher look to the place. I remember it having quite clumpy ‘booth’ seating and being a bit darker and slightly gloomy. It’s now packed to the gills with lots of tiny tables and everything is quite squeezed in. I would guess that part of the refurb was to increase the number of people they can serve.

Tables are small and it’s a wonder they can fit all the food on. We took a look at both the standard menu and a list of specials and I decided to shut up and let Isabel (who is Portuguese and knows her stuff) just get on with it, although I did put in a request for ‘chipirones’ – lightly battered titchy baby octopus. The rest I left in her hands and she did me proud. To be honest if you don't understand the menu and you aren't sure what to have, the tables are SO close to each other you can easily point to what's on the next table that takes your fancy and say - 'Harry Met Sally'like - "I'll have what she's having".

We kicked off with Catalan tomato bread. You can’t spend long in Barcelona without coming across this local alternative to bruschetta. It’s generally a slice cut across a baguette, sometimes slightly toasted, then topped with tomato ‘mush’ and olive oil. Sometimes they rub whole cloves of garlic onto the bread first to give it a bit more kick. You can even find it on the breakfast buffet in many hotels. The next plate to arrive was heaped with what looked like fried cockroaches. These were finely sliced and fried pieces of laminated artichoke or ‘alcachofas’ which taste much better than they look or than I make them sound.

They are light, crispy and very tasty but shockingly calorific – typically Catalan to take a healthy little artichoke and fry it. I knew there was a lot more to come so I tried to resist.

We had a bit of confusion on some mushrooms. Isabel had tried to order oyster mushrooms but we got a dish of more conventional ‘champignones’ which are like button mushrooms. These were cooked in garlic and were gorgeous. Later a second plateof the ‘girgolas plancha’ – grilled oyster mushrooms – turned up too. I was in mushroom heaven and the ‘girgolas’ were particularly excellent. Our two remaining dishes were a plate of ‘chalcots’ and a dish of ‘chipirones’. I had to look up a translation of chalcots and discovered that they are called chalcots – duh – which was a word I’d not seen before. These are an onion-like vegetable that looks like a skinny leek or a fat spring onion. These had been grilled until the skins were blackened and served with a thick red sauce containing tomato and ground nuts. We peeled of the skins and dipped them in the sauce and enjoyed the sweet, slightly caramelised oniony taste. I wasn’t overly taken with the sauce though. Our final dish was the one I’d picked – the tiny baby cephalopods (not sure – octopi, octopuses, octo…….who knows) which were actually the only dish that disappointed. Typical that it should be the one I had chosen though undoubtedly it’s hard to have a high impact after all the rest of the food we’d guzzled down.

Great value

The most expensive of the dishes was the chipirones at €9.95 and the cheapest was the Catalan bread at €2.45. The other dishes ranged from €3.90 to €6.55. Undoubtedly not ordering meat – especially the shockingly expensive Jamon Iberica (air-cured ham) – kept our costs down but I was really surprised when these six dishes plus two beers and two cups of peppermint tea came to a total of €42.60. This was undoubtedly the cheapest meal I’ve had in Barcelona in a long time and I had really enjoyed it. It helped of course that Isabel was happy to indulge my fishitarianism so I didn’t have to avoid lots of meat, but there really weren’t any dud dishes in this selection. I’ll admit I was a bit disappointed by the chipirones but probably mostly because I was far too full by the time they arrived.