TAPAS "If I could only eat one thing, I would have pa amb
tomàquet, which I really miss. They take bread and rub raw garlic
and raw tomato on it, and it is delicious, just fantastic. There's
no other place in the world that really prepares bread that way.
Also, you have to have the ham, the jamón serrano, the one that
isn't cooked. It's cured, like prosciutto. It's just amazing. The
jamón you can get anywhere in
Spain. It's not a Barcelona
specialty, but the pa amb tomàquet is a Catalan thing."
DINNER "Set Portes, the Seven Doors, is right at the port. I
had great squid paella there. It's one of the oldest restaurants in
Barcelona, the place to go if you're entertaining family because it
has that kind of classy ambience. If you're looking for something
kind of fun in the middle of the night and you don't want to get
dressed up, there's Flash Flash. It has delicious hamburgers, and
they mix all kinds of things, garlic or scallions and other
ingredients, into the hamburger meat. They have great tortillas,
Spanish omelets, and very good desserts. That's more uptown, but in
any of the open-air restaurants by the port you're going to get a
good seafood meal. Lots of places have white gazpacho, which is
another
Barcelona specialty that not many people know about. It's a
little strange, made with pine nuts and garlic."
STROLL "From Set Portes, which really does have seven old
doors, you can walk out from there into the port area. It's a
terrific area just to stroll around, because often they'll have
some great antique clipper ship hanging around, and the most
beautiful sailboats and huge, gorgeous yachts from around the
world. There's an area where everybody rollerblades down there. The
port is a nice area to walk in and there are lots of open-air
restaurants and bars. You can get sangria there, but it's not
really the local specialty. People drink beer and a wine that's
kind of like a blush, but lighter. They also drink cava, a
sparkling Spanish wine. It's like champagne. I'm kind of partial to
Cristal champagne, but cava is good."