{Foodie Traves} Dinner in Barcelona

Last week I shared what my breakfast consisted of in Barcelona, Spain while on vacation last month. If you remember from my Airplane Food post, my husband and I had a difficult time getting to Barcelona thanks to a silent pilot’s strike going on.

Night 1: Café & Té

On our first night (extremely jet-lagged) we decided to stay close to our hotel. We walked a block or so to the local mall and wondered around. Frustrated and extremely hungry we ended up at Café & Té. Little did we realize that it’s a franchised restaurant that can be found all over Spain! Drinking a very potent glass of sangria might not have been the best for me, but it sure did taste good!

My husband was craving comfort food so he went for the pasta. I warned him it would be nothing like what we eat at home, but he still went with it. He ordered the Pasta Trio that consisted of: Spaghetti Bolognese, Tagliatelle Carbonara and Ricotta Tortellini with Spinach. He liked it but agreed that the flavors were so different!

I went with the special of the night. 3 tapas items and a sangria for 12 euros. I choose the potato crusted chicken strips; which at the time when I was reading the menu I thought it read potatoes and chicken–when it came out it was totally not what I had expected. However, I loved the chicken strips! I could have easily eaten another order! My second plate of tapas was a tomato and mozzarella salad. I figured it was a safe choice, and I was right. It was delicious and the mozzarella melted in my mouth! My third choice (which I thought was safe) totally threw me for a curve ball. I ordered a mini burger and let me tell you. It did not taste like a traditional burger! The beef patty tasted more like a pork sausage breakfast patty. I had one bite and gave the rest to my husband. But it was ok, because that meant it gave me a reason to roam around and get dessert!

We found a crepe stand outside of the mall, and I insisted that we split a dulce de leche crepe. It was pure bliss and oh so sweet.

Day 2:

We had a late dinner. We didn’t sit down to eat until almost 9:30 at night. We wandered down dark alley ways through Las Ramblas looking at different menus until we found a place that we were intrigued by. This was the night I wanted to have Paella for dinner.

We found Colon Mediterranean Kitchen. We liked that it was busy and it had an English translated menu! We also were drawn in at the fact that they had a Paella dinner for 2 for 19 euros! Dinner for 2 for $24 American dollars? I’m sold! We got to choose 3 tapas plates to start with. Naturally, because I love olives, I chose the marinated olives. We both were enjoying the Potatoes Bravas (fried potato with a spicy mayonnaise like dipping sauce), and we took a risk and ordered the squid rings (aka calamari in the states). We found it odd that the squid rings didn’t come with a dipping sauce. Thankfully they smothered our Potatoes Bravas with sauce, so we just used that! For our main course we chose the seafood paella chocked full of mussels, clams, crawfish, shrimp, bay scallops, and chunks of lobster. This Paella was massive and could have easily fed four very hungry adults. Sadly, we were only able to eat half of the steaming hot pan they brought to our table.

By the time we were done sipping sangria and beer it was close to midnight. Although I was pretty full, I felt the need to get my gelato fix. So I had my first gelato in Europe. A cafe gelato (coffee). It was so rich and creamy and strong (like coffee)! After I ate it I was afraid I would be up all night from the caffeine! Thankfully, that wasn’t the case.

Day 3:

I’ll share both lunch and dinner on this day. Lunch was just too good to not share.  On our last day in the city, we rode on the hop-on, hop-off bus. We decided to get off at a quaint little part of town to grab a bite to eat. We figured it was where more locals were and a little more off the tourist path. Little did we forget to realize that it was around 3pm and most places close in between lunch and dinner. Oh, and it was Sunday! Since the weather looked like it was getting bad we decided to find a restaurant and take a little break from all the walk we had been doing.

I enjoyed a massive glass of sangria. Note to self: I typically don’t drink at lunch time so this made for one tired Katie.

The menu at Canalla wasn’t large, so we were a bit limited on what to order. I saw that they had barratta and I was sold (even though it was 11 euros). We also ordered the Potatoes Bravas (although this version was our absolute favorite on our trip). We also ordered to meat croquettes, and my husband partook in the special: one extra-large beer and a canape for 4 euro. The beer alone was worth 4 euro and the canape was 3.50. He opted for the jamon and cream cheese canape and enjoyed it. All of our food was great, and the drinks were even better. The back room of the restaurant which is where we were sat was very eclectic. The walls were lined with vintage newspaper. It also made for great people watching. My husband and I enjoyed looking at what everyone else ordered.  2 hours later and we were ready to hit the road again.

Sunday was another late dinner night. Especially since we had lunch at 3pm! We had also been walking all day and my feed were sore and I was exhausted. By the time we finished the Magic Fountain show it was 9:30. I just wanted to eat and go to bed. I was also contemplating just going to bed at that point. But we found a few restaurants nearby. We decided to go with TapaTapa. Once again, little did we realize, we picked a chain restaurant. The inside decor was modern and had eclectic artwork on the walls.

We had a feast this evening. I’m sure that the waitress thought we were pigs! My husband enjoyed a local beer while I sipped on a glass of red sangria. We shared tomato bread, (more) potatoes bravas, tomato mozzarella salad (that had chopped walnuts in it), a grilled vegetable platter, and a shrimp and monkfish skewer (not pictured). My husband also enjoyed a plate of fried potatoes with ham and eggs (pictured middle right). All-in-all our dinner was good.

I’m excited to share my adventures in the Las Ramblas market next week (it’s a video)!

If you want to see more vacation photos from Barcelona, head on over to my DIY blog Sew Woodsy.