Cal Pep: Clams

Day 1: Our first dinner in Barcelona was at Cal Pep, which came highly recommended by the LUXE City Guide and close friends.  We waited about 40 minutes for a seat at the bar, which is open to the “kitchen” of the restaurant.  I must warn you that this is an easy place to splurge and spend more than you might have planned.  The atmosphere of Cal Pep is lively, and Pep is at the bar, making a point to speak with every party that sits down.  He recommended a very nice bottle of wine (Cérvoles (2005)) and the Tapas Menu — a full service from start to finish.  In order: Bread, sauteed clams w/ garlic, fried calamari, chicken and cod croquetas, tuna tartare, fried green peppers, truita trempera, botifarra w/ beans, and crema catalan.   The highlight of the meal was definitely the tuna tartare. If you on a budget, this is definitely the one to get.  The seafood here is top-notch; take advantage of it!

Cal Pep
Plaza Olles 8
+ 93 310 79 61
Metro: Barceloneta

Anchovies and Beer

Day 1 in Barcelona:  Ciudad Condal proved to be a great spot to people-watch, relax and enjoy a small bite to eat. The tapas here are reasonably priced and moderately sized despite its location on La Rambla - one of  the busiest streets in the city.  The business hours are also much more flexible than some of the other smaller tapas bars. We had the anchovies w/ olives, patatas bravas, and bread.  A decent glass of red wine was only 1.50€ .   Overall, this was a great value, but not very “authentic”.  An English-speaking staff made this the ideal first-spot to sit and plan the rest of your day.

Ciudad Condal
Rambla de Catalunya 18
+ 93 318 19 97
Metro: Passeig de Gràcia

Sometimes…. things go wrong.

I made a great Creamy Dijon sauce for a pork loin today.

In the end, it separated.  I’m thankful that it still tasted wonderful, but it just didn’t look good. In fact, it looked kinda gross.  Butter, shallots, mushrooms, swedish dijon mustard, thyme and cream. Man, it looked bland. And oven-roasted pork loin doesn’t really have much color to it either, so it was like bland on bland.

Will this urge me to recreate the sauce again? Sure. Did it change the way the sauce tasted? Nope.  Maybe it sat on the heat for too long. Maybe I added the ingredients in the wrong order. I’ll figure it out…. and next time there will be a photo

Salmon Puttanesca

After a couple weeks of low-carb eating, I was craving pasta!  I didn’t have penne on hand, but this whole-grain spaghetti worked fine…. and I think I used a higher concentration of olives and capers.  Olives actually fall into that “food quirk” category. I used to *hate* olives.  (I know, what kind of Italian am I??)  Luckily, I’ve really grown to like them.

Chipotle Salmon, Apple Cucumber salsa, slaw and avocado

This was *super*  yummy. Highly recommend it!  Make it gluten-free by omitting taco shells.