Rafa Zafra closes the restaurant Per Feina: "we invoiced daily the same as at a table in L'Estimar"

The chef Rafa Zafra, from Seville and a Barcelona resident by adoption, has a bunch of successful restaurants. But a few weeks ago he had to close the restaurant with his most popular cuisine located on Via Augusta in Barcelona. "For work, it has been the most exciting project of my life. My mother used to punish me by sending me with my father in the truck. I didn't know that deep down I loved it. The truck would bounce and then we'd stop to eat a three-course menu, three starters and three main courses. And I was the happiest child. As an adult, I wanted to do the same but updated," explains the chef on the day he presents another popular project: the Masia Tibidabo restaurant, up in the amusement park. The establishment was first located in Poblenou, on Ciutat de Granada street, but at the end of August last year it decided to move it to the upper part because it had many difficulties in making the nights profitable. In the new location, the restaurant gained a surname "For work / For pleasure". In this case, in addition to an economic menu, you could also have a more substantial meal. Even so, it has not been enough to keep a business afloat. "I wanted to keep the prices low. And the restaurant was working. We served two hundred people every day, but we invoiced 4,000 euros. And that's one table at Estimar. Or at Jondal [the restaurant Rafa Zafra has in Ibiza], don't even mention it. We have a whole team working and running around for that," explains the chef.

The option of raising prices was not on the table. "Because we would have had to double them and it would have distorted the concept. We started at 18 euros. A daily menu requires two cooks to make it. The margin did not compensate. In the end, you have to look at the sacrifice, effort, and work, and the profit you get from it," he says. Even so, he cannot help but feel a point of disappointment, although he assures that the story has ended well. "It was my little darling and it didn't give us problems. That's why I kept it for a while, it lasted three years. But that's it. I have been able to bring the whole team to Masia Tibidabo. Everyone happy, all suppliers paid. Happy and we are not suffering. You have to know how to close projects," states Zafra.

Even so, the chef continues to have a lot of ideas in motion. One in Saint-Tropez, and also a Jondal in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. The Jondal model, in Ibiza, works very well for him. According to Zafra, it serves 400 covers a day. The chef has the Estimar seafood restaurants in Barcelona, which turns 10 this year, and Amar within the Palace hotel. In addition, he also has them in Madrid, such as his famous biquineria