We interviewed the sommelier and communicator Meritxell Falgueras (Barcelona, 1981) in her native neighborhood, which she has called the Soho of Barcelona in her novels: the Sants neighborhood. We meet at Bodega Bartolí and afterwards we will go to the family shop, Celler de Gelida, where we will meet her brother Ferran and her father, Toni Falgueras. Meritxell has just published the book Women of Wine (Planeta Gastro), in which she has included studies, interviews, and surveys to which she has dedicated four years of her life.

As we approach the best time of year to eat prawns (Aristeus antennatus), in June, it's time to explain that the parental authority over red prawns lies with the Mediterranean. Not the port of Vilanova, nor Palamós, nor Blanes, nor Tarragona. The decapod crustacean that is the prima donna of our gastronomy moves tirelessly from one end of the Mediterranean to the other, and no one can scientifically say that it has spent its life in any specific town. The red prawn has no place of residence because it is nomadic: one day it's from Blanes and another day it's from Cambrils, for example.In a few days, the prawns will have a lilac-colored head (actually the cephalothorax, where the stomach is). This will mean they are females and are about to expel their eggs, which will be fertilized in the sea, and this might happen in Dénia. When the eggs are released into the sea, they will become larvae, and then the sea currents may transport them to Tarragona. Moving from place to place, they may have formed their exoskeleton in Vilanova, and also increased in size. And, finally, they may arrive, adult, in Palamós, ready to reproduce. We could explain the cycle in reverse: the egg could have been released in Palamós; the larva, in Vilanova, and the adult stage, in Dénia. And whoever says Palamós, Vilanova, or Dénia, also means other coastal towns. Therefore, it's anecdotal to say that the best prawns are from a fishing port, because they are all the same. Furthermore, there is no scientific basis for saying that prawns from the Costa Brava have an orangey hue "because in reality the red prawn has a predominantly transparent or white hue when alive, and once caught, the intensity and extent of its color gradually increases over hours and days," states scientist Arnau Subías, who runs the @gastrobio Instagram account. The only thing that indicates an orangey or red color in the prawn is how long it has been caught.

The Almarí restaurant, located within the Cala del Pi hotel, in the town of Platja d'Aro, wants to make lovers of pasta, vegetables, rice dishes, fish, and meat happy. For the former, rigatoni stuffed with oxtail under a langoustine topping. A memorable, indulgent dish, with a generous portion, one of those that makes a celebration just by arriving at the table. Pair it with varied starters, such as Roman-style squid, prawn carpaccio with extra virgin olive oil, or with lobster salad with red berries.

In Girona, they will soon change the idiom es ven com xurros to es ven com xuixos. All the pastry shops in the city, especially those in the center, have queues of people wanting to buy the fried sweets made with croissant dough. All means all. It's Flower Time, a top-notch tourist attraction for the city that shows that picturesque architecture can be even more beautiful if you decorate it with flowers. However, the surprise is that creativity or outlandish imagination has also reached xuixos, so you can find them filled with Oreo cookies, mango cream, pistachio cream (a suspicious fluorescent green), Maria cookies, Nocilla... It seems that with xuixos anything goes, but it is not so, because the Guild of Pastry Chefs, the Guild of Bakers, the Girona City Council and the promoter and inventor of the World Xuixo Contest, Salvador Garcia-Arbós, want to create the Xuixo de Girona guarantee mark so that only the one with pastry cream is the authentic one and with puff pastry, fermented and straight.

There was a day when in La Boqueria they weren't talking about the fried crests sold under the name of potato omelette or chicken paella, nor about the juices nor the squid legs displayed for hours at the fish stalls. There was a day in La Boqueria when everyone was talking about Quim de la Boqueria's fricandó. What a fricandó! The cook Carme Ruscalleda said so, the chefs from Disfrutar (Oriol Castro ate two plates), Albert Adrià and Rafa Zafra. Also all those who passed by his stall on the evening of the 150th anniversary party of Damm, which was celebrated on Sunday, April 26th, between the Liceu and La Boqueria.

I interview the chef Sergi de Meià (Barcelona, 1977) at the Centre Comarcal Lleidatà, located on Gran Via in Barcelona. On the second floor, while a group of elderly people play cards, we sit at a table illuminated by large windows. The conversation begins with his origins in Lleida, from Vilanova de Meià, and we move on to the restaurant where I first met him, Sergi Ferrer-Salat's Monvínic, which has since disappeared and been replaced by the Finestres bookshop.

We want to eat cheese when we buy a package of grated cheese, but if we don't look closely at the label, we might end up eating starches, milk proteins, melting salts, vegetable fats, flavorings, and water. All these are the ingredients that appear on the label of some industrial packages of grated cheese, some of which might not have a drop of cheese in them, because “they substitute it with vegetable fats, starch, and flavorings”, states dietitian-nutritionist Anna Grífols.

The garden with a restaurant or the restaurant with a garden at Hotel Alma Barcelona (c. Mallorca, 269) proposes to unite through cuisine the vegetables from Navarra and Maresme. Joaquín Ausejo, the hotel's owner, knows both regions well, and that's why he has brought their products. Those who want to savor "pèsols llàgrima" (tear peas) with a raw egg yolk in the middle can eat them as a starter, and then compare them with those from Navarra, which are rounder, fleshier, and have a more substantial bite. The green of the legume that sparks passions in the spring that is ending is the protagonist of many afternoon dishes, where you will also find chard with potatoes (excellent), white asparagus from Navarra, artichokes, and "borratges" (borage), one of the vegetables unjustly most difficult to find on menus, and they always deserve ovations: they are crunchy, sweet, and bitter at the same time, and if cooked steamed or sautéed, with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, they make a great dish.

It's the big scam of online table reservations. You want to go eat at the Disfrutar restaurants in Barcelona or El Celler de Can Roca, with all the illusion in the world that it implies just thinking about it, and you go to the website to make an online reservation. You find a table for the very next day (what luck!), and when you have entered all your personal details, they ask you to pay the full menu. You do so, and on the day you show up at the restaurant, they tell you they have no reservation in your name. “In recent weeks we have been encountering this constantly, and we don't stop reporting it to the Mossos d’Esquadra”, states Eduard Xatruch, from the Disfrutar restaurant, who adds that these fake websites manage to be well-positioned on Google to the point that they appear first when someone simply types in the search engine: "Disfrutar Barcelona".

It is Tuesday afternoon, and at Granja Viader in Barcelona (c. Xuclà, 6) the tables are full of people eating melted hot chocolate with a side of whipped cream and another small plate of churros with sugar on top. They are served by Marc Espuny Casademunt (Barcelona, 1986), who today is his first day working as the owner. He does so just one month before his mother, Mercè Casademunt Viader (Barcelona, 1959), retires at 67 years old. "I would have liked to retire earlier, but I didn't have the years counted for it, and there was also the fact that Marc had never told me that he wanted to take over the farm." He didn't tell her until we interviewed him, two years agoand she told us she didn't have a successor. "As a result of your article is when Marc and I talked, and he told me: «Mother, I want to take over Granja Viader»", explains Mercè, happily. She has Marc by her side, who has spent the day working there as he did at seventeen, the first time he worked there.

The rise of vegan and vegetarian diets has made dried fruit a star thanks to its high protein content. Let's discover other options beyond the classic almond, the leader in our country in both surface area and production.

The world is divided between supertasters and non-tasters. The former, due to genetics, have up to sixteen times more taste buds on the front of their tongue than the latter, the non-tasters, and this allows them to better perceive the bitter taste of food and drinks. These latter are the ones who, from a young age, eat all kinds of vegetables without a problem. So much so that there was a moment in history when some scientists believed that paternity tests could be done by checking who in the family liked the bitter taste, says the English psychologist from the University of Oxford Charles Spence. If the child did not like broccoli, because vegetables are bitter and, on the contrary, the father loved it, it could be that he was not the biological father. Fortunately, all this was an idea that science had in the thirties of the last century; today, it is the food industry that benefits from the distinction of humans between supertasters and non-tasters. So, currently, if the child at home likes vegetables and the father does not, the only possible thought is that the new generations are wise.Let's focus on the industry. What does the industry do to profit from the known distinction between those who like bitter taste and those who don't? It brings two versions of the same product to market. Have you ever gone to buy a package of cookies and found that the same brand has different types? The name or color has changed, but you can't quite figure out what the difference is.The tag, not very specific

“On the label it doesn’t say and companies simply let the market segment itself”, says Charles Spence, who also comments that the industry knows that the phrases zero fat or low sugar make food perceived as having less flavor. Storytelling is basic in life in general, and when eating, too. Even in the dishes we prepare ourselves at home, because this makes us believe that what we eat is better. Tell people at home that you have cooked the best meatballs in the world because you have put effort and love into them, and you will see how they eat them more happily.We return to the cookies. There are so many types that it's hard for us to choose some, but the same thing happens with jars of tomato sauce, guacamole, hummus, aioli, pesto, and many other processed foods that the industry has rushed to produce because it believes it makes people's lives easier. I pause: think that making them at home means we will use few ingredients (sometimes only four) and, therefore, they will be healthier. If you are, then, among those who don't know which cookies to choose because you don't see any difference beyond the packaging changing minimally, think that the industry is looking for its niche in your choice. It hopes that one day you will choose some and, the next day, others, and that you will then compare which ones you liked best. They seek to know if you are supertasters, with a genetically developed bitter taste because your ancestors could quickly distinguish if a food was bitter and, therefore, poisonous. If the dilemma overwhelms you, remember that to make cookies at home you just need to mix these ingredients: flour, sugar, egg, and yeast. If you want chocolate and hazelnut cookies, add these two ingredients. Give them the characteristic round shape and then put them in the oven at 150 °C or 170 °C for a few minutes. And that's it. A cookie shouldn't sour our lives.

]]>

On the Avenue de l'Opéra in Paris, there is a daily queue of people, organized with security guards and elastic tapes, who patiently wait to buy sweets. The two adjacent establishments of pastry chef Cédric Grolet have pains au chocolat (chocolate napolitans or rolls), croissants, and frozen fruits on display. They are arranged like jewels, on fine ceramic plates with small golden signs indicating the price. They appeal to the eyes and the stomach, and make people wait an average of twenty minutes, or more depending on the time of day. I am one of them, and when I get my pain au chocolat –which costs me seven euros– I realize it makes me think of one of the sweets that stirs passion in our home: the xuixo from Girona.

]]>

If you enter Mundana (c. Aribau, 34) for the first time, after crossing a shop window where you will find sardine cans, shoes, and a bottle of cologne that smells like pencil, you will find everything you need to have a vermouth or an aperitif with the best brands from Catalan artisans and from other towns. And whoever says aperitif and vermouth, also says knives from the Pallarès brand from Solsona. If hunger can wait, at Mundana you might find that artisan, Catalan-brand piece of clothing that suits your taste: take note of the sweaters from the IAIOS brand, from Granollers, by designer Gemma Barbany Arimany. And if you are interested in the cologne you saw in the shop window, know that it was created by Barcelona designer Oriol Montañés. And that the scent is cedar, that is, the one that makes the freshly sharpened pencil: sweet, dry, and warm at the same time.Behind the store that sells everything design-related in food, clothing, and decorative objects are siblings Anna (Barcelona, 1964) and Jaume Colomer (Barcelona, 1979). One, a molecular biologist by training, specialized in cancer studies; the other, an industrial designer, specialized in industrial creativity. One day they decided to reinvent themselves and six years ago opened their dream, which was to illuminate what local designers create. After having been in the Gràcia neighborhood, they have been installed for two years on Aribau street, near the restaurants Mont bar (with two Michelin stars), Mediamanga, and the indispensable La Valenciana.

]]>

I interview the chef Romain Fornell (Toulouse, 1976) at the Hermanos Torres restaurant, hours before he dines on turbot and sole from the aquaculture brand Neptura. He is a chef with a calm appearance despite the volume of work he has. He leads the Goût Rouge group, which has restaurants in Barcelona especially (the last one he opened is Casa Tejada), and four more in Paris. Fornell arrived in Barcelona in the late 90s to work as a chef at the now-defunct Maison du Languedoc Roussillon. In 2003 he opened the restaurant Caelis, which is now located inside the Hotel Ohla Barcelona and obtained a Michelin star.How did it come about that you are the chef of four restaurants in Paris? In the last interview I did with you, you told me that you didn't want to take any planes to have to go to work.

]]>

Open a bag of potato chips. With your hands it's very easy: you only need your thumbs and index fingers. With these two fingers on each hand, pinch and stretch the bag in opposite directions. And then you'll hear the sound: metallic, unmistakable. It's not shrill, but a pleasant, crunchy click-click. And the adjective is not in vain: if you opened the bag with your eyes closed, you would know perfectly well that you will find potato chips inside. The day the food industry thought about increasing the sale of potato chips, “the marketing specialists intuited that it would make sense to make the sound of the packaging congruent with the sensory properties of the content”, explains psychologist Charles Spence in the book GastroPhysics. The Science of Food (Paidós). It makes sense: if the food industry wanted to sell crunchy potato chips, which make a crunch-crunch when bitten, the packaging had to make the same sound, because that way all the body's senses prepare to intuit that what they are about to eat is a gift from the gods.

]]>

Emili Feliu (Barcelona, 1968) says that he follows to the letter the recipe written down by the baker Eduard Crespo, from the Balmes bakery, the creator of Sant Jordi bread. And with this recipe, and mastery, he has won, for the third time, the competition for the best Sant Jordi bread organized by the Panàtics association. "I have adapted the bread dough, because we prepare it with sourdough, the same one we use to make our breads," he explains on the first day of Sant Jordi week. As Sant Jordi is on Thursday, Emili has decided to dose the amount of Sant Jordi breads he will be making: Monday and Tuesday, about thirty; Wednesday, about two hundred, and Thursday, the big day, about eight hundred. He works with the intention of selling a thousand, which they sell for €28.50 per kilo. That is, it is a bread they sell by weight, which varies between two hundred and fifty and three hundred grams. Therefore, the price will be around six to seven euros.

]]>

I interview the cook Ada Parellada (Granollers, 1967) one afternoon after she has finished recording recipe videos. She offers me a piece of a blueberry pie, delicious, which she has prepared with nine ingredients. Only nine ingredients, because that way everything is easier, she says. We start the interview by talking about the last one I did with her, in which she told me the story of her family, and how it was that she decided to open the restaurant Semproniana with her partner. Ada Parellada has just written the book Els plats del dia (Rosa dels Vents), in which she vindicates set menus, like the ones she prepares at her restaurant daily for 23 euros, and which are dishes made from start to finish, and elaborate Catalan cuisine.

]]>

Neither sardines nor anchovies. The most sold fish in our country is farmed salmon, which, for this reason, is gray and is dyed a range from pale orange to orange-red depending on the country where it is sold, because it is known that every land fights its war in colors. The popularity of salmon is probably explained because its nutritional benefits have been spread: as it is oily fish, it provides readily available omega-3. Sardines and anchovies from our ports also provide it. And you will say that salmon has no bones, and it is true, because they are removed with industrial machinery, and I counter-argue: the nutritional benefits of salmon, that is, the polyunsaturated fatty acids that regulate blood cholesterol levels and help reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases, are only achieved with sardines, anchovies, and oily fish in general with a short lifespan. And with wild salmon. Farmed salmon is another story, and I will explain why.To begin with, in floating cages there is a large number of salmon with a relatively small volume of water, states marine biologist Anna Bozzano, and this fact leads to all sorts of disadvantages. First: medicines have to be used because they are all together and a disease would be easily acquired by all of them. Second: the excrement they form there is organic matter that ends up at the bottom of the sea and suffocates marine life: "There is no animal that can eat it, and that is why the seabed under salmon aquaculture cages are deserts." Fattened with soy feed

To continue, farmed salmon is fattened with feed, made from small caught fish, processed into meal and with soy. “Until a few years ago, to grow one kilogram of salmon, five kilograms of small fish were needed. With soy, it has been balanced to one kilogram of small fish per kilogram of aquaculture; the rest is done by soy”, says Bozzano, who warns that if the proportion of soy with which they make the feed is higher than what the fish can absorb, they get sick because their system is not designed to feed on it. In this fact, the data must be highlighted: small fish and soy are needed to feed aquaculture, and these foods create consequences in the entire system. The small fish used to fatten salmon can come from other areas where the cages are located, such as Africa or South America.And, to finish, let's talk about the color of salmon. Wild salmon eat shrimp that contain a natural pigment, astaxanthin, but there are no small shrimp in the feed, which is why farmed salmon have gray flesh, which the market would not accept if it were put up for sale. So they dye it at the source before putting it on the market. Depending on each country, a different Pantone color. In our country, orange; if you travel and find other shades, lighter, redder, remember that it depends on the final pigment they have given it because it is the color that is liked in that country. A detail: the pigment can be natural or synthetic, which is allowed, but in the latter case, the exact amount that is healthy for the human body is measured, informs marine biologist Anna Bozzano.Despite all this, salmon is the best-selling fish. In 2023, eight thousand tons were sold; in 2024, nine thousand. The second best-selling fish, monkfish, is six thousand tons behind. It is clear, then, the abundance of salmon, but perhaps there is a way to save it: in a growing world population, with an emptying sea, is it perhaps the fish that can provide us with animal protein? But if the sea runs out of small fish, will farmed salmon also not be able to be fed? Perhaps we should eat small local fish and not a distant one, farmed crowded and fed with fish caught on the other side of the world. It is the (dyed) fish that eats its tail.

]]>

The Ninot cheese from the Sant Gil d’Albió cheese factory is the best in Catalonia, according to the Làctium contest in Vic, which chose it from a total of sixteen, from different categories, that had passed a previous elimination phase. A specialized jury, made up of ninety people, met this morning at Casa Ricart in Vic to choose the best of each specialty so that they could advance to the final. In one of the categories, the most popular in recent years, that of cheesecake, the winner has been Jon Cake, a name that refers to the producer Jon García, who started with a shop in El Born in Barcelona and is currently in full expansion, with shops in other neighborhoods of Barcelona and also in Girona. The cake contains three types of cheese: buffalo blue and Garrotxa, both from Muntanyola, and cream, from L’Esquella. García will donate 10% of the sales of this cake to the Fundació Ampans, the non-profit organization that manages the Muntanyola cheese factory.

]]>