ENG: Restaurants in Vilanova - Da Gianni

When we were still new in Vilanova, we found the Trattoria Da Gianni (address: Carrer de fruita 10; phone: 93 814 44 16) thanks to their advertising on one of my favourite radio channels. Possibly our expectations were too high and possibly the service was not as poor as we have thought about it since, but for many years we did not return.

That is until now. Da Gianni’s new outdoor terrace looked so inviting that we could not resist it. Expats with permanent residency in the comarca Garraf might feel a bit uneasy when I tell you that it is located in Plaça del Cotxes – where most of us have spent at least half a night in order to get an appointment with the Extranjería department – but you need not worry. The police have finally moved away to modern offices and while you eat you will be able to observe the beautiful square if not in a new light, so at least with a different perspective.

During our latest visit the service was surprisingly good and we were highly content with the quality of the dishes. Da Gianni offers pizzas, pastas as well as meat and fish at standard Vilanova prices. My only negative remark would be that with four people at the table it was totally crammed with plates and glasses, but that is a detail and I am confident that we will prefer to sit outside next time as well.

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Technorati tags: Vilanova

ENG: Restaurants in Vilanova - George

After a day in the sun on platja de Ribes Roges, you might want to eat something before you head home. Although the kiosks (guingueta or xiringuito in Catalan, chiringuito in Spanish) are good for drinks, I would suggest that you continue up to the beach walk if it is food you are after.

Just before you reach the lower part of Vilanova’s Rambla (Rambla de la Pau), you will find George (address: Passeig del Carme 46; phone: 93 815 20 77) . As you will see, this is not a place for fine dining, but the Dutch owner offers tapes as well as a mix of international dishes - salads, big toasts and, his specialty, crêpes - at affordable prices.

Like most establishments in Vilanova, George is open throughout the year, but what I would describe as a calm indoor sports bar during the winter becomes a busy restaurant in the peak season. This is a good place for people watching, but if you want a table on the outdoor terrace you had better reserve in advance.

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Technorati tags: Vilanova

Restaurants in VnG: Mostaza

Tourists and foreign residents alike, sometimes we want international food served in less traditional ways than what is usually the case here. Mostaza, which opened up in the Rambla de la Pau 11-13 (phone: 93 810 09 75) earlier this year, is Vilanova’s first example of a fast casual restaurant. Compared to typical fast-food, establishments which follow this trend offer their clients the possibility to sit down in a modern environment and be served on proper chinaware.

At Mostaza, you can select dishes to create a three-course meal, but you can also limit yourself to a sallad and a coffee. It goes without saying that everything is available for take-away.

The menu lists a wide range of toasts and sandwiches, all for less than € 5. They have hamburgers and sausage plates - easy choices if you come with small children - and seven different kinds of big main course salads.
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Sí, sí, sé perfectament que molts de vosaltres no cosidereu una franquicia d’aquest tipus com un restaurant. Però, la veritat és que estableciments com Mostaza, que serveixen plats internacionals d’una manera eficient sense que sigui amb la dolenta qualitat que solem relacionar amb el menjar ràpid (fast-food), formen part d’una tendencia global – els restaurants fast-casual.

Les grandes amanides que es mengen com plats principals són caracteristiques i ofereixen la possibilitat de menjar d’una manera sana.

Fa uns anys, quan vam arribar a Vilanova, buscavem sovint però en vá restaurants amb menus semblants a el de Mostaza. Ara ja ens vam acostumar més a la cuina d’aquí, però això no significa que no hi anirem. De debó em sento atret per les taules modernes que acaben de posar a la Rambla i també pels tots petits detalls. Mireu, per exemple, com serveixen les salses. Em sembla molt creatiu.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Pika Tapa – the Mediterranean as we want it

Tourist traps are an interesting phenomenon. Very often they are easy to identify – establishments with a lot of natural traffic, usually charging premium prices since they offer a nice view or are located close to interesting sites. The beach promenade at Vilanova is an area where any seasoned traveller will start to look for advice on which restaurants are good and which you had better avoid.

I always feel a bit stupid when I take my family to a restaurant where we could have foreseen that either the food or the service or both would not live up to our expectations, but every once in a while end up in that situation. What do you do when you come to a town which you do not know and it is already well past the children’s lunch time? What do you do when all places where they seem to know how to cook look boring and deserted? At least my wife and I tend to take a chance and head for a place which is busy and easy to find. This probably reveals that our buying behaviour is first and foremost social and not very rational.

The beach promenade in Vilanova i la Geltrú is truly precious and, as all tourists desire, there are plenty of outdoor restaurants to choose between. From personal experience, however, I want to draw visitors’ attention to the fact that only some of these have a regular clientele among the local residents. When I take my family for lunch, most tables at Pika Tapa (Passeig de Carme, 21; phone: 93 815 12 84) are occupied by foreigners, usually a clear indication that you are about to enter into a tourist trap. However, remember that the Catalan and Spanish culture is deceitful in this regard. For inhabitants of Spain it is perfectly normal to have their meals about two hours later than we do in the Northern Europe.

Pika Tapa is located right in the middle of the action and offers light tapes as well as full meals. We have been here for lunches and for dinners, with as well as without our children, and always been satisfied. The paellas (€ 13 per person) will not win culinary prices but are served in a traditional way from the pan and always are very tasty. Competition close by advertises paellas for lower prices, however, those places do not cook by themselves but merely reheat precooked dishes. Caveat emptor!

Pika Tapa has indoor facilities as well, which means that it is open for business all the year around. Having said that, just like the town Vilanova, in summer it is at it's best. Here you find the Mediterranean feeling as you want it – offered at a very reasonable price. The restaurants close to the beach still have their terraces open. Take note of this recommendation in case you want to have another lunch at the seaside. The season is not over yet.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Peixerot – living up to its name

Some restaurants are emblematic of their towns. El Peixerot has a strong, solid reputation and many regular guest who are prepared to come here all the way from Barcelona. Just imagine if Vilanova as a town would have the same attraction.

Among the connaisseurs of the Barcelona restaurant market whom I have met, nobody has failed to mention Peixerot (address: Passeig Marítim, 56; phone: 93 815 06 25), when I have told them that I live in Vilanova i la Geltrú. This restaurant, specialized in fish, has existed since the year 1918 and, by far, exceeds the quality levels which we are used to find elsewhere in this town. What better occasion could I possibly have to take my wife here than our 5th wedding anniversary. True, she would have preferred a surprise journey around the world in a hot air balloon, but after all these years together she has got used to my boring predictability.

Now in the summer, Peixerot offers the possibility to eat outdoors at tables overlooking the marina. Personally, however, I think that it is indoors where this establishment come into its rights. The first thing that a visitor meets when entering into the restaurant is big display of fresh fish on ice. Tables dressed in starched linen and shining white textile napkins with the Peixerot logotype embroidered on them, add to the expectations about the meal to come.

When seated at your table, on the one side you will be able to observe people passing by on the Rambla outisde, but with a nice feeling of privacy since the lower part of the windows has been frosted. On the other side of the room, you will find original paintings of Vilanova artist Martí Torrents (1887-1977), who, apparently, in his days used to be a Peixerot regular. I really liked the artist’s style, and except for that I must admit being childishly fond of art lit up through spotlights, so I would have loved to walk around and have a closer look at them. Since I did not feel confortable to do so when there were other guests sitting eating right below, I would be very happy if Peixerot would one day develop a web-page with a full presentation of the works.

I cannot say that the waitors of Peixerot felt especially warm or personal, but they are just as professional and attentive as you would expect in a place of this category. It is a special idea to hand your guests a menu card printed for the day, but for the touch and print quality I must admit that I would have preferred a more classic one. The selection of food turned out to be more extensive and varied than we had expected and we were surprised to find out that there were starters for € 11 and main courses around € 20, prices which must be considered as moderate in the Spanish world of fine dining.

Since we were celebrating our special day, we decided to splurge out a bit more than that and had the Peixerot house sallad and steamed mussels for starters, upon which monkfish followed for my wife while I tried the arroz marinera con bogavante. The food was excellent, but I must admit that to me it is the total dining experience which makes this place stand out. If the perspective is limited to food quality and preparation, then I dare to say that there are a number of other Vilanova restaurants which can give them a match. To enhance the unique strength of Peixerot – the stylish, spacious atmosphere - I think that the management of the place should consider adding music. To me, the image would grow further with a background of classic music, albeit recorded.

Peixerot happens to have a branch in the city of Barcelona as well (address: C/ Tarragona, 177). That clearly cannot compare with its prime location here in Vilanova – where the Rambla meets the Passeig Marítim. And remember that the fresh fish comes from here. Visca Vilanova!

Restaurants in Vilanova: Celler del Ton – A home away from home

One of the trends in the restaurant world is to welcome people to a 'home away from home'. El Celler del Ton really feels like a home, but that does not mean that the place is trendy. Or if it is, well then my mother-in-law's dining room is trendy as well. To draw the comparision further, my mother-in-law does serve good traditional food, just like this restaurant .

El Celler del Ton (C/ Cuba, 49; phone: 93 815 39 33) is hardly possible to find without a map or a road description. Thanks to our local newspaper, we came across it when we wanted to discover a new place for tapes a couple of weeks ago. However, we were discouraged many times before we finally sat down at a table. First of all, carrer de Cuba is not exactly one of Vilanova’s more typical restaurant streets, although it is in the city center. Secondly, when we looked in through the door we met with the backs of a thick group of people, all standing around the bar. Our feeling was that we had crashed some private party so we were just about to excuse ourselves and leave again, when the owner looked out from behind all the guests and invited us in.

I dare to guess that this place has been decorated according to personal taste and with a total disregard to design books. The wooden walls set a warm, non-Spanish tone and are so full of framed art prints that they would need to remove some paintings, should they decide to buy new ones. Combined with smart black placemats and linen look-alike napkins with a sparklingly bright design, the interior is totally different from what I have seen before.

For the spirit of the restaurant, we started with a glass of cava while making our selection of food. I assume that most local people see this as a place for finger food per picar, since they do not have proper main courses. We were thinking in terms of a dinner, as we accept it to be, and I must say that with some plates of iberic, cheese and pa amb tomaquet, a rich sallad and some ovenbaked bacallà, we had more than we could eat. All this was accompanied by the good red wine of the house.

El Celler del Ton has managed to create its own distinct niche although it has only existed for two years. There are less than ten tables and, apparently, the clientele might be small but is very faithful. For that reason, advance reservations are an absolute necessity for anyone who wants to make sure to be able to sit down.

The owner himself is the main explanation to the welcoming atmosphere and it did not take long before he and I found out that we had been working for the same company. To make the story even better, after having mapped the old colleagues we had in common, it became clear to my wife and me that this was in fact the very first restaurant we learnt about in Vilanova. The only problem was that we got the recommendation one whole month before we moved here and almost one year before the restaurant opened up its doors to the public. How nice that we found our way there now, albeit by coincidence. Tapes is the perfect solution if you do not want a full three-course dinner but still want to go out for a snack. We will soon be back.

Restaurants in Vilanova: El Genito - the local state-of-the-art

A good restaurant tells a story. It brings you into a certain mood, gives you an insight into a new culture, makes you feel that you are at home or, the opposite, that what you are experiencing is exclusive and unique. El Genito tells the story about Vilanova i la Geltrú. It is a place for those in our town who want to see and be seen. At the same time, it brings to the table the riches of a culinarily spoiled region.

Yesterday evening I was driving home from the outskirts of Barcelona. I was content with the day but tired and therefore quite grumpy about the congested traffic which is a recurring Friday problem on all exits from the metropolitan area. By mistake, I ended up on the national road N-340, but this turned out to be fortunate. The further away I came from Barcelona the more picturesque was the landscape. The sun had just started to set when I made the final miles to Vilafranca del Penedès, the heart of Catalonia’s white wine region. On both sides of the road, lines of grapevine were stretching over the rolling landscape. I promised myself to soon bring my family here to share the sight with them.

The low mountains which separate Vilafranca from Vilanova form a borderline between two different kinds of scenery. On the northern side you have a lush fertile agricultural landscape. When you reach the other side, in Vilanova, the weather conditions are much harsher. Here, we have got used to living with the strong wind from the sea and the big amounts of sand it sends into the town. Foodwise, however, this side is equally blessed. What can not be achieved by farming is more than compensated for by the fishery.

Driving through the region certainly got in the mood for the dinner which my wife and I had planned for El Genito for the eveing. I knew that we would be offered food specialties from the varied landscape which I had just observed from the car. As always at El Genito, the waiters presented us with two menues. The smaller one, per picar, contains the tapes – the different kinds of iberic hams, sausages and cheeses which you also find in the delicatessen counter. In the other one, per menjar, you find combined dishes for a full meal. As the simple table decorations reveal, this is a place for informal dining and you are free to mix and match between the menues.

We started with some glasses of cava in the bar and then continued with some of the day’s special recommendations. When the tallarines de Vilanova, which we thought would be pasta tossed with mussles turned out to only be mussels, I first felt a bit sorry for my wife who is usually not too fond of that. However, we both found these small, triangleshaped mussels cooked in garlic totally delicious. We also had fine potato sticks topped with a fried egg and an aubergine baked with goat cheese. All the dishes were traditional and local, with a glass of red wine as the only exception.

El Genito offers classic main courses as well, but if you stay with tapes and the specials, this place is a bargain. Our check totalled less than € 45. Reservations are absolutely needed since the restaurant fills up already in the low season. One way to get a table is to start dinner early. The delicatessen store is open already in the afternoon and you can continue from cold tapes to warm food once the kitchen opens. If you do not manage to get a table, you will be allowed to have your food in the bar, but do not count on this option, since even that area tends to be crowded.

Why do we not eat here more often? Well, to be honest, we have simply got so accustomed to international and fusion cuisine that we can not fully appreciate a homely fare, in spite of all the fresh ingredients and the genuinity of the recepies. Having said that, no other place tops El Genito's atmosphere so we will at least pass by for a glass of local cava before we go to other restaurants.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Lizarran – as good as genuine

And in the middle of centre of Vilanova you will find a perfect tapes bar, a genuine old place where one generation of chefs has taken over after the other in offering a varied selection of food at very competitive prices. Here you will have a chance to learn more about the local culinary traditions, but still do not have to worry about bringing your children.

A restaurants with those caracteristics would easily attract hoards of tourists. What a pity it does not yet exist! We do have some classy establishments with a special atmosphere serving typical local tapes, but these tend to charge premium prices and they are not suitable for children. Alternatively, you will find less fashionable places serving tapes at lower prices, but these are in the outskirts of the town. Finally, there is one exception, combining a bit of both. In the world of restaurant connaisseurs I am about to commit herecy – the place I will recommend to you is a franchise.

The facilities of Lizarran (address: C/ de Sant Gervasi, 41) are a fake. The rustic wooden details, the old photos on the walls and the hand written menus - everything is standardized and is being presented according to the group’s manuals. Let us now look at the positive side of things. For newcomers to a town, a branded restaurant can be a blessing, since you know what you can expect. Except for that, I admit having been to many branches of this chain and the one here in Vilanova is one of my absolute favorites.

Lizarran is a good place to go for a beer and some snacks. They have tapes, but also the more advanced Basque alternative – pintxos. These are mouthpieces of various ingredients held together by a toothpick. You will find peppers filled with cheese, serveral kinds of tortilla and sausage, fried prawns and skewers of pickled vegetables. Foreigners will experience this as authentic and different - you just grab a plate and then collect the pintxos you want by yourself. To avoid trouble with the waitors, be reminded to keep the toothpicks since it is the number and sizes of the them which will be used to calculate your check at the end of the meal. Lizarran is not expensive (price per pintxo starting from € 1) so here you can give in to the temptation to try many variations.

Pintxos are for adults. Most of them are served cold, and many of them contain spices for an acquired taste. If you turn your eyes to the menus on the walls, you will find that there also is a decent amount of warm dishes. Personally, I have a weakness for Lizarran’s patates braves while we usually order croquetes for our children. Dishes like scrambled eggs and similar indicate that this is a place for fast, sturdy meals. The down-to-earth concept combined with the affordable prices makes Lizarran a natural alternative to a lunch at home, something we regularly benefit from if Saturday shopping has taken longer than foreseen so the children are hungry while we are exhausted.

Maybe this is why Lizarran is such a popular place in Vilanova. If you plan to eat here, I recommend you to go early since the tables fill up quickly when the local people arrive in the afternoon. Look beyond the fact that this is a chain, swallow your pride and just enjoy the pintxos.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Beverly Hills – as American as it sounds

Restaurants in Vilanova serve Catalan food, Spanish food and Mediterranean food. After some days, many tourists from Northern Europe will start to look for alternatives, especially when the children have eaten croquetes for the third day in a row. Beverly Hills is our city centre’s American alternative. And it is a good place for children – maybe too good.

Before learning to know Vilanova, my wife and I were quite critical about the restaurant offer. This is still a traditional Catalan town and people prefer local food. Furthermore, it is a small town so we were unfair in complaining that we did not find as much variation as we had done in big cities where we had lived before. Already after some months here did we start to discover good places with a more international cuisine and there are plenty of promising places where we simply have not been yet.

One of the places which we found early but disregarded for a long time was Beverly Hills (address: Rambla Principal 80; phone: 93 814 32 68). More than once did we make negative comments about the place being a bad copy of an American diner. I was also moaning about the fact that they have very few dishes not containing meat. But then, one day, it struck my wife that there was a lot of American food which she had missed since we came here. Caesar’s salads and proper hamburgers served as nice dishes and not only as fast food.

Once we had dared to admit the problem to ourselves, we knew where to go for a solution. Beverly Hills offers Tex-Mex starters, a rich selection of hamburgers plus some toasts and salads. We certainly prefer food of higher quality and more attention to detail, but this is good value for money.

The interior of the indoor restaurants carries American artefacts and if you walk through the building, there is a small patio with some outdoor tables on the other side. Except for being hygienic, the paper placemats on the tables give you a chance to study a map of the real Beverly Hills and memorize the addresses of movie stars. I like to find more sophisticated table decorations but understand that the management here might see little value in it. This establishment caters to children and that tends to result in a rough treatment.

During our last visit to Beverly Hills we got a new perspective on the dining culture in Catalonia. Restaurants with local food open their kitchens at 8.30 p.m. or later, which makes this place unique for those who want an early dinner. Apparently, even Spanish families with children do and although I often praise children friendly restaurants, this time we got a bit too much action. Our children are usually calm when we go out, but now we know that it only takes a few other children to trigger their energy.

Our oldest son likes experimenting with things and usually we even encourage it, but we were not at all that proud when, halfway through the main course, he managed to switch of all the lights in the outdoor area just by screwing a bit on one of the colourful lamps covering the wall. Since the lights could not be made to work again, we were lucky that that there were some back-up lamps to switch on so that we and the other guests could finish our meals. Beverly Hills is different and special, so we will come back, but only when we feel sure that the staff will not recognize us any longer.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Gas 26 – lounge inspiration

Vilanova has quite a number of stylish restaurants working with chinaware and glasses of classic brands on tables laid with crisp white linen. While many of them show interest in modern cooking techniques like foams and taste contrasts, very few of them strive to be trendy. Gas 26 (address: C/ Gas 26; phone: 93 815 74 29) is a refreshing exception in having picked up international influences also beyond what comes on the plate.

A couple of years ago, the whole concept of dining out was transformed. What earlier had been eating halls were turned into public living rooms where the focus was shifted from the food to the total experience. Places like the Buddha Bar in Paris or Bed Supper Club in Amsterdam, were the trend setters in offering sofas and relaxing lounge or chill-out music in the dining area.

At this time, I was living in Thailand with my family and while prejudice has it that Asians are just copying what Westerners come up with, a more positive interpretation is that they are fast to be inspired and rethink. Lounges rapidly popped up first in the exclusive areas of Bangkok but then also on many of Thailand’s exotic beaches. It is true that the outdoor versions were quite pale replicas when compared to the originals, but vital ingredients such as the music, the colours and the finger food were all there.

To find the same atmosphere in Vilanova is not possible. Our local xiringuitos, the kiosks along Platja de Ribes Roges, might look a bit like lounges from the distance, but as soon as you come closer you start to see the flaws. The music they play tend to be the radio and while they rent out beds and low tables on the beach, you have to make do with all but cosy standard seating when you eat. We still occasionally go here for a beer or a soft drink, but have learnt not to order food, since we have always been disappointed.

Instead, the place in Vilanova where I get the strongest lounge feeling is Gas 26. In order not to disappoint anyone, my wife wants me to underline that this is above all a proper indoor restaurant. She is true in so far that you can not squeeze in sofas and armchairs in an establishment which barely has space for ten tables. At the same time the husband chef and wife waitress who run the place make many references to where they have found their inspiration and I think that they deserve some praise for a good job. A bare and lit up stone wall serves as a historical contrast to minimalistic decorations in silver and white. To stress the modernity, instead of decorating with textile, here you find disposable alternatives and especially the grey napkins truly feel like linen. The focus in on the food but it is the selected lounge music, played a bit louder than in other restaurants, which adds the final touch.

As always in Spain, children are welcome, but I honestly do not think that this is a good place to bring them – the place is simply too small for them. With Vilanova standards Gas 26 is an up-market establishment serving creative versions of Mediterranean food (€ 10 for starters and € 18 for mains), so we prefer to reserve it for special occasions. I am happy that there is at least one restaurant in this town which helps me to recall nice memories from lounges elsewhere in the world.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Cafetet 9 – outdoors on the Rambla

The first impression you get from the Rambla Principal of Vilanova is that it is full of bars and cafes with terraces along the shopping street. Interestingly enough, few of them serve proper meals. Cafetet 9 (Rambla Principal 83) is the most notable exception.

When I grew up in Halmstad, Sweden, in the 70-ties, the streets of our town centre were reserved for traffic. The authorities considered that eating was an activity to be carried out indoors, partly for hygiene reasons, partly not to encourage the consumption of alcohol in public. For Swedes back then, the concept of eating in an outdoor terrace was tightly linked to travelling abroad, not the least to the Mediterranean countries.

Nowadays, the centre of Halmstad has been turned into a nice pedestrian area crowded with outdoor restaurants, which tend to be very busy during our short summer. Still being Swedes, although we live here now, my family and I like to go for an outdoor lunch at places where we can sit and observe people passing by. Here in Catalonia we can do this in Barcelona, Sitges or any of the coastal towns of Costa Brava, but not easily so in Vilanova.

I guess that this stems from the fact that Vilanova is first and foremost a relatively industrial town and still has some way to go to fully cater to tourist needs. Demand here above all comes from local people and while they seem to love to have a coffee or a glass of wine in the terraces on the Rambla or in the Plaça de la Vila they prefer to sit indoors whenever they eat a full meal.

Luckily enough for us, in the middle of the Rambla there is a place called Cafetet 9, which does serve food in their terrace and for that very reason was the first restaurant we went to when coming here in 2005. We acted as true foreigners and chose a table outside to eat. I do not really remember, but would not be surprised to hear that the other tables were totally empty, since this was in late February and it must have been much too cold for the Vilanovins to accompany us outdoors.

Except for a long list of tapes, el Cafetet 9 also offers the typical 3-course menu del día, where you have a number of starters, mains and desserts to chose between, here for € 10,50 (weekdays). The dishes served are Catalan, or in the most extreme cases Mediterranean, and although nobody should come here for a culinary experience, this is far from a tourist trap.

With Vilanova attracting more and more tourists, I trust that we will soon see more establishments of this kind, especially down at bottom of the relatively unexploited Rambla de la Pau. Then my family might be able to find a new outdoor restaurant where we do not have to have cars crossing the Rambla right next to our table. Neither will I miss the irritation it causes me that the Cafetet 9 management does not let me exchange the dessert included in the menu for a coffee. I know of few other places showing that lack of flexibility and service mindedness and will be happy to vote with my feet whenever that is possible.

In the meantime, this restaurant will remain the place to go for us whenever we want to have a meal but at the same time see and be seen in Vilanova. And that is not too bad.

Restaurants in VNG: La Cucanya

Any premium restaurant must serve good food in a nice environment. La Cucanya (address: Racó de Santa Llucia s/n; phone: 93 815 19 34) does more than that. It is a family friendly establishment located on the rocks and directly over the sea. If you add a walk along the beach you have a half-day experience which I am happy to recommend to visitors of this town.

Sundays are family days for the local people of Catalonia and the natural time and place to meet is over a long lunch. Very often it is the grandparents who invite the family to come and eat at their house, but at least for special occasions, a good restaurant is the choice of preference. Among all places I have visited in Vilanova so far, none beats La Cucanya for this purpose.

I took my parents and family here on Easter Monday and, for the first time, we received a table directly at the windows and thus had the company of rolling waves throughout our visit. We all did our best to enjoy it while at the same time keeping an eye on our two active boys. The baby spent most of the time banging on chinaware plates with cutlery or happily looking for food left-overs on the floor, while the older one was kept busy with La Cucanya’s colouring sheets and crayons. In so far the lunch was a true success that we managed to leave the impeccably white linen table almost without any colour stains and with all glasses intact. When we left, our oldest son asked the staff if he could keep the crayons. What really warmed his parents’ hearts was not that he was allowed to do so, but that he asked the question in perfect Catalan.

La Cucanya presents you with high quality Mediterranean cuisine of seafood as well as meat. This time, we also had the opportunity to select from a special seasonal menu, but decided to go for some old favourites; Xató, the local salad of Garraf, for starters and skewers of monkfish and prawns for mains. I must admit that so far I have not managed to make my wife as excited about this restaurant as I am, but there is one thing that she can not resist – the tempting offers on the dessert trolley. The piece of cake that she ordered was so big that she had to leave a bit of it on the plate, but partly we can blame that on our sons doing a surprisingly weak job in helping here to finish it.

Like last time we were here, my parents were a bit concerned about the prices, around € 13 for starters and € 20 for main courses. That perspective is quite common for people from Germanic countries. I am sure that Spanish people are much less sensitive to restaurant prices than we are, and this although disposable incomes here are lower than in Northern Europe. There were quite many grandparents at the tables in La Cucanya on Easter Monday. To be critical about my native culture, I doubt that we are as generous in inviting our parents to nice restaurants as the Spanish are. And to be honest about my own strong feelings for this place, I can not deny that it gives me a feeling of belonging, by doing as the locals.

To find La Cucanya is not so easy. You can of course go there by car, but I recommend you to walk. Follow the platja de Ribes Roges to its end, then take either the stairs up on the hill or the walk path along the ruins of Adarrò. After having admired the view, cross over the small platja de Sant Gervasi and then pass through the railway tunnel. Following to the small paved road up to the right, you will soon see signs guiding you the last meters. A bit of an effort, but that only makes the place more exotic.

Restaurants in Vilanova: L’Oganqüit - a good old friend

Nobody is perfect. One of the nice with good friends is that once you have reached a certain level of confidence, small mistakes are easily forgiven. This is very much true for restaurants as well.

L’Oganqüit (address: c/ Llibertat 128; phone: 93 815 63 62) does not accept reservations. Last Friday, when I was planning to bring my parents and family there for the evening, we happened to pass by in the afternoon and I decided to knock on the door, just to make sure that the usual opening hours were valid also for the Easter holiday. Although at least three people inside noticed me and although none of them was overly busy since the restaurant was still not open, nobody came to open the door to check what I wanted. In a social context this is considered rude. From a business point of view, it is a sadly easy way to lose potential new customers.

Since my family is a big l’Oganqüit fan, we have already forgotten them for this inhospitable behaviour. Maybe the restaurant is already so popular that the management feels that they do not need to attract new people. Although I would not agree with that conclusion, I have to admit that this place is always very busy and it is hard to imagine that less than two years ago, they were located in much smaller premises in Rambla de la Pau.

We had the opportunity to visit l’Oganqüit at the old address and thanks to small children and Swedish dinner habits we always came early enough to get a table. What struck us from the first visit was the personal attention given by the French owner of the place. We were presented with a Mediterranean menu with international details and immediately understood that we had reached the famous place which more than one person had recommended to us but of which nobody remembered the name. After 9 p.m. in the evening you usually had to queue for a long time to get a table so we were not surprised to learn that the establishment would soon move.

From our point of view, the move was clearly for the better, although the owner does not feel as present as before. Since we always come with a push chair, we appreciate the extra space and the fact that the personnel are as welcoming to children as they have always been. Butcher’s paper on textile tablecovers is not the most stylish thing you can put on your tables but fantastic if you come with children, especially since l’Oganqüit usually provides them with crayons as well. In our case, it keeps our oldest son busy drawing while we enjoy our meal. Except for some strange log-cabin decorations in the area where we usually sit, the place is has a clean and trendy touch, with atmospheric dimmed-down lighting. We are happy to be able to sit in the non-smoking area, but the corridor to the part where smoking is allowed, is probably Vilanova’s best example of modern interior architecture in a restaurant.

Since our youngest son was born, we do not come here as often as we did while we only had one child. With my parents visiting, we wanted to go back to some of our favourite restaurants. As always, our three-year-old needed to go to the toilets – this time only once. His personal l’Oganqüit record is three toilet visits during one dinner but to excuse him I have to admit that going to the toilet here is a bit exciting. Our one-year-old contributed with a little performance of “before-sleep-tantrums”, but all of this is much easier to cope with when you have two extra pairs of hands supporting you.

For my wife and me, the dishes were as good as always. The place prides itself with “artisan cuisine” and we above all appreciate the interesting salads as starters (approx. € 9) and elaborate pastas and pizzas for main course (around € 13). My parents went for steaks and just like the experience I have personally had with tuna fish at an earlier occasion, these dishes did not reach quite the same standard. My mother is certainly not a picky person and therefore accepted her entrecôte as it came. I am not a big meat eater, but I know that well-done should not mean still red in the middle while charred on the outside.

Having said all this, we will not have a problem to accept this small flaw with our good friend l’Oganqüit. Instead, we all look forward to the day when our youngest son is old enough so that we again can start to come regularly with the whole family.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Fresh air at Club Nàutic

All too often, good locations do not have the restaurants they deserve. Last time I took my family to Club Nàutic in Vilanova (address: Escullera de Ponent s/n, phone: 93 815 93 27), we were so unimpressed that we left already after the aperitifs. Last Sunday, we took a gamble and brought some friends to this place without having tested it in between.

Being the official restaurant of the marina, Club Nàutic has one of this town’s best sceneries directly overlooking all anchored sailing boats. It is also a uniquely spacious restaurant – indoors as well as on the terrace. This is what attracted my family to come here last time, but we were scared away by the slow service. Even worse, chairs had been left unarranged after other guests had left and on some tables dirty dishes and full ashtrays were piling high. Service is enough of a challenge in the restaurant industry. If you manage make new guests change their mind already before they have had the first contact with your staff, you really need to re-think what your establishment is all about.

Encouraged by a rumour that Club Nàutic had a new management and some window shopping proving that things had improved, we decided to take the risk and try the place again. We had invited some friends from the Swedish community of Barcelona to come here, and although many of them already knew our town, we wanted to give them a pleasant and lasting flavour of Vilanova. What better place than the marina is there to do so?

Vilanova is a place for outdoor life and some rounds of the Scandinavian social game kubb was meant to be the main attraction of the program. In the late afternoon the sun managed to break through the clouds, so we could play for a while, but except for that we had rain and overcast throughout the day. Since the weather conditions were not on our side, we were lucky to be more than satisfied with out choice of restaurant.

With two babies and two small children in the group, we had reserved a table indoors. From the very first moment, I could relax from my worries about the restaurant. Our long table had been laid with linen-coloured placemats and proper textile napkins and a fast glance at the other guests plates revealed fresh ingredients presented in a nice way.

Half of the group decided for the set 3-course lunch (€ 18 for anyone not yet a member of the local sailing club) and the other half ordered some starters followed by paellas. Only one girl in the group had such a problem selecting from the typically Mediterranean offer, that together with our oldest son, she ended up with the children’s menu. I assume that she would have had similar difficulties in most other Catalan restaurants. As far as my wife and I could judge, our friends were as satisfied with the meal as we were. Personally, I especially liked the fresh sea bream which I had for a main course, although I had a tough time removing the bones while at the same time stopping my youngest son from playing with the ketchup on his older brother’s plate.

Club Nàutic is a good place for children, especially when they reach the age when they can look after themselves. The marina leaves them with many things too look at. In the lounge there is a huge old steering wheel on the wall, which I let my oldest son play with until he got so excited that he almost knocked down the pictures from the wall.

I am still concerned that the staff of the restaurant is slow to clean away empty dishes when guests leave their tables. This is especially the case in the strangely planned and under-utilized lounge, but it can be that that part of the premises does not fall under the restaurant concession.

My family and I will certainly come back, but we will wait until we reach the temperatures which we should usually have by this time of the year. I want our next lunch at Club Nàutic to be on the terrace.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Basque food at El Far

Whenever I go to the Basque country for business, I have a feeling that the pride of their cuisine is in the quality of the beef, while fish only takes a secondary role. At El Far (Passeig Marítim, 107; phone 93 815 42 07), it is the other way around. The menu lists some five meat based main courses, but the focus is on fish cooked and served in styles originating from different Basque provinces. Except for the Basque dishes, El Far also offers a nice selection of rice dishes, paellas and arrossos.

Already before your enter, you will notice a fresh, white interior and marina inspired high class textile tablerunners. El Far has been decorated with some old fishing equipment and the owners have managed to get the balance just right. With more props, the place would start to look tacky, but as it is now it adds to the flavour of the place.

This was one of the first places which people from Barcelona recommended my wife and me to go to when they learnt that we had moved to Vilanova i la Geltrú. Only last Friday, however, did we finally make it, letting the children stay at home. Although prices are moderate (starters around € 10, main courses at € 17 and desserts for € 5), I would place El Far among Vilanova’s up-market restaurants so we did appreciate to be able to enjoy the food together, rather than taking turns either eating or looking after the children. Except for that, this is a small place – less than 10 tables plus a small terrace – so there is not really anywhere but the street outside to escape to if you have to comfort a crying baby.

To be fair to the owners I do not think that they would have objected to us bringing children. Rarely have we met with such a commitment to make us like a place from the very first visit and such an interest in explaining how the different dishes are being prepared - an impressive personal service well on the same level as the quality of the cooking.

You do not go to el Far to see and to be seen. Theirs is a story about good cooking and the relatively small and niched menu makes it a place rather for special occasions than for regular weekend dinners. Some day we will have to try the rice dishes as well, but at least for next visit we look forward to continue to explore the Basque fish variations.

Restaurants in Vilanova: Japanese cuisine at Yamato

If you hear people living in our neighbour town Sitges say that they prefer to go to Vilanova for a good sushi dinner, you get curious. So far, I have only visited one Japanese restaurant in Sitges but that one made a strong impression on me, although it might be that I was so blinded with the sophisticated ambience that forgot to think about the food quality. However, logic has it that Sitges should be a better breeding ground for Japanese cuisine than Vilanova. No matter if you prefer to call the local people of Vilanova Catalan or Spanish, their culinary preferences are local and traditional. A cynical person would point to the fact that all recently opened Asian restaurants in the town are all-you-can-eat bufé libre concepts. If you can not make people interested in the quality of your cooking then maybe, at least, you can catch their attention through quantity.

Sitges is the opposite. Although its actual population is smaller than Vilanova’s, the town is populated by a big amount of western foreigners and those of the local people who have actively decided to live there, often do so for the international flavour. To make things better, Barcelona’s jet set has this as one of its favourite resorts to go to for weekend lunches which further increases the impact of money and sophisticated taste on the local restaurant scene.

So, can it really be that Yamato (Passeig del Carme, 2) here in Vilanova beats the Sitges competition? My wife and I went there to give it a try. Our first impression was that the interior decoration was genuinely Asian, but not in any positive sense. In many Asian countries, the local population prefers to go to restaurants with a strong florescent illumination. According to their culture, bare tables are considered as dirty and the only accepted solution to cover them is real linen, albeit that the hunt for cost savings results in the owners accepting the cheapest synthetic textiles available in the market. To this extent Yamato is truly Asian, albeit not very Japanese, since in that country dimmed lighting is popular and bare wooden tables are a proof of quality. In the end, this confusion at Yamato is not too strange since, as far as we could hear, the staff are Chinese and not true Japanese.

So what about the food then? To try the place, I ordered a miso soup which I liked although the chef could have been more generous with the miso. I was also content with my third dish, teppan yaki squid. In between we had a sushi combination plate, the big test of the evening. Maki rolls should be freshly made when you eat it, in order for the seaweed not to absorb the humidity of the rice. For that reason, typical mixed sushi platters are not good for food quality, since in all restaurants with anything but high rotation it will result in the makis being refrigerated before they are being served. Yamato, on the evening when we were there, was far from crowded so we have only ourselves to blame if our makis were not perfect. On the other hand all the pieces of nigiri were to our full content, most importantly the quality of the fish.

To sum up, we are not yet convinced that Yamato beats all sushi you can find in Sitges, but we certainly will come back. We almost feel a responsibility to support a place which manages to serve good Japanese food here in our town. Yamato’s owners can hope for occasional visits from the local people but I am convinced that among their regular guest they have a big number of Vilanova’s relatively few western foreigners.