Back From Barcelona – The Tapas Tour

We had a very full and busy day exploring the Parc Guell Back From Barcelona – Parc Guell and Monjuic areas Back From Barcelona – Montjuic of Barcelona. But our day was far from over. We still had the night ahead of us. We did a really deliciously fun tapas tour of the city.

We started the tour at The Traveler’s Nest in the Gothic part of town.

We met our tour guide Laura, and about 15 other new friends from around the world, and toured around the city, going to four different restaurants and tavernas to sample the city’s tapas and traditions.

At The Traveler’s Nest, we all started off with a little sweet red Vermouth, or Vermut Rojo, and some pinchos (Spanish) or pinxtos (Basque) styled tapas. There are four main styles of tapas – 1) The pinchos or pinxtos, 2) cheese and/or charcuterie platters, 3) hot and 4) cold. I love them all.

Pintxos are small snacks eaten in northern Spain and are lesser known internationally. They are offered in skewers and toothpicks. Pintxos vary because they can consist of several foods such as meat, fresh seafood, olives, and peppers. Pintxos got its name from the Spanish pincho, a cocktail stick. A typical snack of the Basque Country and Navarre, “pinchos” consist of small slices of bread upon which an ingredient or mixture of ingredients is placed and fastened with a toothpick, which gives the food its name “pincho,” meaning “spike.”  Traditionally, you are charged by the number of toothpicks you have on your plate. Some would think it is easy to fool the bartenders or servers by hiding the toothpicks, but they know. They are counting too. 🙂

After the pinxos were finished, it was time to move on to our second stop for the evening, to try another style of tapas at another restaurant.

We sampled a wide variety of different tapas here while enjoying the company of of our fellow world travelers. We met people from Ireland, Australia and more Americans.

We sampled some traditional Spanish tortillas, made with eggs and potatoes,

mushroom croquettes,

steamed mussels,

and some breaded and fried eggplant topped with cheese. Once again, it was a feast for our taste buds.

We were told to pace ourselves because we still had a lot more to try.

Stop #3 was at a traditional Catalonian restaurant that was so packed, we had to enjoy our tapas and wine outside, Catalonian style.

Laura is explaining how to “drink” Catalonian style. You have to pour the wine from above. The higher you can get the pitcher, without spilling, the more “Catalonian” you are.

Larry has really long arms, so he mastered this style of drinking. He must have some Catalan in him that he didn’t know about. In the end, we all spilled some on us, including Laura.

After drinking Catalan style, our fried salted fish came out and we passed it all around for everyone to sample.

Round #4. More tapas and postres.

Here we sampled some albondigas (meatballs), pane (bread) and patatas bravas, with sangria.

Dessert followed after the savory tapas.

This was a really fun evening, and I highly recommend taking a tapas tour like this. It’s a great way to see the city and to try different places and different dishes that you might miss otherwise. We met some really fun people and we all shared a lot of fun stories and laughs over great food and drinks.

As Wolfgang Puck would say “Live, Love, Eat”, and that we did too. ‘Til next time.