Yes, I love Barcelona. And yes, I have spent some pretty perfect days over there, but there is more to Catalonia than its capital city. Let me take you 60 kilometres up the coast and show you around the place I call home: Malgrat de Mar.

The beach at Malgrat de Mar

It’s a calm Saturday morning in June. The temperature hopefully won’t raise over 25 degrees and the town is not that full of tourists yet. We enjoy our breakfast, that includes pan con tomate and orange juice, in the apartment. Around 10 o’clock we make our way down to the beach where you can go kite surfing or just relax and swim. After a couple of hours we follow our way over the beach and end up having a vermouth in Vivo Platja (Av. Pins, 5). Here you basically sit on the beach and you can totally calm down with the sound of the sea in the background. Read the rest of this article…

The bread at La Fabrique in Poble Sec

This month, Poble Sec and I will have enjoyed a full year of blissful cohabitation. One of the reasons I love living in Poble Sec is because it feels so homely and laid back. The streets are narrow and you generally get to know your neighbours in ways you weren’t quite expecting, but with that comes a sense of community, of closeness. Although I must admit to crossing Parallel on occasion, I regularly enjoy spending a whole day without venturing much further afield than the Sant Antoni metro station. So, I wanted to share my perfect day in Poble Sec and Sant Antoni (to which the subtitle could probably be “A day spent eating and drinking in Poble Sec and Sant Antoni”).

My perfect day would be at the weekend – I like the buzz that occurs at weekends. They feel special somehow, like a lesser version of the feeling you get at Christmas. I love cooking so I often like to start my day with a bit of breakfast at home. And if there’s one thing that makes breakfast special, it’s a croissant, or better yet (if I’m feeling really extravagant) a pain aux chocolats aux amandes from La Fabrique (c/ Radas, 35). This bakery is by far my favourite, all their breads are sourdough and organic – and absolutely delicious. Having grown up in France I’m a harsh judge when it comes to croissants and have not quite been able to come to terms with the lard croissants you sometimes find here in Spain. Unsurprisingly perhaps, and a testimony to my tremendous if unknowing bias, one of the owners/bakers is French. Oh là là… Read the rest of this article…

Houses in Carrer Campoamor, Horta-Guinardó

Being born and raised in Barcelona has given me the chance to enjoy this wonderful city in many ways. Now that I live abroad, I still regularly come back to Barcelona, to see my family and friends, to enjoy Barcelona’s culinary and cultural hotspots, and of course, the nice weather and the sun! For my perfect day in Barcelona I’ve made a summary of my favourite places and local spots, which I always enjoy visiting.

Morning

My perfect day would begin in Horta, which is the neighbourhood where I grew up and where my family lives. At one of the terraces in Plaça Eivissa I would start my day with a café con leche (a cup of coffee with milk) and some sweet pastry. At Plaça Eivissa there’s also a churrería. Pick a handful of churros and eat them while you discover Horta! Carrer del Tajo is the main shopping street with a local market you cannot miss. A bit further you can discover Carrer d’Aiguafreda, where in the past century clothes from Barcelona’s upper-class members were cleaned. Read the rest of this article…

Enrique Tomás on Carrer de Pelai

My perfect day in Barcelona would definitely start with an Iberian ham sandwich, no tomato please, I might be the only Catalan that doesn’t like pà amb tomàquet – no one is perfect.

Food is a big part of a perfect day, and I would start with Iberian ham from Enrique Tomás on Carrer de Pelai, there’s nothing like good quality Iberian ham.

I would walk down las Ramblas in the morning after breakfast at around 10am, any later will be a battle between tourists and locals. It is a pity that the city centre has become a forbidden place for locals since you know how crowded it would be so you don’t want to fight every step you make. Although this changes with the season, I certainly hope that Barcelona tourism is sustainable and tourism in the future combines the local needs with tourism growth. Read the rest of this article…

UPDATE: Unfortunately the excellent Manolete is no more. It is now the Aperol Spritz Bar. A nice bar, with a covered terrace, in a good location, that thankfully serves more than Aperol.

Manolete, Passeig d’Isabel II, Barcelona

Located slap-bang next to Port Vell underneath the beautiful arches that line parts of Passeig d’Isabel II, Manolete is a charming little restaurant serving some equally charming tapas.

Now I want to be up front here. I don’t normally do restaurant posts. I’m not normally invited to restaurants. To review them I mean – I have friends. But Manolete kindly invited me and for once with these sort of things they were kind enough to invite my wife too. So it was brownie points all round.

We arrived on a warm August evening. You can see Manolete from across the street thanks to the string of bright bulbs out front that remind me of a stage actresses dressing room mirror. They have a small terrace outside with cute red and white polka-dot tablecloths. Inside is similarly charming. It has some nice touches. Distressed-look cupboards filled with glasses and wine, modern black and white photography perched on a shelf half way up the back wall, and pretty embroidered cushions along the wooden but perfectly comfortable benches. Even as I write this it sounds like it shouldn’t work, but it does. The lighting was just right too. And the music playing in the background was loud enough to notice but quiet enough not to be intrusive. I have to admit, I sat down, arranged my cushions behind me, looked around, listened, and then smiled. Even though the restaurant was pretty empty at this point it was an extremely pleasant atmosphere. Read the rest of this article…

Zoe with all the kids

I’ve lived in (and loved) Barcelona for over 3 years now. And I pinch myself almost everyday that this is my life. It’s easy to have a perfect day here, with the incredible weather, the beach on my doorstep, beautiful architecture at every turn and the goblet of G&T. But all of this can be easily trumped by the ultimate perfect day… my wedding day. Cliché much!?! Of course. But to have all our favourite people, in the city we love, doesn’t get any better in my opinion; wedding or not.

It was on Saturday 11th April this year. It had been a whirlwind week of drinks and dinners out with the stream of wedding guests in holiday mode. Unfortunately, our French neighbours decided to have an air traffic control strike that week resulting in many guests having to endure challenging journeys over. So amidst the fun, I’d also been glued to my phone most of the week getting stressed out hearing about cancelled flights and peoples’ ‘planes, trains and automobile’ adventures just to get to our wedding. Luckily everyone made it! And our three French wedding guests miraculously became French Canadian overnight. Read the rest of this article…

Voices, Faces, City Spaces: Ramon Holgado Ordaz (Otoxo Productions)

As part of the ‘Voices, Faces, City Spaces’ series by BCN Mes and Otoxo Productions this short film follows Ramon Holgado Ordaz, a homeless man whose life has been transformed thanks to the Hidden City Tours social enterprise project.

It’s a great little story that will only take 4 minutes of your time. Read the rest of this article…