When travelling and discovering other countries, one of my main fields to explore to know the territory’s culture and its people is definitely the food. Does that happen to you as well? If so, we are sure you have already tried paella or tortilla de patatas, two of the best dishes of the yummy Spanish cuisine. But what about the traditional Catalan food and the real Catalan cuisine? During your stay in Barcelona make sure to discover the best Catalan food. Because it is just… _____ (enter your description here after trying some of the most typical dishes :-)).
Traditional Catalan bread: Pà amb tomàquet
Bread, a tomato and olive oil, these are the ingredients you need to enjoy the simplest but most delicious traditional Catalan food: pà amb tomáquet.
Along with traditional Catalan food like fuet, llonganissa or botifarra blanca will make a simple meal hard to forget.
Authentic Catalan dish: Botifarra amb seques
White beans along with the typical Catalan sausage: botifarra. This dish is all about Catalan History, an icon of the Catalan gastronomy. Popular festivities celebrated among neighborhoods are known as “Botifarrada” where this celebrity-sausage takes all the limelight. If you have the chance to enjoy one of them, don’t think twice and experience this authentic familiar gathering to discover the authentic Catalan cuisine.
A fun food ritual: Calçots
And since “Botifarrada” was created as a popular event thanks to “botifarra”, the same happened with this traditional Catalan dish, calçots. From calçots, we created the “Calçotada”. Eating calçots is a Catalan experience you must live. It is the perfect excuse to organize a gathering with friends or family and enjoy a ritual which starts this way: putting yourself a bib to avoid staining your shirt with the sauce “romesco”. The ritual is easy: take a calçot, dip it in romesco sauce, then you raise your arm, turn your head back and… open your mouth! The “calçot” is traditional Catalan food at its finest.
Esqueixada de bacallà
This is probably the most fresh traditional Catalan dish, that is why it gets popularity specially during Summer. We are pretty sure that you have never tried cod cooked this way: chopped cod with sliced tomato, onions, olives, some olive oil and black pepper.
Canelons
Best Catalan food ever: Canelons. They are basically rolls of pasta with meat inside, and with a special sauce called “bechamel” on top along with melted cheese. They are typically made for the Catalan festivity “Dia de Sant Esteve” celebrated on December 26th.
Escalivada
A traditional Catalan dish made out of roasted vegetables. Concretely: eggplants, peppers, onions and tomatoes. The simplest but one of the tastiest!
Traditional Catalan soup: Escudella i carn d’olla
Escudella is the typical Catalan soup, one of the Catalan dishes specially cooked during Christmas. It is made out of these vegetables: carrot, turnip, onion, celery, potatoes, cabbage and chickpeas; and also meat bones (beef, chicken, pork…). The pasta added is called “galets”.
Escudella is usually accompanied by a meatball made out of minced beef and pork, called “pilota”. Among the best typical Catalan food escudella definitely stands out.
Traditional Catalan dish with meat and mushrooms: Fricandó
One of the most tasty traditional Catalan dishes: tender beef fillets cooked with a delicious sauce made out of tomatoes, onions, garlic… and mushrooms! Our recommendation: order some bread to dip in the sauce ;)
Traditional Catalan desserts
If we talk about the best traditional Catalan food in terms of desserts, we have two options that stand out:
Crema catalana
The perfect dessert to end up your Catalan meal. This sweet cream is typically served in a little clay pot, which has a first layer of burnt sugar that you will have to “break” first to eat the cream hidden below.
Mel i mató
Cheese and honey are the main ingredients to prepare this delicious dessert. “Mató” is a type of cottage cheese known as “brossat” or “Brull” which tastes specially delicious when dipped in homemade honey.
If you want to try one of these traditional Catalan dishes in Barcelona, we recommend you to book a table at Can Punyetes, a typical Catalan restaurant that we talked about some time ago. You can also try to cook one of these dishes at home or join a popular Botifarrada or Calçotada in your neighborhood to discover the real Catalan cuisine.