In search of Mano we found Manna, Barcelona

Can Mano was another tip-off, in the backstreets of the old fisherman's quarter Barceloneta, the young ones must live elsewhere. Family run and serving the freshest fish I'd been told, we came looking on a Sunday afternoon, it still felt early after a night spent listening to flamenco in a medieval palace filled with goblets of gin. Barceloneta's main drag lived up to it's name. Paseo Juan de Borbon was a seething mass of tourists, locals, pick pockets and staggering stags swarming about the hoards of dubious restaurants lining the route to the beach. Yet only one street in the neighbourhood appeared deserted.

Not a good sign and after thirty minutes of searching we came across another.

Can Mano doesn't open Sundays, I should have checked. Fortunately we'd just passed a place that looked rather appealing. In the way ultimately rewarding places often do, by being completely unappealing in almost every conventional sense. 

All the tables outside were taken, we had to squeeze past people to get through the door, inside it was mobbed, everybody we wanted to speak to ignored us and everyone else kept telling us off. 

Eventually we got our names on a list, a virtual one inside the waitress's head, and were told it could be an hour. Suddenly I spied someone leaving the bar and moved like lightening to secure the gap. Result. 

Well, not quite as it turned out. The boss said we still couldn't eat because there wasn't enough room for three. A reasonable point, if his bar hadn't already been hoaching with people utilising every available surface. 

We ordered drinks, Clara, a mix of lager and lemon Fanta. All I'm saying is don't knock it till you've tried it, especially after walking in blazing sun following a very late night. God it was good.

As we refreshed, in synchrony, our reception did too. We'd either passed the initiation or made it clear we weren't going anywhere fast. More space opened up, enough for us to get to order. The food was terrific, razor clams and cuttlefish croquettes stood out, the Pulpo Gallega, 'Galician style' octopus, served warm with lots of paprika on a bed of potato, was sensational. The prices were too.

 

Bar Jaj-Ca Tapes, Ginebra, 13, Barceloneta, +34 (0)933 195002

Vincent Price's Guide To Entertaining With Wine. A gem.

La Paradeta: seafood stuff as dreams are made of

La Paradeta was a tip off. Someone did the research then ended up holidaying with relatives whose sole criterion for eating was outside seating. We can all share their pain. Like many of the finest eateries in this city, Paradeta doesn't do al fresco. It caters for it's audience and does that perfectly. If, like me, you're inclined to seafood fever, you'll have eaten here before, in countless dreams. To see them realised takes some sinking in.

It did sink in though and then from deep within arose the fever. An intense, trance like state which precedes a manic dash, fueled, not entirely irrationally, by the fear that all the best will shortly disappear. In Paradeta I was not alone. From the fishmongers slab you choose what you fancy and how you'd like it cooked. If you're unsure they'll advise. We went for oysters, elvers and chipirones, deep fried and clams, steamed with garlic and parsley. I'd have ordered more, lots more, indeed I tried but got pulled away mid sentence to pick up a tray, bread, salad and bottle of wine. You pay by weight, get a numbered receipt then go find a seat. Simples.

The numbers get called from behind a hatch where, for seafood lovers, the magic happens. The pace was perfect. The taste of iodine from seafresh oysters still lingered as the elvers and chipirones were called.

Both were delicious, the elver coating batter as light and crispy as tempura. Next, again in perfect time, came the clams. Possibly the best I've had. Each one a sweet marine sensation.

There are four Paradetas in Barcelona. This was the Born branch. The canteen set-up and no fuss attitude means remarkably reasonable prices. Two of us ate a lot with a bottle of decent local white wine for 36 Euros. Get here early though, it's justifiably popular. As we left I glanced over to the fish counter, all the elvers were gone... knew it. Desert was a short stroll down the road, melon ice cream, a new favourite flavour, I ate it every day and miss it terribly.

Click here for La Paradeta's website

You'll find La Campana Ice Cream Parlour at: Princesa, 36  08003 Barcelona, Spain

933 197 021. It's well worth it.

BUY, BUY, BUY THIS WINE!

Everyone should get this wine. Even those who don't think they like Chardonnay. Smelling of freshly cut melon mixed with butter as Night Scented Stock drifts by on the warm night air. Drinking of Andean streams, cascading through meadows past the cattle tending granddaughters of fleeing Nazi children. If you like that sort of thing. If not, then consider it for what it is: a bloody bonza wine that costs four pounds twenty nine.

Co-op Chilean Chardonnay: £4.29
Remarkable value wine that I've mentioned before which just keeps getting better. Get some before it goes the other way. Best served bollockingly cold anywhere with anything or nothing.

A Very Determined Visitor

Guy's Restaurant - Glasgow

We were greeted by a huge surprise coming through the door, people, lots of them and on a cold Wednesday night to boot. Then another pleasant change, a nice long bar heading down to the restaurant proper, with coat hooks and plenty of space to sit or stand. Too often restaurant bars are interior design add-ons and requests to sit at them greeted with incredulity. Not here. The house sauvignon blanc was good, the glass it came in spectacular.

We moved through to the main dining area. It was completely full and a glance at the menus gave some indication why that might be. The pre-theatre remains available long after the play has begun, for most of the week £15.95 buys you three courses till 9pm. Tempting though dishes like calves liver and rabbit were from the carte, there's no ignoring a price like that.

Prawn cocktail for starter, probably a 'retro retro' dish by now, but I still love Marie Rose sauce. What arrived looked like a smörgåsbord that had lost it's bord, with surprisingly tasty prawns and lots of that lovely sauce. It's never a sophisticated dish but often disappoints, this didn't, I'd order it again. The retro theme continued with chicken liver parfait. Declared light, creamy and delicious by all who ate it.

We chose a Spanish white from the malvasia grape, one of the cheaper bottles on the list, at about £18.95, the first white wine I've drunk from the Toro region. A lovely wine with a beguiling flavour I couldn't quite pinpoint, possibly angelica. Would order it again in a shot.
My main was lamb shank. It's pretty hard to mess up lamb shank, though some Glasgow eateries still manage. This one was seriously tasty, a huge portion of confit textured lamb sliding off the bone.

The others had fish and chips and the most amusing dish on the menu, the tapas style Scottish selection. Mini steak pie, mince 'n tatties, haggis and chips. Apparently the fish and chips were fine, the steak pie divine.

Had a raspberry fool for puds. Not as light and fluffy as it should be and lacking acidity. Took a scoop of someone else's fruit crumble to compensate. Very nice.

Guys is a cracking place to dine. A visually pleasing space that buzzed from the moment we walked through the door. The staff were great and didn't forget anything throughout the meal.
The cooking we sampled was competent and at these prices that's all you can ask for. I'm really looking forward to coming back and that's not a feeling I've had leaving many Glasgow restaurants lately. We popped off down the road to Brazilian bar Boteco for a nightcap and to watch the samba dancing. Don't remember very much after that...

CLICK HERE FOR GUYS WEBSITE

And here for Boteco Do Brasil

A Cracking White Wine

I've decided there's not enough, 'try this it's lovely' posts on my blog. So here's one. First bought at the weekend when it was reduced to £4.99, today it's back to £6.99. Well, this is Spring in a glass which makes up for a severe lack of Spring anywhere else. Like the label says apricot, blossom and almond. Okay, it says almond blossom but never having sniffed an almond's flower I couldn't couch for that. On the palate there's a beautiful tingling acidity and a wonderful aftertaste of tinned mandarin juice. It's utterly delicious and well worth the price. From Waitrose.

Easter Treat

My Grandfather was extremely pleased with own his fondness for the simple pleasures. Smoking, polo mints and plain food. He didn't even drink, save for a lager and lime with Christmas lunch and half a shandy after dominoes... if he'd won. It hinted at gentle rebellion, his father had been the drinking, gambling sort who'd played for Arsenal and fell foul of the taxman. Ted played it straight.

This was his favourite meal for as long as I knew him. Lamb, new potatoes, peas, mint sauce and gravy. The lamb had to be cooked til it was crisp and brown to the bone. The peas, often freshly picked from the garden, cooked for 30 minutes in boiling water. Boy did we give him some stick. He always made his own mint sauce though, chopped using knives he'd sharpened on the window sill. I've never encountered blades that sharp since.

Some sample wines arrived the other day with food match suggestions, so I thought it'd be fun to play along. They recommended serving the Priorat with traditional Easter lamb. So I cooked it, Ted's way, mostly. The wine smelt like it could do with decanting, that is, it didn't really smell of anything. So it got an hour to 'open up'.

Initial tasting revealed a wine that wasn't as overpowering as many Priorats. Finely balanced, elegant almost, but not revealing much. Once we started eating it came alive... it still amazes me how some wines do this. Especially modern creations that I always presume are made with food free imbibing in mind. Spicy smells intermingled with liquorice, bbq and woodsmoke. There were tastes of blueberry, coconut and white pepper. It was a perfect match for the fayre, even coping with the mint sauce. Home made of course. My only minor criticism was that it was almost too correct, a kink or two wouldn't have gone amiss... just like my Grandfather.

According to the blurb 2008 Scala Dei Priorat should sell for £19.99. Majestic is one of the retailers but I've just checked their web page and can't see it.
Priorat's never cheap, I'd say provided you decant this for at least an hour, preferably two, then serve it with food, it's well worth the money.

Couple of Crackers from the Co-op

The price of everything is hyper inflating these days, except interest rate linked mortgages. I should be rolling in it, the amount I pay out each month to pretend to own a flat has halved in recent years. Yet, I'm not. Somehow the cost of nice stuff- wine, food, travel, central heating- has rocketed. I'm not one for conspiracy theories but it seems remarkable that every penny I've saved on a mortgage has been divided up so thoroughly between utility companies and supermarkets. Here's a graph. Proof if proof be need be.

There's no point in switching supermarkets or utility companies. They're all charging more or less the same. There's just the illusion of choice camouflaging a modern day Zaibatsu. So all I can really do is trade down on the non-essentials, and sadly, mid-week wine falls into that category. On the plus side I've been discovering some remarkable value white and red wines. These two come from the Co-op and are widely stocked.

First up a Chilean Chardonnay for only £4.29. Fresh, buttery, no oak and a fascinatingly spicy palate. This works tremendously well with tomato sauces and spicy ones too. Particularly good with a quality kebab.

Next up a cracking Californian shiraz. This one's quite spicy on the nose has a lovely juicy mouth feel and a lick of liquorice on the tongue. Incredibly it's only £4.99. Remarkable value.

One for sipping while wondering... why, in every other branch of journalism we question why we're being told something, yet when it comes to financial markets, we just accept what we're told?

'Phylum Feast' @ Stravaigin

Stravaigin's vast these days. The space upstairs doubled when familiarity, along with walls and the hairdressers next door, was swept away a year or so ago. In truth, I probably preferred the smaller place. The new and lengthy bar's too inviting to the rolling mauls of bland clothed men who haunt west end nights but pack the bars and fill the tills. The old place put them off. It's heaving, cluttered, tiny bar forced them to press up close to flamboyant types and question whether urges that they hoped had gone away, still lay, beneath their tightly fastened hose.

The downstairs restaurant was refurbished too, but it's so darkly lit you'd need a torch to see what's changed. We went on Thursday for 'The Phylum Feast'- a celebration of Darwin's birthday- and had a cracking night. I'll list everything:

First up was an aperitif, Monkey Gland Martini. Very tasty and fortunately no sign of the glands. Maybe some cheeky bar monkey dipped them in and out again before serving. Next came Primordial Soup and a glass of cava. Lovely. Nice cava too. Being pernickety I'd say the chicken stock was a bit intense for balance, but hey, best named dish of the year so far.

After that came mollusc salad- clams, scallop, squid, baby octopus, prawn, mussel- with a glass of Muscadet. Perfect combination.

Main was mutton with panko crusted langoustine. The flash didn't do this dish any favours, illuminated it wasn't the most visually appetising of dishes, but it tasted great. Flavourful, perfectly cooked mutton, again making me wonder why anyone bothers eating lamb and the panko (Japanese breadcrumbs) crusted Scottish langoustines were immense.

Biting through a gentle crunch to a just cooked, sweet, sea fresh prawn, is about as good a eating gets for me. This dish came with a glass of a Bordeaux good enough to make us order a bottle.

By the time desert arrived I was so high on life I can't even remember eating it. Coffee followed.

All of this, everything that is, except the extra bottle of red, came to £32. We sat down at 7.30 and left the table after 11. I think, frankly it was all getting a little hazy by then. All the drinks were proper sized glasses. That's truly remarkable value for money. This night came out from the jaded sea of Glasgow's eateries and will hopefully spawn a host of offspring. If it does, be sure to book your place aboard the evolution revolution.

CLICK HERE FOR STRAVAIGIN'S HOMEPAGE