Fuck, I can't believe we just walked downstairs and got a world-class meal!

Our body clocks are still screwed up, so we headed out after noon in search of a late lunch. A lot of restaurants in Spain close between about 4 and 8pm but a Galician place recommended by our AirBnB host was open.  We had padron peppers simply sautéed with a bit of salt, a bacala (salt cod) salad, grilled asparagus, and roast ham. Maison David was right around the corner from our flat, and is a fine neighborhood place -- I think we were the only non-locals.

We had some shopping to do, but most of the shops and markets were closed this late on a Sunday. We stumbled upon a place, La Bellvitja,  with stunning architectural doors and a sleek, modern-meets-medieval interior. And wouldn't you know, it featured vermut (vermouth), so we had to go in.  An artisanal vermouth set us back a whopping €1.25 and another from Rues (where Gaudi was born) for €2.50. Both had a slice of orange, a good olive, and spritzed with seltzer from an old fashioned seltzer bottle. The seltzer lightened the drink and made it refreshing.

Albert Adriá had something to do with the place, so we expected higher prices, but the dinner menu looked very reasonable.

The door is a sinuous stainless steel organic shape with a clever custom hinge pin mechanism.

We continued wandering, ending up at the back end of La Boqueria (Mercat de Sant Josep de la Boqueria), where they're adding new covered space, and here again we find the industrial meets organic design that appeals to me so much. The steel doesn't have to have those cut-outs or the tree like branch patterns, the underside doesn't have to have the rich wood... but it does.

At Mercat de Santa Catarina we found similar tree-like branching patterns, and again a combination of steel and wood.

The day was getting late and we hadn't even had a glass of beer. A quick web search for something good, something other than the ubiquitous Estrella Damm in regular, lime and brown flavors. Sadly, Ale & Hop was a disappointment. They had maybe 10 beers on tap but only one was from Spain, the rest from England and Germany. The Spanish one, made for the bar, was called a Session IPA, and it was OK... just OK.  As a Session beer, it was too sweet, and for folks used to American IPAs, wasn't hoppy enough, just a bit of unbalanced bitterness in the finish.  The place didn't feel comfortable, the music was too loud, 1970's southern American rock (think Creedance), it was cramped and the bartender completely ignored Irene who was obviously wilting from thirst. Not some place I'd return to, but we're still on the hunt for craft beers in Barcelona.

We did find the CatBar, but it was closed. Like Ale & Hop, it too was vegetarian -- vegan in fact. I like beer, but I also like food: is there some perverse pattern in Barcelona that you have to be a herbivore if you want non-industrial beer? Clearly, further research is indicated. 

We headed back towards our flat as evening fell, and saw the Barcelona Cathedral (La Seu) illuminated by the warm sunset. Interestingly, the bell tower is an open frame of steel, not enclosed in a stone tower. 

 From our rooftop terrace we can see the statue gracing the top spire.

 Some shops near Las Ramblas have whimsical decorations advertising their crafts and guilds from the past -- umbrellas here.

 I suspect the dragon reiterates the asian motifs painted on the wall of the building.

We headed out our door to the bustling Ramblas del Raval on a quest for dinner; we didn't have to go far.

All the cafés had busy tables in the center, and it was a fabulously comfortable evening so we didn't want to eat in side. We picked the only one that had an empty table, Suculent. We had no idea about the food but ended up having a stunningly good dinner. Dinner started at 10pm, so we're really getting into the swing of eating like locals.

We'll document the meal as part of our Daily Dinner series blog, but suffice to say it was  adventurous cooking exquisitely prepared: eel with raw egg in intense broth, cock's comb (!), squid with foie gras, pigeon, and finished with white chocolate mousse stuffed strawberries.

In fact, the usually mild-mannered Irene exclaimed near the end of dinner, "Fuck, I can't believe we just walked downstairs and got a world-class meal!"