The Salaryman's Guide: the Flaming Lips (Inaugural Edition)
About two or three summers ago, we had bought two tickets to see the Flaming Lips which, for a variety of reasons, we couldn't use. Instead of letting the tickets go to waste, I asked around the office to see if anyone could use them. I sent one email out to various co-workers that were around the same age; I sent another email out to the entire office. No one had heard of the Flaming Lips.This blew my mind.
Granted, it's not like the Flaming Lips are the biggest band in the world: my parents would acknowledge that they've at least heard of U2, but I would never expect them to have heard of the Flaming Lips. Conversely, however, it's not like the Flaming Lips are a little garage band playing open stage hours at the pub: the show was at the Malkin Bowl, in Stanley Park (this summer, Elvis Costello, the Pretenders and Cat Power played the same venue). How does that large a phenomena in popular culture go unnoticed in an office of over a hundred, wherein the majority of people are in the 20 to 40 age bracket?
Over the past few years where I've gone from carefree student to indifferent workerman, I've noticed this happen on multiple occasions, be it with bands, movies, restaurants or some other trend or fad. It'd be easy to laugh at this in some sort of self-righteous, holier-than-thou kind of way, but it's not like these folks were some sort of backwater hicks or Stepford Wife suburbanites. Many, if not most, were simply people that spent a good chunk of their youth working extremely hard to make a career for themselves, found themselves with families to support and just plain didn't have enough time to spend surfing the web or reading magazines. (And, of course, a handful were just plain lost.)
If and when they did find time to seek out new things, I've inevitably fielded questions on all sorts of things. What's that crazy band you're listening to in your office? What's a new restaurant to go to? What movie should I take my wife to? I've always loved answering these questions, and I've found much more earnest and sincere music/movie/food/etc fans than I'd ever met in all the various circles I've been in that have purportedly been bound and formed by mutual interest.
And so, I thought I'd start this: the Salaryman Guide. A user-friendly service that will hopefully skim over the surface of the grand iceberg known as popular culture. It seemed obvious to have the Flaming Lips as the inaugural post.
The Flaming Lips
Who is This, and Why Should I Know About Them? Well, as college/art rock bands go, weird doesn't get more accessible than the Flaming Lips. Anyone that remotely listened and liked the Beach Boys beyond "Help Me Rhonda" or heard half of any prog rock album should be able to connect the dots.
When Would I Have Missed This? In 93, the Flaming Lips had a modest hit in "She Don't Use Jelly." It's one of those songs with diminishing returns; it just gets less and less amusing the more you listen to it... and, in 93, you had to listen to it ALOT.
Shortly thereafter, the Flaming Lips generated buzz with a handful of odd experiments. With their Boombox Experiments, the Flaming Lips would arrange up to 40 friends play boomboxes loaded with music that they had composed, each playing the tape, adjusting the volume, messing with the tape speed, etc. at varying times. With Zaireeka, they released an album spread over 4 CDs that were meant to be played simultaneously. So: weird for the sake of being weird. But in a delightful sense.
In 99, though, the Flaming Lips released The Soft Bulletin, which took them from weirdo art band to mainstream success (as in graduating from Conan to Leno). This saw the Flaming Lips end up in countless tv shows, movies, commercials, etc. This continued on in 2002 with Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and, to a lesser extent, with War With the Mystics in 2006.
Where Should I Start? Just skip past the mid 90s output and start with Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi.
Both are honest to God albums, as in need to be listened to start-to-finish, odd for our current times where the single reigns supreme. Plus, these are the ones that Justin Timberlake latched onto, and who's to argue with that guy?
"Race for the Prize" from The Soft Bulletin
The Flaming Lips - Race For The Prize from Phil Bebbington on Vimeo.
Uh.... If this ain't your cup of tea, don't worry. I'm not sure the Lips have that much traction with the kids nowaday, either: 3 years is a long time to go when the collective attention span grows shorter and shorter, and there's been a lot of Animal Collective albums that have come out since then. But they do have a new album, Embryonic, that comes out this month, which will hopefully change that.
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It might seem odd to add that much sugar at first, but, depending on the spice of your chorizo, it takes some of the bite out and balances it out. A 1/4 cup of canola oil might seem like a lot too - we probably used a bit less - but, again, it depends on the chorizo: the sausage we got didn't really have too much fat (thanks Whole Foods!), and, because you'll have to refrigerate any leftover cornbread because of the meat, you'll need just a tad bit more than you'd think in order to keep it from drying out in the cold.
The opening blurb to the recipe reads: "Toasting the cornmeal first gives the corn bread a heartier flavour." Well, if it did, I didn't notice, 'cause a 2/3 cup of honey IS A LOT OF HONEY. Well, at least for a cornbread.
The first version we tested was from Saveur's July 2009 Texas issue:
It's always somewhat unnerving when you arrive at a place close to 10pm and the only other table in sight are seniors, but that's Madrid for you. We sat to an serving of olives and yucca chips, which turned out to be the first course of the tasting menu without us having even ordered it (we did). The place slowly filled up, mostly with other tourists in the know, with locals following close behind.
Once we had ordered, the next item really set the stage: the gin fizz. I've never had a tasting menu where a cocktail is one of the courses, but I can't say I'm opposed. The shot glass was filled with seltzer water, with the gin encapsulated in this bubble sphere floating at the top. Meant to be downed in one gulp, the orb of gin bursts in the mouth with the rush of seltzer water to mix.
A little espresso cup of a chilled ginger and leak soup followed. Soup in shot glasses isn't exactly a new thing, but this one was more like a foamy drink than a pedestrian chilled soup, and refreshing after a day in the summer sun.
After four starters, the actual courses commenced with a gazpacho. Instead of the usual tomato soup that college kids serve at their first few grown-up dinner parties, this gazpacho had a healthy base of strawberry thrown into the mix, which made it much more of an interesting flavour combination than expected. 
I've only ever known bonito as those little dried flakes that adorn so many Japanese dishes, but here we were served an actual piece of bonito, which is similar to a tuna. Bonito is a dry, firm fish, and it would be pretty easy to overcook. This bonito, though, was well-prepared, and served with a citrus sorbet of sorts, and a bed of peppers. This gave a great dose of sweetness to the dish that would have otherwise been on the meat-y, protein-y side.
To keep the dry fish theme going, the next course was hake, which, of course, was also perfectly prepared. I remember this as being served in a bonito broth, which had the right amount of saltiness that the traditional dried and salted hake has.
I cannot and will not cease in extolling the virtues of suckling pig. Every culture has some version of the suckling pig, and for good reason: there's very few dishes that are more perfect. Dassa Bassa's version had layers of suckling pork sitting atop a cornmeal type base, which in itself was in a slightly sweet sauce. On top, the most crucial element: the crackling (oh, GOD, the crackling!), with another citrus-y glob that was reminiscent of that atop the bonito, but at room temperature. Simply perfect.
I don't remember much about dessert number one - it has been almost two months - but I do remember a good dose of gin, tying it to the gin fizz served at the beginning, a layer of sweet ice, and feeling like I needed to take a picture of all the layers involved. There you go. A good palate cleanser to transition.
I do remember slightly more about dessert number two, a chocolate fudge. It doesn't look like much from the picture, but underneath the surface of chocolate fudge pudding was an array of nuts, chocolate, cake-y goodness underneath.
Things ended off with a selection of petite fours, which I feel should really end all dinners around the world, everywhere. These included a selection of truffles, passionfruit marshmallows, and cookies.
For example, when we sat down for a quick snack at the Rene Sofia addition, it really wasn't about the food, but about the incredible Jean Nouvel-designed room that we sat in. 
Of course, it helps when you order something as brilliant as a lomo sandwich. It's pretty hard to fuck up a grilled pork chop sandwich, and I really haven't had a bad one yet. Eating it in that room just elevated it to a higher level than it probably otherwise would've been at.
When it came to 
We sat down outside in the sidewalk patio during an intense summer afternoon, watched British tourists cut the line and steal our table and one of our adjacent tables lose a purse to a petty thief. After the drama settled, we went with the "Meat Bombs": a take on the traditional meat and potato croquettes. These weren't so brilliantly conceptualized so much as they were brilliantly executed (and plated), with there being a great balance of meat and a delicate, crispy potato exterior, miles away from mere average croquettes that end up being a mash potato nightmare.
Throughout our visit, we noticed that Russian salads were a ubiquitous option on every menu, which didn't seem overly obvious to us. As far as I can gather, the Russian salad is really all about the mayonnaise, with the rest of the contents being a toss up of egg, meats/seafood and the quality dependent on freshness and balance. I can't remember much about this version, but probably mostly because I'm not sure what the attraction of the Russian salad is to begin with.
We also got the Cantabrian anchovies with tomato and basil. Cantabrian anchovies are highly sought-after, and probably a bit politically incorrect to order as their numbers are now quite low (we didn't know until, um, today), and are cured longer, giving them a bit of a firmer, drier taste than the typical oil soaked fillet one sees in grocery store tins this side of the Atlantic. Roncero is apparently also known for his mastery of olive oil, and these simple two/three bite anchovies saw amazing compliment in the olive oil, basil and tomato that they sat on. Probably the best anchovies I've ever had.
The true star, though, was this dish: pig trotters with cuttlefish "noodles." The pig trotters were, quite simply, one of the most memorable items I have ever eaten. The meat, fat and skin of the trotters simply melted in the mouth, into an incredible mix of all-things-pork that dwelled in the outermost points of extravagance. The cuttlefish 'noodles' might seem unnecessary, but they gave a good contrasting balance to the richness of the trotters, despite being resolutely rich in themselves. This was a dish that exuded pure substance, and rendered the surrounding stylishness a non-thought.
Quite often the simplest thing can be the hardest to write about. Despite the fact that we tend to visit markets wherever we end up in the world, I tend not to write about them, so as not to reduce an awesome experience into a shopping list. I would be remiss, though, if I didn't tell you about the 
My shitty internet research reveals that the Mercado is housed in a late 1800s/early 1900s building, which probably is true, but the powers that be have updated the place into a modern miracle. Nestled on the outer boundary between La Latina and Los Austrias, just a few minutes away from Plaza Mayor, the Mercado isn't the largest market, or the most exotic of markets, but simply one of the best conceptualized market I've seen in awhile.
I love me some Granville Island, but imagine if they got rid of everything extraneous, and concentrated all the great parts of the market into one medium-sized venue that (drumroll) SERVES BOOZE. I'm no lush, but Lord knows I hate all the restrictions the Man has placed between alcohol and my consumption of it. To add that extra proverbial cherry on top, the place is open late, which works out gangbusters for everyone.
The market generally works much like a cafeteria. There's a stall that serves fine wines of all sorts, another for tapas and other cooked items, one for cheeses, a vermouth bar, etcetera, etcetera, and one simply collects whatever they feel like for dinner/post drinks grub/whatev.
Most of the stalls stay open through the night, but there's a few that close up. There's not a lot of people looking to eat dried bacalao right at the market, but there's always an audience for little sausages in every corner of the world.
One of the more popular stalls was the oyster one, which was serving an array of oysters on the cheap: it was something like 2 euros for 6.
Another was a dessert stall, with fresh macaroons, gelato, chocolate, cake...you name it.
Our hotel was just a bit north of the La Latina district of Madrid, which apparently is a more culturally-mixed area (read: more immigrants). This, of course, means that there's a ton of food to be had, and the area is known for its plentitude of restaurants, both tapas/pinxtos and full out ones (word to the wise: if you order a drink without ordering food right away, most places will give you a free tapas dish to nosh on until you order). On our walk there, we passed by a confectionary with basically a huge window box full of potato chips they were making on site - always a good sign of the destination ahead.
As with most places, the daily menu on the chalkboard featured just as many (if not more) choices than the permanent menu, and we chose a few raciones - basically appetizer dishes for 2 or 3. Given our immense love of all things starch and cheese, we got this cheese toast with grapes. It should be no surprise that it came, of course, with olive oil drizzled on top, y'know, cause it needed it.
You can't be in Spain and not eat at least one sausage, and I ain't saying that in a euphemism-sense. This was an amazing chorizo or similar type sausage, drowned in oil, and served with enough bread to sop all of the goodness up.
I was also super curious about squid served in its own ink. As common as it is, I'd never had it before, and had kinda built it up in my head. This didn't quite live up to it, mostly because the sauce was thickened to the point of being a syrup, and kinda had this sweet/starch thing going that just seemed bland. With that said, it came with rice cooked in milk, which was by some of the best rice I've ever had (and, trust me: I've had a lot of rice in my life), so much so that I had to take a picture of it.
El Mollete, though, was one of these highlights. The place was only two streets over from our hotel, and yet the concierge hadn't heard of it. The ol' World Wide Web, however, had: it had made the NY Times' "36 Hours in Madrid" list as one of the places to go to:
We didn't order the mollete as they either ran out or only serve it during breakfast - not that I didn't pout about it for a split sec. We never went for breakfast either - our hotel had free breakfast - but apparently El Mollete is known across the city for having one of the best tortillas around. We couldn't read the menu or the daily chalkboard, but did as the NY Times suggested and let the owner/manager pick for us. The dude is as charming and down to earth as it comes: the staff is basically just him serving tables, a bartender, and (I'm assuming) one lady we saw come out of the kitchen. One picture of Francis Ford Coppola adorns the wall, and that's it. There's no fuss or muss here: it's about the food.
The crappy thing, then, is that our photos just don't do it justice. The place is dimly lit and small, and we didn't want our camera flash to annoy everyone. Don't hold our crappy pictures make your mind up for you. Particularly when it comes to this Galician octopus dish, which is quite simply one of the two best octopus dishes I have ever had (the other being at Cibo in Vancouver). The octopus sits in a lake of olive oil with potatoes, paprika sprinkled on top. The octopus was cooked to perfection, tender, juicy and brilliantly flavored with just enough saltiness to contrast the natural sweetness of the potato. The immense quantity of olive oil might put some off, but when you're using olive oil of this quality, you can learn to love it.
El Mollete is apparently known for eggs, so we had the huevos rotos too. Huevos rotos is kind of a broken egg (scrambled isn't quite right, but it's in that vein), cooked with potato. It might just sound like your standard eggs/hashbrowns breakfast combo, but there's something that just differentiates it. It's either the paprika or immense quantity of olive oil (a constant theme), but it's just different. And great. I love breakfast enough to think that eggs should appear on the menu at all times of the day, and the people in Madrid tend to agree. It's hard not to when it tastes as good as this.
The last dish we had was a grilled pork chop. I had picked up the Spanish word "lomo" earlier in the day, mostly because of my fondness for a Spanish pork chop sandwich. I'm not even 100% sure that "lomo" translates to "grilled pork" in Spanish, but heck, people understand. I'm also not sure what it is about every other country and their relative expertise with pork, but we have a pretty steep learning curve ahead of us here in Canada/US (I'd say North America, but a carnitas or el pastor taco are evidence that the Mexicans get it). Anyway, this was perfectly grilled, nice and salty, and a perfect end to the meal. 
One of these places is Casa Ciriaco, which has been around long enough to witness an attempted assassination of King Alfonso XIII in 1906, and forms part of the setting for Valle-Inclan's novel Luces de Bohemia. We figured its longevity must have been well founded, and had read that it tended to be the least touristy of the grand dames of the old restaurant scene, being a bit further from Plaza Mayor and the Huertas district, both tourist centres. The place looks its age, an old neighbourhood restaurant that's been in need of an upgrade for awhile, long enough so that it would be a shame to do so now. Pictures of famed bullfighters, the royal mum, and other celebs from yesteryear decorate the walls, with the servers having probably worked there longer than I've been alive.
One was an egg drop soup with bits of bread in it, which had an interesting mix of salty and a hint of sour to it, seasoned with healthy amounts of oil to make the medicine go down. It was good, but definitely far too much for one person to be able to finish it in one sitting.
The other dish was artichokes, which were cooked, tossed in olive oil, and topped with bits of jamon. Again, a good dish, but something one would have to share lest you get sick of it.
Without a digital SLR or good lighting, most of our food pictures are underlit and kinda look yellow. These pictures, though, pretty much capture what the dishes looked like. We both ordered chicken (in hindsight, I should've ordered the tripe): one roast, one stewed. I can remember the roast chicken being cooked perfectly, and the stewed chicken in one of the thickest gravies I've ever ingested. Beyond that, there wasn't too much more to make it memorable, but one can definitely see how the restaurant would be a Sunday family dinner fave.
We ended with a traditional Spanish flan or creme caramel. I don't think I've ever had a bad creme caramel, but this one seemed extra good, rich and caramel-y.
As museums go, the Guggenheim Bilbao is pretty incredible. The place is something to behold from inch to inch: the Gehry building, the artwork outside (including this Koons flower pup), the artwork inside... it's really overwhelming, and a good example of how an institution that makes that large of an artistic statement will eventually mould a city's identity.
When it comes to Basque cuisine, most will tell you to make the drive from Bilbao to San Sebastian, which has more Michelin stars per capita than any other place on earth (for example, one of the fathers of new Spanish cuisine, Arzak, hails from San Sebastian). But when Food & Wine magazine calls Josean Martínez Alija, the chef at the Restaurante Guggenheim, "Europe's most thrilling young chef," you know you gotsta check it out.
We both ordered the tasting menu, which we try to do in order to really get a sense of where the chef is coming from. This started with a chilled cranberry juice or tea, spiced lightly with cinnamon, which was just sweet enough to have flavour, but just neutral enough to serve as a palate cleanser. At the same time, the server put a huge aspirin pill in front of us, and poured a touch of water on top. After a minute, the pill grew into a wet napkin (the picture shows it just after the water was poured on it). If this was the opening act, we were anticipating some really crazy shit to go down next.
As an amuse bouche, we were served a small piece of bread that had been infused with herb oil (can't remember which herb). When I say infused, I don't mean that it was merely soaking in herb oil: this bread tasted as though it had been completely made out of herb oil, but with nary a drop appearing on the plate. And yet, at the same time, the bread wasn't soggy at all, but light and chewy instead.
Alija is known for emphasizing on local, with the menu spotlighting certain 'slow food' dishes. This white asparagus dish exemplified this: the white asparagus is lightly grilled, eaten with your hands, and accompanied by a juniper and chevril 'gel' dipping sauce, which really helped to heighten the natural flavor of the asparagus without over-complicating the mix of flavours.
The next dish played on the same theme, but took it to a whole other level. The menu listed it as "roasted aubergine flavoured with 'makil goxo', based on a yogurt emulsion* 'Farga' olive, a thousand years [sic] old olive tree)." As far as I can tell, this was an amazingly slow braised eggplant, cooked to the point of ridiculous tenderness but without having the eggplant fall apart, with a licorice flavoured glaze, and plated like a painting with the yogurt emulsion on the side, which helped to balance the strong licorice taste.
The crazy flavors were toned down for the next course, which worked well as a bridge to the meat courses coming up. I could just describe it as a roast avocado in a squid broth, but the menu listing does it alot more justice: "vegetarian foie. (avocado), with a juice of baby squid, acidulated and coriandered." If you've never done yourself the favour of putting an avocado on the grill, do it: it brings out an incredible butteriness and sweetness to an avocado that can't be beat. You almost can't go back to having it raw, and it works well in guacamole too. This avocado was lightly salted, but the squid broth really took it somewhere else, adding an immense richness to the dish that made it something quite special.
A fish course came next: steamed hake resting on a wild garlic and caper sauce, with a touch of lemon and herb. Hake can often be quite dry, but this came out as moist as a halibut.
My meat course was "Thoughts of lamb grilled over a fire of dried vine cuttings, on a base of Tolosa beans and hints of hot spice." Or, in other words, lamb brains. For the most part, brains taste alot like sweetbreads (which are other glands), but these seemed to be even softer and mushier. In other words, they're certainly not for the squeamish, and the light foam in the sauce probably ain't gonna help either. I do remember this being quite amazing, but I probably remember it more as the time I ate brains. 
My lovely companion, quite understandably, wanted to sub in another option. Instead of brains, she had a course of Iberian pork. I can't remember what this was served with, but take note of the colour: this pork was served medium rare. Again, not for the squeamish, but the rareness of the pork did help to keep the natural taste of this dish intact, and made it quite a rich, wonderful thing (well, the one piece I tried, anyway).
As a pre-dessert course, we had slices of pear with hazelnut, poached in a "Garmillas" cheese "serum" (whatever that is) with elder flower. This was a good touch of sweetness to bring us to dessert, but without being a diabetic, syrupy nightmare than many poached pears end up being. Nice, delicate and light. 
The dessert continued on the licorice theme from the eggplant course, with a licorice ice cream, black olive ashes, and a "casein" of aromatic herbs. The casein is an amazingly rich cream, which was pretty necessary considering how strong licorice can be. I remember this dessert as being mostly about those two flavors, and don't remember much about the black olive ashes.
If there's one thing I love about getting a tasting menu, it's the free stuff that you're often served as well. Post dessert is an amazing thing that can bring tears to my eyes. This was either a berry-flavored mousse or a pannacotta of some sort, with a nice little Pocky-style breadstick thing topped with pistachio. By this point, we were full to the point of obscenity (considering this was a late lunch), so I can't say too much about it.
For the most part, our trip pretty much went as such, given the short amount of time we had, but Bilbao ended up being one of my favorite points of our whole trip. The city's picturesque, an old port town that, when in need of an upgrade, went to the ends of the spectrum and became an architecture wet dream. When your city's main tourist feature is the Guggenheim, that has its effects, and the city seemed like the perfect mix of quaint and modern.
Case in point: the picture above is a good overview of what central Bilbao looks like. A grand river flowing through, with downtown and the Guggenheim on one side and the more historic part of the city on the other, with one of the main bridges designed by Calatrava (who also did the airport, one of the prettiest I've ever been in) and the other framed by the museum. Smattered around the city were these tile pieces by famed French graffiti artist 
One of these restaurants is 
For that added touch of familiarity, the 'decor' at Victor Montes worked wonderfully. Generally, the whole place is lined with aged wines and spirits of all kinds; this picture is only one small fraction of the whole place. The only area of wall space that didn't have shelves of bottles had legs of jamon hanging against them.
We stumbled into Victor Montes early in the morning, which in Spain is about 11am. The main bartender/manager was busy slicing jamon for the day, but gave us a warm invite and asked us to help ourselves to a slice of tortilla, a Spanish omelette. Instead of the Spanish omelette you might find in diners here (ie an omelette with peppers), the tortilla is more of a deep dish affair, with layers of potatoes baked in egg. I ate a lot of these in Spain (thanks, hotels with free breakfast!), but this one was the best: seasoned perfectly, with just the right amount of savory playing against the natural sweetness of a good egg, and topped with a slice of jamon. 
Later that night, we tried out other tapas (or pintxos, as they're referred to in Basque) places, including Wallpaper's pick Irrintzi (just okay). Most Basque places simply leave them lining the bar: grab what you want, and they count the toothpicks stuck in each tapa afterwards. This system works fantastic, because it basically felt like a glutton's dream come true - an all-you-can-eat smorgasbord with little guilt involved. Afterawhile, we found ourselves back at Victor Montes. For starters, we really just wanted to go to a great bar, and this place was an easy pick. In most places, when you order a glass of wine, your choices are basically just red, white or rose if you don't speak any Spanish. Our fave bartender was kind enough to give us different pours of wines from Rioja, explaining each one despite the place being packed to the gills. Also, based on the tortilla, we figured they would have great classic tapas.
We weren't wrong: Victor Montes had some of the best classic tapas we had in Spain. We had every combination of small bun/croissant, jamon, baby eel, cheese, sardine, anchovy, crab, egg, you could think of. My fave was the one that looks like a sunny side egg in the picture; instead, it was cheese with a fig paste and bits of jamon sprinkled on top, playing on the egg appearance. If the tapas aren't enough, there's a full restaurant as well, and an offshoot deli/wine store located at the other end of the square.
Barceloneta is basically the port and beach part of Barcelona. The port side is a hop, skip and jump from Born, and features a big mall, a museum, and, uh, boats. The beach side has a W hotel under construction that looks like it could easily have been in Dubai, clubs that line one end of the beach, and the Gehry fish.
The contemporary architect that gets bagged on most seems to be Gehry. Fair enough, but he's payin' the bills, which is more than most people can say. Dude took this fish to 
As you'd expect, then, the whole area features high with seafood joints, and that inevitably means paella. The one tricky thing about finding a good paella in Barcelona is every single place has one, mostly to draw in the tourists. There's a lot of crappy paellas: it's common to find a paella with exactly two shrimp, two mussels, two clams, two blah blah blah...you get the idea. It takes the soul out of it, and a good paella is a pretty soulful thing. Can Ros was recommended on a few different lists (including Paella Prof). It's located on a quiet side street that takes you from the port side to the beach side, and it feels more like being in a small beach town than in a bustling world city.
With a paella on the way, we didn't order too much else. But, in keeping with habit, we ordered the tomato bread. It wasn't much to rave about, and the picture shows it all: two slices of good bread, two tomatoes, and a jar of 
I also had to get the razor clams, cause I just can't get enough of them. I've never had razor clams this fat and meaty, and that's not even an inappropriate pun. Apparently a lesser family of razor clams are 
What I can say about the paella is that it indeed was THE BEST PAELLA I HAVE EVER HAD. I've tried to make paella at home, thought I did an okay job, but I'm going to toss our pan out now. The rice was perfect: flavorful, with just the right amount of saltiness and acidity, soft but still slightly chewy. The rice's importance in a paella cannot be overstated: fuck it up and you've ruined the whole thing. Make it amazing, and you serve it in the heaping portions you see here.
Can Ros has a lot of other seafood features on the menu, many of them non-paella. If I were that Japanese hot dog eating champ, I would've ordered the whole frigging menu. Instead, I had to take a picture of what the table across from us ordered, which was a seafood feast. I took this picture after they had already taken a few items to their plate: when it originally came out, it was probably closer to a 7 inch high seafood bounty of everything one can find underwater. Another table ordered a fish baked in sea salt. It might take an unhealthy amount of gluttony and envy to be eating the best paella ever and still crave every other dish around you in the whole restaurant, but I defy you to not feel the same way. It ain't weakness, it's instinct. After Can Ros, I can only imagine how amazing Valencia must be - now that we're home, I'm trying my damnedest not to think about it.
Our favorite of these places, hands down, was Bubo. Bubo is the brainchild of Carles Mampel, who had once been at the famed Espai Sucre. Bubo is tucked behind the Santa Maria del Mar, along a boulevard lined with tapas joints, a cooking school and other boutiques.
When you enter Bubo, it's automatically clear that you are in a dessert shop operating at a completely different level than most. The fact that you can sip on champagne with your sweets doesn't hurt, either. Presentation is key: these gellies, which look alot like coloured sugar cubes, were just one minor assortment of sweets that gave the place a great technicolour appeal.
Other corners featured chocolates with hints of curry, chocolate lollipops, and so on.
We ordered two desserts, each amazingly intricate to the point where I can no longer remember all of the details. The one on the left had a mandarin orange layer with green tea caviar on top, and the red cherry looking orb on top of the one on the right was not a maraschino, but instead a molecular gastronomy type orb with a dark cherry liquid inside. Lesson learned: carry a notepad at all times, because all I can remember clearly was being in candyland heaven.
If Bubo (proper) re-conceptualizes dessert, than Bubo Bar tries to do the same thing with traditional tapas fare. For instance, the usual tomato bread that we always ordered came out as amazing bread sticks with a tomato mousse of sorts. As with all places in Spain, this version of the tomato bread also reminded us of the virtues of a good olive oil, and not to spare on its use.
We also had croquettes, which I remember being a bit different but great, though the picture we took turned out like crap. That was followed by jamon/cheese finger sandwiches with fig paste, which were again a good re-interpretation of the classic jamon tapa sandwiches we ate at more conventional Basque-fare tapas bars.
This was a bocconcini-type cheese/tomato salad nestled on top of pastry. The tomato was slightly roasted. I don't remember alot about this, mostly because we were in anticipation for the next dish.
If there's one type of seafood that I remember most fondly from Spain, it's the squid/octopus. Perfectly cooked octopus is a force to be reckoned with: juicy and tender, instead of bland and rubbery. This was a take on Galician octopus, which is usually served with a host of potatoes and swimming in olive oil, with sprinkles of paprika on top. This didn't have as much olive oil excess as other places, which was a pleasant change.
You see egg dishes alot more prevalently in Madrid, where a traditional fave is the huevos rotos, basically fried eggs mixed up with a host of potatoes. Here they had a fried egg nestled on top of a hollandaise/gravy type sauce, and it wasn't until you dug into the bottom that you realized it was resting on a bed of potatoes.
The one thing to forewarn about is that Bubo Bar has a smaller dessert choice than Bubo, mostly because they bring over what hasn't sold in that day from Bubo, which is usually very little. This was a chocolate-raspberry mousse. I remember the sticks being raspberry flavored as well.
The other dessert we had was a chocolate affair, which the website describes as a "guanaja sponge cake, guanaja cream, guanaja chocolate mousse, and guanaja chocolate crunch." I'm still not quite sure what guanaja is, but I remember this being a layer of chocolate mousse on top of a denser peanut butter cake of some sort, all resting on top of a crunchy layer.
And with a small mom n' pop place that only serves hot chocolate and churros, Born is a neighbourhood I can get behind.
After a day of walking for hours on end, there's nothing quite as appealing as a busy local eatery in a well-groomed neighbourhood, and La Bodegueta fit that bill. The restaurant's main location is on Rambla de Catalunya, and known for its wine/vermouth selection and charcuterie. The place is small and cramped, with patrons lining up outside amidst the smokers. The overflow goes to their second location, which is kitty corner to it on Provenca.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: I love, love, love to drink outside. Which means I love, love, love to eat outside. The strict bylaws/zoning/bullshit that limit sidewalk cafes, restaurants, etc. in Canada don't seem to have any historical root in Europe, so wtf? Is it the cold? We gots to get right with that shit. Anyway, we ate outside, with the daily specials board behind us. Again, as with many places, the daily specials almost outnumber the items on the regular menu, so it's always hard to narrow down our choices.
Not being able to read Spanish is definitely a handicap: we really should have brought a Spanish/English dictionary with us, and there don't seem to be any good (read: free) ones on the iPhone apps. We told our waitress that we wanted sardines, and had picked something out on the menu. She explained that most of our picks were from the 'non-fresh' (ie canned/preserved) menu, but recommended these sardines (out of numerous choices) to us. It's weird eating canned food that's just as tasty as fresh food, but there ya go.
We also picked a few things off the dailies list, figuring that they were probably the freshest items for the day. Our waitress took time to attempt a translation: apparently the different kinds of clams have different names in Spanish. These were the meatier, juicier type of clams with a darker and thicker shell, lightly tossed in olive oil and cooked over the stovetop or grill until they opened. Simple and great, with just the right amount of char on the shells to give a great scent and taste to them.
I also knew that I really wanted some squid or octopus. Perfectly cooked squid or octopus is a holy wonder to behold. Tender instead of rubbery, these baby octopus were sauteed in red wine, garlic and olive oil, with a hint of smokiness to them. Probably among the best octopus we had in Spain.
We also hadn't tried any suckling pig yet, which seemed totally wrong and needed rectification. This was a more contemporary take on it, with candied pineapples to pair. I cannot emphasize how great the skin was on the pork: nice and crispy and salty. I seem to remember the sauce being apple-y or pineapple-y.
Dos Pallilos isn't the most obvious place to find: it is the restaurant in the Camper Hotel, as in Camper shoes. The hotel in itself just features a bright sign that reads "Hotel," and Dos Pallilos has a bright sign that reads "Bar." It isn't until you notice Raurich's old El Bulli chef whites displayed on the street until you realize that this is indeed the place, with a subtle sign located to the left. What's more, when you walk in from Elisabets, it looks like any other neighbourhood bar, until you realize that there's an Japanese style bar in the back, in the same color scheme as L'Atelier Joel Robuchon. Certainly a marked difference from El Bulli.
When you walk in, it's just dark and red. Only after your pupils adjust do you notice the cute little Asian affects decorating the walls, like the little rice hat jars on the wall, or the wood squids, etc. in the window boxes.
Instead of going for the fixed lunch menu, we opted to pick a few things ala carte. The chefs are also the servers. This is also novel, considering how many people travel from around the world to work with Raurich. One of our servers spoke fluent Spanish through the thickest Scottish accent you could imagine. The menu features Raurich's take on traditional Asian (mostly Chinese and Japanese) small-dishes, all of which he lumps under his co-opted usage of the term "dim sum". We tried these Chinese glazed walnuts, which you can generally find in any Asian market, sweet/spicy glazed with sesame, although these ones seemed less chemical-y than the store bought ones. It wasn't too far from the usual.
What came next, then, totally set the tone. An "Onsen Tamago," which was a slow-poached egg, cooked at 63C to emulate an egg cooked in a Japanese hot spring. The egg is then drained from the water, and placed in a dashi/bonito broth, served with shiso leaves and soy sauce crystals. Once you crack the yolk, the whole thing mixes up into something amazingly broad in flavour, though light at the same time.
We also ordered the tempura cherry tomatoes. A completely simple idea, but not one that we'd ever seen in any Japanese restaurant in Vancouver. The tempura batter was tremendously light and delicate, far better than many Japanese places we've been to.
Next came the steamed shrimp dumplings, which I don't remember much about. I do remember that they made the dumpling wrappers using "de farina de patata," which meant they had a perfect texture to them without being as doughy as in some Chinese restaurants. They were stuffed with pork and shrimp, and some other bloggers claim a bit of foie gras. I don't remember much about it, apart from being a decent dumpling, so perhaps that says it all.
My uncle in Hong Kong always claims that any good Chinese chef ought to be able to make a good char siu bao. He's somewhat right: it's hard not to overdo the bun, so as to make the whole thing too doughy, and it's even more difficult not to fuck up the BBQ pork, so as to make it too saucy or sweet. So, I had to order the BBQ pork buns at Dos Pallilos, which were completely different than anything you've ever had before.
For starters, it's completely savory, without any hint of sweetness. This is why, I suppose, they also serve the buns with a side dish of Chinese mustard, which I though was a bit unnecessary. There are also pine nuts in the mix (or was it peanuts?), which completely took it out of the ordinary. In a way, it was almost shocking.
We had also ordered a grilled Chinese braise pork belly, which took 20 minutes or so to slow grill. It's not too often that you see an executive chef actually do any of the cooking, but Raurich actually came out to handle the grill with his chef de cuisine for most of the time (his wife was busy entertaining other guests). It was probably the furthest thing I assume El Bulli's kitchen to function, so it was a pleasant surprise.
In the meantime, the chefs kept asking us if we wanted to order anything (other than booze) to snack on while we waited. During this time, we watched one chef prepare the Thai red curry razorclams right in front of us, so we ordered those as well. These were, of course, incredible. The Thai red curry was more of a light drizzle of red curry infused oil, with sea beans and seaweed to accompany. These were a real highlight: emphasizing the natural flavour of the razor clams, with the red curry notes in the background.
At long last, the Chinese braise pork belly was served. The braise was close to a traditional Chinese sweet and salty one, one that we would probably have at least twice a month growing up at home, and sort of reminiscent of a traditional Shanghainese braised pork hock. Coupled with the fat of the perfectly prepared pork belly, each slice just kind of melted in the mouth.
All in all, Raurich finds an interesting balance of Asian small plates within a Spanish tapas context, and Dos Palillos was one of those places that, while serving Asian food, was still uniquely Spanish. It wasn't so much any one dish that completely floored us, but the sum of the parts added up to what was probably one of the most memorable meals we had in Spain.
We had heard that it was impossible to get into Inopia if you didn't show up around the 7/7:30 opening time. We weren't sure whether to believe the hype or not, as 7/7:30 is insanely early for dinner in Spain; most people don't seem to eat until closer to 10. It was a good thing we didn't chance it, though, because the place gets packed as soon as its steel gate opens.
As with most places, Inopia has its menu, and then a slew of daily features written on the chalkboard. Many places have English menus, but Inopia does not. We relied pretty heavily on our server's basic English, and he did a pretty good job of explaining the choices to us whenever he could, though the high volumes meant we were guessing most of them. There are also pictures of popular dishes hanging from the ceiling, and little chalk pictures on the chalkboard. To round out the decor, there are guest-book tags in Jiffy marker all over the tiled wall, with pictures of famed celeb chefs (or just plain celebs) posted as well. These ones are of Ferran Adria, and Gael Garcia Bernal/Alejandro Gonzalez Inarittu/Javier Bardem; pictures of Heston Blumenthal, Wylie Dufresne, etc. flanked them, with copies of an El Bulli book were perched above.
As I mentioned in the last post, we always ordered the tomato/garlic bread, mostly to balance out the other tapas dishes.
For instance, the bread goes pretty hand in hand with a plate of nothing but anchovies in oil. As many writers have noted, Spain is one of those odd places where canned or preserved foods are often as appreciated as fresh food, and anchovies are a great example. Inopia had three or four different types of anchovies to choose from, and we picked the higher grade. This meant it was a bit less salty, and less earthy tasting than most anchovies I've had.
We also picked white asparagus which you could buy in jars from Inopia - it seemed like they canned/preserved them themselves. I've seen white asparagus plenty of times here, but never quite as thick as the ones we had in Spain. Inopia served them with a light hollandaise sauce, and they were a great clean counterpoint to the anchovies.
Bacalao is another preserved mainstay. It's basically a salted cod fish, but in many variations. We had bacalao salad with tomato, and as with everything, it was swimming in olive oil... but in a good way.
Croquettes are a universal item on tapas menus as well. We picked a standard, stuff with potato and Iberian ham. These were among the better croquettes we had, where the outer shell was thin and delicate.
The other potato dish that seemed ubiquitous at every table was the patatas bravas, which is potato chunks, cut like larger hash browns chunks, served with a slightly spicy tomato sauce and mayo. I don't really get the appeal, but I suppose it's like ordering fries as a side.
As one of the many daily specials, Inopia featured ribs. Instead of your standard pub food short ribs, though, these were rabbit. They were great: gently fried, moist, and light enough to eat in large quantities. Served with a mayo/horseradish type sauce.
Our server really pushed this cheese dish, and for good reason: the cheese, torta Cañarejal, is insanely creamy, and a gold medal winner at the international cheese competition. The closest thing I could compare it to is obviously brie, but this was much creamier, and served lukewarm instead of the usual oven-hot baked brie. An excellent finish.
We spent our first dinner in Barcelona at Taller de Tapas, which was tucked away in one of the many squares off Las Ramblas, one of the main pedestrian drags that caters to tourists and locals alike. The place is a real maze, so we picked what looked like the least touristy place. As we found it later, Taller de Tapas is a chain of tapas restaurants, with numerous locations spread around town.
The first thing that we had to order was a plate of jamon. It's hard to critique one plate of jamon to another: not much bad one can say about perfection.
The other thing that jumped out was razor clams. I used to eat alot of these in Texas, but for whatever reason, I've never seen them on a menu in Canada (apparently you can get them at T&T or at Chinese restaurants depending on the season). This is the first of a recurring theme. If you've never had them before, they taste sort of in between clams and geoduck. Here they were just steamed with a bit of olive oil, which I like: most seafood shouldn't be messed around with too much.
This was a plate of tomato/garlic toast, which seemed like a pretty common side order at most places. While the tomato and garlic were pressed into the bread here, many places just give you a plate of toast, a sliced tomato and a bit of mayo/aioli. This version was one of our faves. Again, simple without too much fuss.
Grilled sardines are always great. They have a sardine fest in Vancouver once a year; this seems to happen 365 days of the year in Spain. 
There's not much to say about this paella. It had two clams, two mussels, two crayfish, and way too much lemon juice. I wasn't overly crazy about it, especially considering the paella we had later in Barceloneta, the beach/waterfront part of the city.
I would have to be completely socially isolated not to notice the ongoing early/mid 90s nostalgia. Yesterday I saw someone wearing actual Cross Colors pants. I didn't realize that they still made those. I am assuming (and hoping) that the summer heat will lead to an obvious delay in Eight Ball jackets coming back.
Every now and then I completely obsess over De La Soul's "Stakes is High," which, in my mind, is one of the better hip hop songs through the genre's history - "Every word I say should be a hip hop quotable". This cycle stated anew when the Mos Def cover starting circulating the web.
