Cheers, Sussex.

I am leaving England tomorrow. Alex is coming to Europe! Yay! We are taking the train to Paris and from there going on to Germany and the Czech Republic and Austria and eventually getting back to France.

Yesterday Ba and my dad and I went to Sheffield Gardens, where there are tons and tons of rhododendrons and an old estate. It was lovely and we had a little picnic in the sunshine. Today I went into Eastbourne with Ba to see Star Trek. I loved it! Well, being the nerd I am, that is probably not surprising.

By the way I should mention that I managed to beat Ba at Scrabble, which is pretty much unheard of. It ended up being 234 to 225. One of my finest moments.

We went to a pub for supper tonight that had really good, upscale food. I had fantastic lamb Wellington with bubble and squeak and sticky toffee pudding. Brilliant.

Not sure how regular my posts will be for my last two weeks in Europe as neither Alex nor I will have a computer. But I can guarantee I will be having a great time!

Heaven take my soul, and England keep my bones.

I arrived in London on Thursday afternoon, May 7. We rented a car and drove down from London to Horsebridge, where Ba lives. On Friday it was rainy in the morning and dreadfully cold. We took the train into London from Polegate and ate at Tom Aikens, an incredibly good restaurant in South Kensington. I think if I were a billionaire I would get a flat in this area to go with my Aston Martin. It is a really nice part of London, with lots of chic boutiques and bakeries and the like. Tom Aikens was an incredible experience in extreme deliciousness, although the very traditional wait service felt a bit stuffy at times. It is a must for fine dining in London though.

After lunch we walked to the Saatchi Gallery and saw a really great contemporary Iranian art series. We went from there to Leicester Square and to the National Portrait Gallery, where there is a John Constable portrait exhibit on. John Constable is a Jane Austen-era romantic painter. Ba is a big fan. We caught the quarter till 7 train back home and called it a night.

Today, Saturday, was far nicer weather. It was actually warm! I sat out in the garden with my dad, Ba, and Uncle Bill for a while. Ba's favorite hobby is gardening and the gardens behind the house are really lovely. My dad and I drove to Brighton, a small seaside city, to pass the afternoon. We ate at Jamie's Italian, a Jamie Oliver-owned bistro. It was very good. We had an antipasti platter with salami, mortadella, several types of olives, pecorino and chili jam, a lemony slaw, and mozzarella with peppery relish. Then I had pumpkin ravioli in a rosemary sauce and my dad had a tomato-broth fish soup. A really fantastic orange-flavored tiramisu (sounds odd, but it tasted great) finished the meal.

After lunch we walked all around the downtown shopping area of the city, stopping in to a record shop to get some new music. Before lunch we walked by the pier. The beach was completely packed, despite the fact that England's beaches do not have sand (they have rocks/pebbles instead) and the water was freezing.

Sussex is so beautiful! We drove to Brighton on country roads, through the South Downs, and everywhere you look is the most bucolic green hills, wildflowers, grazing sheep, cottages, streams, rabbits, etc. you could imagine. I absolutely love being here. The weather obviously could be better, but England is a really lovely place. And I love the food--scones with clotted cream, strawberries with double cream, cream tea, cream-based quiche, bagels and cream cheese, creamy goat cheese, ham and chutney sandwiches. There seems to be a cream theme here. I will have to go for a run tomorrow.

Cinc Sentits

Now for the Cinc Sentits review:

Cinc Sentits was recommended by the New York Times Travel section as the one upscale place to go if you are in Barcelona for a weekend, and I can definitely see why. It was one of the top dining experiences of my life. Every single thing was exquisitely good. I went with Ba and my dad, and the three of us spent hours enjoying every course with a wine pairing. This picture of me and Ba looks pretty silly, but it captures the mood of our afternoon.

We started off with olives, almonds and anchovy crackers. I decided to put my usual food inhibitions aside, i.e. eat the olives, and I was rewarded with the tastiest olives ever. The next course was a 'shot' of cava, cream, maple syrup, sabayon and salt. It sounds weird but tasted fabulous.

All the bread was really good, and you could have as much as you liked. It was full of bacon, olive and herbs and served with Catalunya olive oil and rock salt.

An asparagus soup was pure, unadulterated asparagus heaven. The next dish was seared foie gras with chive sauce on a pastry with a thin layer of burnt sugar on top. The burnt sugar was the perfect counterpoint to the foie gras.

A Galician scallop with Jerusalem artichoke puree, an onion reduction and ham chip was incredibly creamy and rich. Wild Mediterranean sea bass with spring onion, green peas, garlic sprouts, and pil pil highlighted the super crunchy, sweet taste of spring peas.

Carrot foam, parsnip puree, 36-hour cooked oxtail and beet cubes blew my mind. The meat was super tender and the sauce it was in was blissful. The cheese course was bleu cheese, pear, truffle reduction and a cube of brioche. It was probably the least impressive, and it would still be the best cheese course ever at a lesser restaurant.

Dessert part one was strawberry and rhubarb with sorbet and almond cream. A second dessert course was vanilla and olive oil ice cream with chocolate and macadamia nut.

My cappuccino came with five different kinds of sugar: regular granulized white, granulized brown, crystalized white, crystalized sugar in the raw, and vanilla. The petit fours course was lemon muffins with mango-passionfruit mousse.

If you have plenty of time and money on your hands and happen to be in Barcelona, for sure try this place.

La huerta de Espana

I will try to remember everything from my trip down the eastern coast of Spain.

On Monday we left Barcelona in our convertible for the drive to Valencia, which took between 3 and 4 hours. The whole time the sun was shining and we passed endless vineyards (the Penedes region that we drove through is the wine-making area of Catalunya) and olive trees and orchards. After arriving in Valencia, we walked to the Plaza Ayuntamiento, the Plaza de la Reina, and the Plaza de la Virgen by the cathedral. I had actually been to the latter plaza when I went to Valencia in March, although I did not spend much time there--it was taken up with a huge statue of the Virgin Mary that was to be covered in flowers as part of Las Fallas.

We ate dinner in the medieval area at a restaurant called El Rall, where we ate fantastic paella of chicken, rabbit, prawns, langoustine, mussels, and lots of vegetables. The next day, we had breakfast at a little pastry shop and walked to the Royal Gardens outside the Museum of Belles Artes. I liked the museum a lot. It was small and almost empty, so it was like having it to ourselves. It is mainly Spanish art and has some Velazaquez, Goya, El Greco, and Ribera.

We drove that day to Alicante, a seaside resort town. We passed tons and tons of Valencia orange trees along the way. We walked along the marina to the beach, which was quite full of English tourists. My dad and I hiked up to the Castillo de Santa Barbara 166 meters up. The castle was very cool and the views of the Alicante bay were absolutely amazing.

The next day we drove the 3 hours or so to Granada. The first thing we did was go to the Alhambra. It was more amazing than I had anticipated, because in addition to the incredible palace (similar to the one in Sevilla) it has some of the most stunning gardens I have seen in my entire life. There are roses everywhere of every kind, and super tall cypress, and beautiful flowers of every kind. I thought it was incredible. There are tons of pictures but I won't be able to upload them until I get home.

The other unexpected thing about the Alhambra besides the gardens is how HUGE it is. We were there nearly four hours exploring everything. So we did not leave until about 8:00 at night, just in time to find a bar to watch the Barcelona-Chelsea game. It was great getting to watch it with a big crowd of people. Barcelona scored in the second minute of injury time at the end of the game and the place erupted with cheering, my own included. It was just great.

After the game we wandered over to a Moroccan hole-in-the-wall for dinner. I was not all that impressed with the place, which was surrounded by creepy homeless guys. (As I waited to order, this guy on the ground next to me rubbed my leg--ugh!) It did have good lemonade though. There is an evident Islamic influence in Andalucia that is a really interesting complement to the Catholic Spanish heritage.

The next day was Thursday, so after spending the morning walking through the old part of the city to the cathedral, to the university and to the Alabaicin, or Arab quarter, we drove to Malaga, the city from which we caught our flight to England. Overall I had an excellent time, as I knew I would, and got to see more of Spain. It was a great farewell.

Espai Sucre

Very belated, and going out of chronological order, but here it is: my Espai Sucre review!

Espai Sucre is an all-dessert restaurant of international acclaim. I think it has some sort of connection with El Bulli (the most avant garde restaurant in the world), like the pastry chef used to work there.

The space was very elegant but too dark and gloomy for me. Another strange thing was that our party of five was the only group in the restaurant all night. They were having a pastry school class in the kitchen/back room, so we heard them from time to time, but otherwise it was pretty much just us and the waiter.

We were given not just one but three amuse bouche, including this cracker with sweet corn atop soy mousse, flecked with a peppered caramel. It was delicious, as was the buttery parmesan cracker and pumpkin coup with toasted pumpkin seed and cream cheese. They were off to a good start.

The other dishes kind of varied wildly in their actual appeal. They were all super creative and visually interesting, but tasted downright bad in some cases. A soupy mix of tea, pineapple, green apple, green apple and honey gelatin, spicy fennel and verbena broth hit all the right notes: refreshing, crisp, sharp, sweet. On the other hand, a pineapple bread pudding with bacon ice cream was nothing but bacon, and not in a good way.

The most delicious things I ate included braised duck on a cocoa biscuit with caramel sauce and this dish, labeled red mullets fish with onion ice cream and buitfarra negra (sausage) rice. The only downside was the melting ice cream lowered the temperature of the dish so that the rice and fish were slightly cold.

The group's least favorite dish (evidenced by choruses of "Eww!" and "Yuck!") was a beet root sorbet with cheese tart, black beer foam and lemon marmalade. The cheese was really pungent and the ice-cold beet root did not taste good at all. Ditto on the black beer foam.

Equally bad: extra virgin olive oil cake with peach sorbet, green olive caramel and sauce, and San Simon cheese. The peach sorbet was great, but it was totally overwhelmed by the taste of green olive.

Somewhat controversial was the "signature dessert," layers of cocoa streusel, brioche, butter ice cream, hazelnut and black truffle. Some thought it tasted like spoiled milk, but I thought it was creamy and French toast-esque.

The petit fours at the end were very good, except for the bacon chocolate cream. (Too smoky and salty.) They included a bay leaf and apple granita, homemade marshmallow, verbena chocolate madeleine, citrus jelly candy, thin pistachio cookie, coconut cream lolly pop, coffee shortbread, and buttery regular shortbread.

It was a very neat culinary or dining experience, but I wouldn't go back, simply because the flavor was often sacrificed in the need to be daring and innovative.

El fin.

Tonight is my last night in Barcelona. It is pretty unbelievable that I will actually, finally be leaving this place that has been so important to me. During the months I spent here, I had some of the best times in my life, and I really love this beautiful city. I will carry the experience with me forever. But I have resigned myself to leaving, and honestly I am ready. 

My dad and Ba (my grandmother from England) have been here over the weekend and their trip has been a whirlwind "Best of Barcelona" tour. Or perhaps "Barcelona: the good life." They got here Friday evening and the first place we went was Sagrada Familia, since it is right by (literally 1 block away) from our apartment. We had tapas at Cerveceria Catalana. (Making my third visit in one week, but it is just too good a place for any Barcelona visitor to miss it, and obviously I did not mind going again.) 

On Saturday we got up and had coffee and croissants at the bakery next door to the apartment, Supan. We then went to Plaça Catalunya, Plaça de l'Angel, and La Rambla. We spent a lot of time at the Boqueria picking out jamón ibérico and three kinds of cheese. After the Boqueria we went back to the apartment to change for lunch at Cinc Sentits. This is a very posh restaurant where we had an 8 course tasting menu. It was fabulous--easily one of the top meals of my life. We were there for 4 hours and had wine with every course, so all of us were buzzed the entire afternoon. We had great conversations and it was a super experience. I took pictures and when I can, I will post a full review on the blog. 

After that we went to the Arc de Triomf and walked down the promenade to the Parc de la Ciutadella and UPF (my university in Barcelona). We walked to the Frank Gehry fish at Ciutadella Vila Olímpica and along the beach, stopping at the Princesa 23 drink stand. It was a lovely evening but Ba was pretty exhausted and we headed home from there. We had our ham and cheese from the market with a baguette from Supan and drank champagne from the Duty Free to celebrate Barça's trouncing of Real Madrid. There were people celebrating the team's victory into the wee hours of the morning.

Sunday we had a bit of a late start, repeating our café con leche and croissants routine. We went to the Cathedral, where since it was Sunday a large group of people was gathered dancing the Sardana, or traditional Catalan dance. It is like a Greek wedding dancing-in-a-circle sort of thing. The Cathedral was free so we went and explored the cloister, where there is a sort of garden with geese and fountains surrounded by individual chapels. We got gelato in Plaça Sant Jaume.

We walked from there to Plaça Reial, where there was a market--or junk sale--being held. The weather all weekend was perfect and sunny. We then went to the Museu Picasso. Since I'd already been twice, they went ahead (they got in free since it was the first Sunday of the month) and I wandered down the Passeig del Born to the Parc de la Ciutadella. It was the same walk I had taken two weeks before when all my study abroad pals were still here, and it made me very nostalgic. 

I met back up with my dad and Ba and we walked around Santa María del Mar and had lunch at Taller de Tapas. We went back to the apartment, then my dad and I went to a concert at the Palau de la Música Catalana. The building is really stunning and it was a wonderful experience. It was somewhat randomly the Ukraine Symphonic Orchestra. Ba had a night in experimenting with rioja, tonic and oranges to make her own sangría.

Tomorrow morning we will pick up the rental car and drive to Valencia. From there we are going to spend a day in Alicante, a day in Granada, and finally fly back to the U.K. from Málaga on Thursday. A few days in Sussex and London, and then my dad goes back Tuesday and Alex arrives to travel with me for two weeks. It is going to be great! 

"Single Ladies" and Sangría

The last day of Liz, Evelyn, Kathleen, and Julie's visit was really fun. We got up, had our coffee and packed, and headed to the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, where we got a very good idea of what the Modernisme versus Noucentisme movements are and how cool Ramon Casas is. (Well, I can only speak for myself I suppose.) From there we went to Cerveceria Catalana, since Ev and Kathleen had not been there, and it was just as good as ever. The bacon, date and cheese flauta is pretty much the perfect sandwich. 

After lunch we went to Casa Milà, or La Pedrera, the Gaudí apartment building on Passeig de Gràcia. I am glad that I got to do all the touristy stuff that I wanted to do before while these gals were visiting. We spent our evening hanging out, eating some more manchego cheese, watching funny YouTube videos (and attempting to learn the dance to Single Ladies--one of my still unrealized goals in life), and preparing ourselves for waking up at 5 a.m. the next morning.