Hispania: Beginning of a Love Story

I am not exaggerating.

If I choose one restaurant that I will eat at once a week in the foreseeable future I will not have a second thought: It will be Hispania, located in Arenys de Mar, about a 40 min. drive from Barcelona.

This is actually what Josep Viella, gourmet extraordinaire, does, who has also been my generous host in Barcelona last month.  He is certainly lucky to have access to this gem of a place in his backyard.

Hispania is almost the antithesis of what puts Spain on the map nowadays: molecular gastronomy. The cuisine of Hispania is neither chic nor faddish. Instead it is umistakeably a cuisine rooted in tradition and terroir: the best of Catalunya. The ingredients they use are not just first rate; they are extraordinary. Some of the dishes are not only very good, but the best examples of traditional dishes (such as crème catalana, butifarra sausage, tripe, Catalan style paella), and the cooking is extremely clean and focused, its sole aim being to highlight the superlative ingredients they use. Unlike some other Spanish high end restaurants, such as Can Roca or Mugaritz, which may as comfortably set up shop in, say, New York and London, Hispania is restaurant that can only exist in its place of birth.

And the Spanish know it. When I visit some Spanish multi-starred restaurants, such as Mugaritz, Berasategui and Akelare, I am often struck by the absence of local clientele.  More often than not, this is for good reason. Hispania is the opposite. They actually have a loyal clientele base  To them, this venerable Catalan institution, run by two sisters, Paquita and Lolita, may evoke the memories of childhood, that is, mom’s cooking on festive days, except that mom probably never achieved this level of consistency and did not have access to the same ingredients.

One problem in writing restaurant reviews is that one single meal, while sufficient to make a judgment, is often insufficient to reach a conclusion about a restaurant. I have often found that my second meal in a place that I was quite positive the first time was a relative failure. The converse of this statement, however, is not true. I have never been excited about a restaurant that left me cold the first time. Fortunately, we have had two meals at Hispania during our five day visit of Barcelona last month, so I have some confidence that my ultimate judgment reflects the underlying value of the restaurant.  In the review below, I am combining the dishes we have had in two meals as if they belong to one single meal.

However, I have one word of caution.  At the beginning of the meal you will be served the famous tomato bread (PA AMB TOMAQUET), that is traditional grilled bread rubbed with garlic, tomato juice and crystal salt. It is the best grilled bread on earth because the focacio-like bread that they use and the tomatos are both outstanding. One picture below shows about a third of the loaf baked in a local bakery (and the second picture is how it is served). At any rate, go easy with it. Don’t fill yourself up, as there are many more goodies to follow.

If you are seated in the cozy interior room, you will find that your table is already endowed with home made sausages of various kinds and marinated anchovies. The restaurant butchers a pig once a week, and all the sausages are homemade. The quality is very high and makes one feel like one is having a meal in an organic farm.

All this charcuterie is a very good match with the tomato bread. But before you have tasted them all, a new plate will be brought before you: PORK EARS.  They are crunchy and soft in texture, and gelatinous. If you like offals, you owe yourself the favor of tasting them in this restaurant.

One can then turn to lighter fare, such as tomato salad and baby artichokes. All kinds of vegetables actually are a showcase for the restaurant to demonstrate how vegetables tasted before the onset of agribusiness and modern agriculture. One can no longer taste such vegetables in the States and rarely finds them even in Southern Europe. The GANXET BEANS, which come with the tomato/onion salad, almost have no skin. To me, they are superior to the Paimpol beans at Gagnaire. The tomatos, even in mid-November, are full of flavor, and the onions are sweet. (I was told that the Montserrat tomatos whose season had ended are better.) The olive oil which is used in the salad (and in the tomato bread) is the 2006 harvest, bottled about two weeks before our visit. The grilled heart of baby artichokes, which follows this dish, are also evocative of forgotten tastes. While the whole world “discovered” sunchoke or Jerusalem artichokes, we seem to have forgotten, especially in the States (even in California) what artichokes are supposed to taste like. Well, they should not taste bland or sterile; they should have a pungent, slightly metallic taste which lasts after each bite. Here in Hispania, artichokes are tender and full of flavor.

Hispania prides itself for seafood dishes too, and for very good reason.

The SALMONETES (rouget) are super fresh. I prefer them from the Mediterranean rather than the Atlantic. They are fried perfectly; they come non-greasy but moist. The best way to eat them is with your hands.  If you shake them by holding the tail, you will see that the meat will separate from the bone. Chances are that they have not been refrigerated.

CHIPIRONES (baby calamar) a la plancha is equally fresh. What makes them particularly special is that the restaurant only uses calamar de potera, that is basically caught with a special instrument so as not to spoil the texture and taste. Some drops of the extraordinary olive oil and sea salt elevate this simple dish to the level of rare and delicious. They are as good as restaurant Lorenzo’s (in Forte dei Marmi) superlative version.

Hispania of course serves GAMBAS DE PALAMOS.  These are deep sea prawns which come from an area between Palamos and Denia. IMO, together with the Gamberi di San Remo, they are the most outstanding prawns on earth of which I know, very sweet and subtle in taste. When so fresh, they belong to the category of those rare flavors from the sea which have to be tasted to be believed. (Unfortunately they are much more expensive than other prawns. I saw them for 80 Euro a kilogram in the mercado in Barcelona.) I can swear that the prawns had been served within a day of being caught. They tasted even fresher than the ones we had at Etxebarri in the same trip. It is possible that never putting the prawns on ice was the basic difference between the Etxebarri version and this one. Of course gambas need to be grilled whole with the shell intact to preserve the juice. If you get to try them, I recommend that you also suck on the head.

If another great restaurant, such as the Etxebarri in the Basque country, brings prawns from Catalunya, then Hispania, in turn, imports a great ingredient from San Sebastian: the baby eels or ANGULAS. Actually Raimon, the son of Paquita, who works in the kitchen of Hispania, told us that they use the same supplier for angulas as ETXEBARRI. But, unlike Etxebarri, they don’t grill the angulas, but prepare them the traditional way, that is, cooked in an earthenware casserole with a little garlic and parsley. Either way, it is really a pity that angulas are so expensive and rare because they become an acquired taste, like jamon bellota, where one can only find the best examples in Spain and then understand what the fuss is all about.

LANGOUSTE or spiny lobster is also of very high quality in Catalunya. According to Raimon, the best example comes from Cap Creus where the water is cooler than Arenys de Mar. Raimon is brutally honest because he could have told me that the live langouste he brought to our table was from Cap Creus, but his honesty, a personal feature which is quite rare in the modern world, must also be coming from an upbringing in the family that has owned Hispania for more than half a century(I was told by Josep Viella that the mother of Paquita and Lolita was “una grand cuisiniere”). Clearly these family values, which are embedded in the restaurant, put a premium on no nonsense solidity and mutual trust, rather than PR, theater and glibness. At any rate the simply boiled langouste, which we devoured by dipping it in the super olive oil seasoned with freshly ground black pepper, was extaordinary (also a sauce romesco and homemade mayonnaise were brought to the table). Raimon then placed a small braised langouste in front of us to show the traditional preparation with potatoes, called a “suquet”. In this case the show stopper was the zesty potatoes which had absorbed the sweet taste of spiny lobster and stood in the forefront, while the langouste was relegated to the supporting position.  In a way this made sense, because, of all the products we had in Hispania, the small langouste was the only one that I will not call extraordinary. My best guess is that it was not a local product but was coming from the Balearic Islands and was semi-farmed,  like the small Maine lobsters which cannot be called wild. (But the langouste was still more interesting in taste than the quasi-farmed Maine lobster.)

I confess that I have never had a PAELLA in Valencia or Alicante as I have never been in these cities. So I never have had a great paella in my life, and the examples I had in Barcelona (such as in the restaurant Set Portes) have been disappointing. I am now converted to the cause after trying the Hispania version.  Clearly the rice is the main flavor in this dish which absorbs shellfish, vegetables, and some roast pork flavors. The saffron that is used in the dish is also of very high quality in Spain. This is another great traditional dish which may be among the most abused, like most traditional dishes nowadays. I have an inkling that they may have cooked the paella in the fireplace to acquire the extaordinarary taste, but I forgot to ask Raimon. We were all too intoxicated by its aromas and taste.

After meeting and enjoying the company of Josep Vlella, I am now thinking that traditional Catalunyan and Turkish hospitality have very much in common. One such feature is that, when you like something, you really want to share it with your guest. This is a type of generosity rooted in another romantic era, and, even if the harsh realities of the modern world so much shaped by global capital and labor mobility rule out romanticism, many good traditions still linger in Mediterranean countries. At any rate, I am thankful to Josep’s insistence on having me try two more masterpieces from Hispania: a beignet de morue (as good as Mikael Johnson’s homemade version) and a broth of bouillabaise soup.  While we could not have had Hispania’s celebrated bouillabaise that a group of Barca football club managers and their ladies were enjoying in an adjacent table, we got to taste the fish soup without the fish.  It was neither fishy, nor salty, nor too intense, just sweet and with a whiff of the sea. Next time, hopefully I will get to order a bouillabaise.

Up to this point, and if you are still bearing with me, you may conclude that Hispania is basically a seafood restaurant with good vegetables. This would be the wrong conclusion. Actually Hispania scores as high with meat dishes as it does with seafood, and we have tried quite a few to reach this conclusion.

For example, we tried the TRIPE with Chorizo. The tripes are well cleaned. They certaily smell like tripe, and they melt in the mouth with the right amount of spiceness/contrast provided by spicy sausage. Most importantly, the quality of the dish is betrayed by its light texture. It feels light and uplifting, unlike most tripe dishes one can try elsewhere. Tripe is certainly a well liked ingredient in Catalunya.

Or consider another traditional dish:  BUTIFARRA sausage, simply grilled and served with great fries. They are firm and moist at the same time. From now on, they will be the benchmark for me to gauge the quality of any grilled sausage, an ideal comfort food.

Another traditional meat that one can get the ultimate example in Hispania is CABRITO or baby goat. Simply roasted to perfection, its skin is glistening by the olive oil which penetrates the flesh.  I like the taste of goat, but having eaten it so many times, I am usually reluctant to order it. The goat has to be very young to taste good. When it is very good, it tastes more like young lamb. Otherwise it can develop a “goaty” aroma and stringy texture which is not too pleasant. Modern chefs often try to conceal the “goatyness” of older goat by  rendering the texture excessively soft by cooking it sous-vide and also by rubbing the skin with excessive spices and/or by covering it with sweet paste. This was not the case in Hispania. Here, like in other dishes, the main actor was the main ingredient. If you don’t like it, this means you don’t like the taste of baby goat. If you like it, it does not get better in taste.

Unfortunately, we had been so taken by the aroma which filled the room when the dish was served that we forgot to take a picture. The same thing happened when PORK FEET was served at the same time, which confirmed our earlier opinion reached after tasting the pork ears that Hispania excels in preparing all parts of pork. The pork feet dish was served with the bone, without any alteration or adulteration of the main ingredient. This is part of the restaurant’s philosophy about integrity, but it may be anathema to those who visit Spain and who eat only in Michelin two and three star restaurants. (Hispania has one star.)

Fortunately we did not forget to take the picture of another traditional dish: PILOTA I CARN D’OLLA.  This was basically a “pot a feu” or like a “bollito misto” which combines various ingredients, such as chicken feet, pork chops, pork cheek, veal chop, a meat loaf from pork, veal, bread crumbs and herbs (pilota), blood sausage, etc. I especially found the meat loaf and blood sausage outstanding. But what made the dish memorable for me was the quality of the condiments they served with it: the green cabbage and the garbanzo beans, espeically the latter. The small garbanzo beans virtually had no skin, and they tasted like they were from another bygone era. Raimon said that they come from a traditional farm in Extramadura. In all fairness, vegetables served in Hispania are on par with Bras and Passard.  At the same time Raimon thinks that it is getting harder and harder to procure them, as some of the farms from which they get their supplies are threatened by urban development schemes, and traditional farming methods are also being abandoned by the new generation farmers.

We also tried some very good desserts at Hispania, such as fraise des bois with frozen custard, an ethereal ile flottante, which will make any French chef proud, and quite good homemade vanilla sorbet. But the one dessert that should not be missed is their version of CRÈME CATALANA. If I am asked to choose between this and Robuchon’s crème brulee at Jamin, I will have a very hard time to choose….

So many rich offal and meat dishes in Hispania go well with the Rioja wines. I was very happy with the 2002 San Vicente, although I can see that some Priorat wines will also be a good match with the hearthy fare. The harder task is to match the seafood dishes. Albarino-based wines from Galicia are always an option, but I don’t think the more complex examples, such as Pazo de Senorans Seleccion, are available.  A wine from Rueda, such as Belondrade y Lurton, is always a possibility, but I think both this wine and the higher end examples of the chardonnay-based wines in Spain, are too much in the international style and lack complexity. Perhaps the best option is to stick with good cava and then switch to red wine. This is what most Catalunyans do anyway!

Hispania may as well be my favorite restaurant in Spain at this time.

Gastroville Ranking: 18.5 /20 (Vedat Milor-December 2006)