If you like good food, go to Barcelona.

While they don’t serve paella as much as Cataluña as in the rest of Spain, there is something delicious: tapas.

Before we left Barcelona for the holidays, two friends and I decided to go to a tapas place.  It’s a great way to eat–everyone orders a few dishes and you end up with a table full of little plates of food.  Armed with a fork (and some nice wine), you try everything.  It’s my favorite way to eat good, good, good, good food.

grilled duck with spongecake

This was the perfect tapa: small, fancy and creative.

Galician-style grilled squid

chicken skewer with house brown-sauce

pan con tomate

It wouldn’t be a complete meal in Cataluña without pa amb tomàquet (bread with tomato).  It’s healthy, delicious and simple to make–here’s my recipe.

Galician style grilled octopus

This was delicious–lots of paprika and a nice peppery flavor.  Served with potatoes and drizzled in olive oil.

padrón peppers

These little guys are fried and salted padrón peppers.  They don’t pack much heat, but their refreshing crispy saltiness help clean your palate in between tapas.

The meal we all shared was wonderful!  And it was classic-Spanish: when the meal was coming to a close we looked at our watches and noticed over two hours had passed.  Enjoy eating!

But, good food wasn’t only “out.”  I had some good/interesting/creative food at home, too.

These were served as supper in my homestay.  Having eaten escargot only one other time in my life, I thought a picture would be appropriate!something delicious for dessert

This is absolutely my favorite dessert ever—one day my host mother had bought some peaches that weren’t very good.  After saying “Estes melocotones no valen nada” (These peaches aren’t worth anything) her solution was chopping them up, sprinkling sugar on them, and covering them with wine.  After soaking up the sugar and wine for about 20 minutes, the peaches that no valen nada were delicious and soft!