Inopia

Address: C/ Tamarit 104, Barcelona

http://www.barinopia.com

Phone: 934 245 231



If you ask me at this point which restaurant I absolutely recommend to eat in Barcelona, it would be none other than Inopia. Inopia is a modern tapas bar owned by El Bulli's dessert chef, Alberto Adria, who is also the famous Ferran Adria's younger brother.

Inopia is not a dessert place, nor is it a molecular gastronomy restaurant. What they served there are just damn amazing tapas. We went to the restaurant around 9pm, and waited at least one hour before we could be seated. Actually, we were offered to "stand" at the bar area in the restaurant, but keep in mind that most people stand and eat instead of sitting down at tapas bars like these. But I was really tired and lazy, so I grabbed two bar stools as soon as they are available! From the first tapas to the last (we ordered 10 dishes, including desserts), everything was absolutely amazing. Gan compared this place to another restaurant we Love in Paris call L'epi Dupin. We adore restaurants that serve AMAZING food at reasonable price, and L'epi Dupin and Inopia are that kind of restaurants.

If you go there, you have to order the croquetas (croquette) caseras de jamon Iberico, Pinchos chorizo with chimicurri sauce, gambeta friegida (fried shrimp) and the patatas bravas (fried potatoes). Best croquetas, best gambeta friegida and best patatas bravas we have eaten so far. Other dishes such as the ensaladilla russa (tuna salad), pincho moruno de cordeno (lamb skewers), lomo de atun la parilla con mojo (toro), "bomb" (huge minced meat croquette) are pretty good too.

Gan: My favorite dishes were the croquetas and gambeta friegida. Still need more research on the origins of croquettes as our experience has been limited thus far to Japanese style. But one thing we observed of the differences between the croquettes from these 2 cuisines (Spanish and Japanese) is there's no katsu sauce to accompany the Spanish croquetta. It's served straight up, just very nicely clean olive oil fried croquette with silky smooth potato puree & meat inside. The fried shrimp was similar to the Hong Kong style salt and pepper shrimp. Only they're probably fried with olive oil and the batter is lighter. I was actually a little pissed at the ladies next to us for not finishing it... how do you say "If you ain't gonna finish it, let me at it?" in Spanish? :-)

For dessert, we ordered the lemon sorbet and flan de huevo de la casa and gin & tonic with lemon. Very satisfying. I think we would have ordered more if Inopia wasn't closing that soon! ( the restaurant closes at 11pm).

Gan: This comment is for HC, my favorite gin and tonic mixologist back in NYC. Dude, you're in for some serious competition man! They're just that good. Who would've thought it's just such a common sense, why give small strips of lemon peel when you can give a whole avenue wide of it? Duh! And the final touch of shaved salt rock (??) was perfect.