Across the road, if you could even call it a road, more like a large path with cars, bikes and pedestrians all fighting for its use. Well, across from our apartment, literally, a couple of metres from the front door was a craft beer bar. Fantastic for us but with one very annoying problem, it never seemed to be open.
Morning, noon, early afternoon (siesta time) evening and even at night, it was never open. The 'graffed' up shutters remained permanently shut throughout the Earths daily orbit of the sun and seemingly the moons orbit of the Earth.
Beginning to lose faith that it would never open, we almost gave up on it. In actual fact I don't even know if the others really cared about it, perhaps it was only my little heart that was aching.
After nearly a whole day walking around Barcelonetta searching for some decent tapas, it was like we'd been walked all day long in the blistering sun, through narrow streets, past the sweetest smelling doorways and windows. Finally our search for food was over, our hunger being teased by a few morsels of food, lots of little plates with bits and bobs on. Looking barely enough to fill even a child let alone a group of fully grown adults ravaged with starvation.
Every single bite however small was received with delight by all, such simple things like Padron peppers fired until almost charred and bursting and then sprinkled with sea salt before serving. Deep fried baby squid in a deliciously seasoned batter, crispy, salty and with incredible strong flavours of the ocean. There were these plain looking olives in a jar of dense cloudy liquid with a slightly red tint, I can tell you they were certainly not plain olives, they packed so much flavour it was unbelievable. An explosion of flavour in the mouth, the odd one had a subtle and creeping kick of chili, like a ninja hiding in the shadows, it snuck up and slapped you on the tongue with a burning blow. If it were a cold and damp day one could possibly see steam jetting out of ones ears, like in the cartoons.
Everywhere does this differently, but the bread. The bread, simple bread, none of that fancy 'sourdough' or 'rye' stuff. Lightly toasted, rubbed with fresh sun drenched tomatoes and olive oil, seasoned with a little salt and pepper. It was beyond amazing. Unfortunately the bread in this place we ate was a slight disappointment. The rest of the food was probably the best that we'd had but the bread was burned and had barely any flavour, flavour strong enough to mask the carbon taste.
Apart from the bread all the other little bits were amazing, so bloody good.
On the way back to our apartment, I suddenly got a craving for beer. Which isn't than unusual but with only Estrella Damm in the fridge, I wanted to venture to new pastures and try one of the many craft beer establishments that Barcelona has to offer.
Trying to organise three other not particularly like minded men was a challenge to say the least. In actual fact it was an epic failure. My dreams of drinking even the smallest sip of a fancy little Spanish craft beer had been crushed.
A couple of hours passed, we'd all showered, one of the group had left to check out a band that were on earlier than we could all be bothered to get to the festival site. It was about an hour train ride from where we were. The fridge was now empty of beer, I'd eaten my fill of jamon, queso and papas fritas. It was time to leave.
In need of a refreshing palate cleanser, something sharp, with tang and bite, something with acid to cut through all the fat in my gut. I went for a little treat 'Calypso' a Berliner Weisse from Siren, England. I know, English beer in Spain at s Spanish craft beer bar. I made that worse when I ordered 'My Antonia' an Italian Imperial Pils. Seeing it on tap I just could not let that opportunity go. Not knowing if I'd ever see it again, ordering the best Imperial Pils in the World most definitely had to be done. After drinking so much crap piss poor beer, these were a real delight.
After they'd finished with 'Antonia' and I on my tart little princess, we all had a half of some very sepcial beer with a name that didn't quite make sense. 'As Bastard Joker', an Imperial/Double IPA of incredible bitterness and a stratospherically high abv of 11.1%. Not the strongest beer I've ever tried but still damn strong and damn fine. My first 10%+ IPA and it was a right old treat.
Sipping on some fine beer is a wonderful way to get pumped up for a long night of banging tunes, dancing and having to deal with crap beer.
Can't seem to find a website but these guys have Twitter and the bar is number 22 here...
bestbarseurope
The place to find joking bastards
ascervesa
sirencraftbrew
birradelborgo
Click here on on 'Antonia' to read a post about some great Italian craft beers including My Antonia
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