For a long time Disfrutar has been my all time favourite venue, and, to me, defined what all top end dining should aspire to. I have made an annual pilgrimage to worship at the pass since it first opened its doors in 2014. The day after my first visit it was voted the best new restaurant in Europe. It is now rated the best in the world. It is the flagship restaurant of Mateu Casañas, Oriol Castro and Eduard Xatruch, originally heads of development at El Bulli, Ferran Adrià’s legendary place in Roses on the Costa Brava. Alongside Adrià they gave birth to the molecular gastronomy movement or at least were the midwives.
Every Michelin stared restaurant now features spherification, usually in the form of a seemingly huge olive that bursts in your mouth with a flood of peppery olive oil or tiny little ‘caviare’ flavoured with some exotic fruit or whatnot. This all began in El Bulli. These chaps were in from the off and this is what you get in Disfrutar: Culinary magic tricks, grand gestures and amusing theatrics but never at the cost of undermining the taste. It is fine dining after all.
A bowl of black beans is shaken and out float little beetroot flying saucers. The fresh red and green peppers are actually of chocolate. Sweetcorn kernels have been painstakingly reconstructed, each one liquefied inside. You are invited to delve into a box of dry ice to see what you can discover hidden beneath the swirling mist. A white bread sandwich is really meringue. I could tell you more but I fear it may diminish your experience.
This is high table dining as performance art and you are part of the play, not stuck in the gods in your stuffed shirt. No tragedy here but a lot of drama fused with a light comedy, the waiters showmen, guiding your way through the script that has come from the kitchens. You wonder if one of them will be sawn in half as a finale.
Yet this is still a restaurant way ahead of the field. Upon arrival you are led through to the open plan kitchen where you are introduced to whichever head chefs and his team have time to pause with a good-hearted greeting. The service is warm, well informed and courteous. The front of house are true professionals and many have been there since the off. You are led to your table where your waiter introduces themselves by name. You are told to make yourselves at home and you feel that they genuinely mean it.
A friend recently visited twice within a fortnight The first time he was with his glamorous business partner, but all very innocent. A couple of weeks later he took his beautiful girlfriend. He was slightly put out that he was not acknowledged by the staff having previously got on quite friendly terms. However as soon as the lady took a bathroom break, the maître d’ shot over and greeted him whole-heartedly. He had obviously been concerned about putting his foot in it in case of indiscretion on my friend’s part who found it hysterical but admirable. That is the sign of a true professional.
There are only two choices on the menu, the Classic or the more experimental Festival, either of about 32 courses. However they are very flexible and go out of their way to accommodate any preferences, dietary, allergenic or otherwise. The plates are spectacular with extravagant and often theatrical presentation yet without pretension and, importantly, taste simply wonderful. You are given no indication of what will follow. A menu of what each item was, along with the wines, will only be given to you at the end. This is how it should be, sensation seekers. Just believe that each course will astound, thrill and delight. Just get on board, strap yourselves in and let go. It will be an escapade of a lifetime.
A wine pairing of sorts is offered but I tried this once and found this just too over the top. Rather than a glass of something matched to each course there were seemingly random, although I was told carefully chosen, offerings of strange liquids, many of which not wine at all. Saki, Cider, liqueurs, sherry. Fair enough but I do need some good conventional wine to wash my food down. In the end we had to order a couple of bottles of reliable Provence Rose to keep us going. I quite understand that this is in keeping with the quirky nature of the place but sometimes you just need refreshment.
The main room is a joy to be in, full of light, reminiscent of the seaside where the chefs come from, looking out on to a large enclosed terrace where coffee and digestifs are served. Sadly during my last visit I noticed that they had exchanged the beautiful tiled table tops for plain white linen cloths. I cheekily suggested, strongly denied, that this was perhaps a bid for the their third Michelin star that they clearly aspire to. I am sorry that it has so far eluded them, they clearly deserve it, but curiously I think it is better without it.
I have been to the only two 3* places in Barcelona and they are soulless, sterile affairs. At Lasarte, when I dropped my napkin, a waiter picked it up with chopsticks then presented a choice of 7 identical replacements proffered on a silver tray. If this is what it takes I don’t need it.
At ABaC a junior sommelier outright refused to leave the bottle of wine on the table as I asked him to do so I could pour it myself. He said his boss would not allow it. I asked him just who he thought the was customer here and who was paying. Unperturbed he promised I would never have a dry glass. On the third time of waiting for a top up I just recovered it myself from where it had sat tantalisingly close and in full view. When he attempted to take it back I had to stab him with a fork. The second bottle was left where it should have been, at my fingertips. Don’t fight with the clients; they have an array of sharp implements to hand.
During lockdown, once established it wasn’t going away for a while, they produced a takeaway box of classics. When restrictions were finally lifted Rubén Pol, Disfrutar’s original Head Sommelier, brought a few of these to my restaurant for a private tasting with a few friends, alongside some premixed cocktails of his devising. Our chums, restaurateurs in their own right, complimented this extravagance with some very fine bottles of wine. That’s my idea of a ready meal. Still, not quite the experience of the real venue. I shall be back.
Disfrutar – Carrer Villarroel, 163, Barcelona 08036