It is not exaggerated to say that Barcelona is a Mediterranean food paradise. If you are into cooking you will probably go crazy at Mercat de la Boqueria, seeing all the fresh produce - from healthy vegetables and juicy fruit to the freshest seafood straight from the sea. You will wish you had stayed at an apartment with fully equipped kitchen rather than at a hotel. However, worry not. There is plenty of delicious food to be had at many excellent restaurants in Barcelona. In fact, you can start sampling the fresh seafood right there at La Boqueria: try Kiosko Universal for superb prawns and Galician octopus.
Apart from the seafood, such as calamari, baby squid, octopus, mussels and various fish, restaurants in Barcelona also offer other Calatalan delights, such as botifarra (grilled Catalan pork sausage), canelons (baked pasta with ground meat and béchamel sauce), conill all i oli (rabbit with garlic mayonnaise), estofat de vedella (veal stew), faves a la Catalana (stewed broad beans with bacon and botifarra), pollastre al cava (chicken with cava sauce) etc.
Vegetarians should not have any problems eating in Barcelona restaurants as there are always plenty of vegetarian choices available. Some Catalan vegetarian favourites include: calçots (large char-grilled spring onions), escalivada (grilled aubergine/eggplant, pepper/capsicum and onion), espinacs a la Catalana (spinach cooked with raisins and pine nuts), llenties guisades (stewed lentils) and pa amb tomàquet (bread, often grilled, rubbed with tomato, garlic and olive oil).
Last but not least, Barcelona is a perfect place for sweet-toothed travellers and coffee addicts too. Start a day with a potent cafe solo (espresso) or a tasty cafe con leche (coffee with milk, always full-fat, you can forget about skinny lattes in Spain), accompanied by pastries available from bakeries and cafes found almost around every corner. Another popular breakfast (or mid-morning or afternoon snack) is 'churros i chocolate', a deep-fried dough snack dipped in hot chocolate. Traditional Xocolaterias (chocolate bars) are usually tucked away on back streets of Barcelona. We found one almost next door to an excellent Hotel Guillermo Tell, where we stayed during our last visit of Barcelona. If you like sweets, don't leave Barcelona without trying crema Catalana, which is a Catalan version of crème caramel, with caramelised sugar topping.
Oh, and when in Barcelona, take a vacation from your diet too.
Barcelona restaurants opening times
Most touristy restaurants in Barcelona are open all day, but you wouldn't want to munch on an inferior paella surrounded by hordes of tourists, would you? If you wish to sample good local food in Barcelona, stay away from Las Ramblas and Gotic Quarter and head to parts of the city further afield. Try to eat at local places, but keep in mind that most restaurants are only open a few hours for lunch (say 1-4 pm) and dinner (say 8pm-midnight). Opening hours vary among the restaurants so check if they are open before turning up. The locals, including restaurant owners, flee Barcelona in August to escape the summer heat, which leaves many restaurants and small private shops shut for a month.