What a pity that some great restaurants in Barcelona are hiding in places that are not very Barcelona. This is the case of Batea, probably one of the best seafood restaurants in Barcelona (certainly, at least, the most contemporary), which is housed in a hotel on the corner of Gran Via and Rambla Catalunya, somewhat hidden from view, but hiding in turn that , a contemporary seafood restaurant of pleasant premises where it is achieved as in few places the encounter that makes the seafood restaurant (serve top quality product almost intact) and haute cuisine (create dishes that make us forget the products that compose it to remember the final creation).
The place, which avoids the traditional baroque style of this type of business, does not warn of the quality of the elaborations. Molluscan shellfish is the example: clam in a delicate Verde sauce, razor clam with codiem emulsion, carneiro with gilda dressing. The product almost only with a touch of mastery. The langoustines with lourdes water, tasty like few other dishes, too.
But there are few dishes to define the place as the ravioli of Galician stew that swims in a suquet de peix and arrives with a raw white shrimp, a delicious dish that is the perfect summary of the essence of this restaurant: Galician-Catalan spirit with the taste of the sea as protagonist and the naked product, that white shrimp, as emblem.
Everything on the menu is appetizing, and everything is ephemeral, because here we work with the catch of the day (the cook hooked to his cell phone talking to the fishmonger) to ensure fresh products that allow us to adapt the elaborations to the available product. A great place to celebrate in a seafood restaurant style… but not a seafood restaurant.
Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes, 605, Pl. Baja, Eixample
60 -80€