Can you imagine eating sitting at the top of the MNAC? Now, in fact, you can, because Absis, the new restaurant of the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya where you can find, as it could not be otherwise, authentic Catalan cuisine, has just opened in the viewpoint of the museum.
For us it is already, in fact, one of the great Catalan restaurants in the city (and one of the most beautiful) thanks, for example, to a mullet suquet that they prepare by cooking the mashed potatoes with the same broth of the fish, emulating those potatoes cooked in the same suquet that melt absorbing all the flavor of the fish.
Catalan dishes, Barcelona views.
The views sell themselves and it’s a pity because here they cook really well and maybe those views even cover it and it’s a pity too because it’s easy to end up cooking those great dishes for tourists.
They cook that, Catalan cuisine thanks to Albert Raurich, disciple of Ferran Adrià and chef of Dos Palillos and Dos Pebrots, one of the first restaurants in Barcelona to explore the gastronomic and historical heritage of the city, with its mythical lletons de porc, that dish served on an upside down pig, a tribute to the cuisine of the Romans when the city was born.
From these recipes, these restaurants, and that is why here Raurich has made a Mediterranean and Catalan menu, taking care to be consistent with the proposal and to refine the elaborations to elevate them. Hence the suquet mentioned and also the other star, the sea and mountain chicken and scallops, round. Hence also the sepionets a la bruta with aerial gnocchi, magnificent.
The other sign of coherence is the originality, which makes them prepare original recipes based on the Mediterranean without having to resort to the usual. Hence the escabeche of olives and grapes with orange blossom perfume, a coquettish detail to start the meal and take care of all the details, and hence also the coulant to finish that meal, made of carob, “the chocolate of the poor”, and that is one of the good ones we have tasted.
Regarding the price:35€ for the midday menu, which is very tempting, and 60€ for the tasting menu, which we think is a great option, given what we have seen. Although both options convince us. Even more so now that they are open at night, and you can enjoy it by candlelight and with the whole city at your feet.