Le Verre Volé

Le Verre Vole is super hip, super small and cozy with great good and a huge wine selection from the shelves that serve as a wine shop surrounding the tables.

The fish pate was so light and airy; could have eaten this all night.

A pretty, crunchy crab salad.

Sausage with creamy mashed potatoes.

Lamb brains fried in a light, crunchy batter.

Grilled hake in a delicious minestrone soup.

Le Fumoir

Le Fumoir in Paris may have the best brunch ever - in a dark, cozy room with the shades closed as not to wake anyone up too early, brunch was a feast of courses that left me wanting to go back to bed, starting with yogurt and pastries.

Next up were eggs benedict with a crunchy english muffin and thinly shaved jambon.

The best part is not having to choose between sweet and savory - after the egg course it was on to pancakes and waffles.

La Paradeta

The line starts outside La Paradeta before it opens; upon entering, you're greeted with a fresh fish market where you select which fish and how much you'd like; it's then weighed, sent to the kitchen and cooked, and you pick it up from a window as it's ready.

Fresh oysters.

Steamed mussels with tomato sauce.

I was sick and this soup was the cure - insanely good broth with mussels and tiny shards of pasta.

Razor clams with green sauce.

Almost too cute to eat baby octopi.

Monvinic

If you're going to Barcelona, go to Monvinic. The space is gorgeous, the cutlery brass, the food amazing. Amuse bouche of avocado gazpacho with crispy fish.

Truffled foie gras terrine with flowers.

Pumpkin soup with pumpkin crisps with chunks of pumpkin.

The lightest, most airy fried fish balls.

Cabbage stuffed with vegetables resembling the texture of ground beef in consomme.

The single best thing I ate: royal style hare. A 3-day preparation involving sous-vide, pancetta, foie gras, white truffles, blood sauce, and more white truffles resulting in the richest, most compact, concentration of meat.

Market fish with veggies.

Suckling goat with beans.

Grilled rockfish - the same fish the girl stepped on in The Blue Lagoon.

Pasta with mushrooms.

Veal with mushrooms and potato cake.

Lovely mango sorbet.

Chocolate mousse, with slices of chocolate, and chocolate crumbs.

A cloud of coconut goodness.

Tickets

Tickets, the tapas bar opened by the Adria brothers in Barcelona after the closing of El Bulli, is a fun, over-the-top theatrical dinner production, with the inventive food as the star.

With more inventive things to come, an intro of iberico jamon and perfectly crunchy pan con tomate was a simple start.

The famous non-olive olives: they look like olives, taste like olives, but deflate entirely upon entering your mouth, with pickled mini mussels.

Fish rinds, like really good pork rinds but fishy.

Paper-thin slices of tuna belly painted with iberican jamon fat and pine nuts.

Cloud-like pastries with manchego cheese.

A quail eggs "nest" with each egg coated in cheesy breadcrumbs.

Oysters with chicken juice and lime seeds.

Galician crab cannelloni with avocado as the shell, with sour cream.

Prawns in a box.

Tuna belly and roasted vegetables.

Clams in green sauce.

Razor clams with ginger sauce, cayenne pepper and lemon foam.

Beautiful bundles of squid with caviar.

The fun cooked mushrooms that arrive in a pouch.

Fried rabbit ribs...mmmm.

Chocolate cake with hazelnut spread and ultra cute mini strawberries.

Cheesecake and sorbet reversed - the sorbet is the yellow globe and the cheesecake the creamy white scoop.