El Bulli - Restaurant

agentundercover

Active Member
Ola amigos! have any of the spanish posters (or indeed anyone else) ever eaten at this place outside of Barca. It's meant to be the worlds best according to usual sources and if we can get a table for 2008 we are going to try it. Has anyone been here - would you ..i wont say reccomend as i am sure it amazing....but recomend it, given it is approx 150 euros before wine!?

cheers indeed:)
 
getting a table is, quite literally, a lottery. it is only open a few months a year and tables are allocated by a random draw. it is fully booked for 2007 already


it is though, as you say, reputed to be up there with that french laundry place in california as about as good as a restaurant gets.
 
getting a table is, quite literally, a lottery. it is only open a few months a year and tables are allocated by a random draw. it is fully booked for 2007 already


it is though, as you say, reputed to be up there with that french laundry place in california as about as good as a restaurant gets.

You should "ask" for a table a year in advance, and you only know which day you are going with a week in advance. It's only open at evening and it's 200 km away from Barcleona, near the french frontier.
It's supposed to be a real experience, but expect to pay between 200 and 300 €/persone depending on the wine
 
emailed them today - as you say, booked for 2007 already. I need to get back to them in October. 50% of tables are for 'our customers' - regulars I assume they mean, and 50% for those who are 'experiencing it for the first time'

Fingers crossed anyway!

Sample menu!!!

Snacks
Cucumber gin tonic* with candied citrus peel, prepared tableside with a jug of liquid nitrogen
Esferificación olives* (olive oil trapped in a soft casing to look like an olive)
Olive oil spiral*, which you loop around your index finger and drop in your mouth, where it dissolves into thin filaments
Mango leaf with tagete flower (a type of marigold)
"Animals": seaweed-flavored rice crackers with a fragile, moussy texture that reminded me of Monster Munches
Hibiscus, blackcurrant, and eucalyptus candy with a paper-thin sugar "cape"*
Sea lettuce and white sesame waffles
Freeze-dried banana crunches flavored with sesame and nutmeg*
Walnut polvorones ("polvorones" are traditional Spanish cookies -- these were savory, and had a buttery texture that turned to dust in your mouth)
Mandarine essence: a silky soup of mandarin with a hint of mango
Caramel filled with squash seed oil*
Popcorn cloud*
Melon and passionfruit caviar
Pine nut tart in a meringue shell
Thai brioche filled with a lemongrass and basil ice-cream
Crab fritter topped with an anemone*
Liquid ham croquette topped with breadcrumbs*
Tapas
Parmesan wontons in a chicken broth, plopped into a bowl of basil foam
Parmesan "air" (more like snow, really) in a styrofoam box, on which you sprinkled a freeze-dried berry muesli (this was our least favorite dish: there was too much of the Parmesan air, the texture wasn't particularly enjoyable, and the muesli seemed completely out of place)
A fillet of anchovy, surrounded with dots of variously and intensely flavored sauces and grape-like bubbles, and a crisp cardamom brioche on the side
Tomato soup with virtual ham* -- thin slivers of tomato-flavored jelly, and croutons topped with ham-flavored jelly and basil seeds
Mussel spheres in a potato and bacon soup, with dots of double cream, and cubes of apple jelly
Bread soup with egg yolk spheres and laurencia seaweed
"The seeds": tiny lumps and piles of various vegetable and herb seeds
Curry-flavored zucchini seed risotto with capsules of peanut oil*
Ackees (a Jamaican fruit) and cucumber hearts in a veal and basil broth
"The sea": a discovery trail of twelve different types of seaweed, some mild, some extremely bold in flavor
Crab Marrakech: lumps of crab meat in a mandarin flower broth, with bulgur on the side
Boneless chicken feet wrapped in sea lettuce with sesame sauce and froth*
Cheese and dessert
Creamy sheep's milk cheese topped with a sheep's milk cheese "wool", with a wedge of raspberry jelly on the side
Liquid peach: a frozen casing of peach liqueur, and a spoonful of thin peach purée
Raspberry sorbet, verbena mousse, and chocolate* (notice how the plating makes it look like a snail)
Peach soup
Mango sorbet sandwiches
Chocolate bites filled with mandarin sorbet*
 
I'm sure it is amazing, but not much on that menu really grabs me. :? :oops:
Maybe it's the way it's described, virtual ham?????
 
Actually maybe pointing out the virtual ham thing is not a good pointer from me as I eat lots of mock meats. :lol:
 
anyone who pays that kind of dollar for food is dumb in my book
(just as i am no doubt a pauper in theirs)

its the cnuts who have normal-ish jobs who go out their way to eat in such places as some kind of status symbol. ****in twhaaats!!!
 
it's the pacha principle. charge high prices to keep the beer monsters out, charge high prices and keep the burger monsters out.
 
its the cnuts who have normal-ish jobs who go out their way to eat in such places as some kind of status symbol. ****in twhaaats!!!


- nah, bit harsh phil - nothing wrong with aspiring to eat at the best restaurant in the world if your a fan of food - its not a status symbol just an experience. And i am neither a cnut or a twhaat!
 
anyone who pays that kind of dollar for food is dumb in my book
(just as i am no doubt a pauper in theirs)

its the cnuts who have normal-ish jobs who go out their way to eat in such places as some kind of status symbol. ****in twhaaats!!!


Anyone who pays 60€ to get in a club is dumb in my books :roll:

I don't think everybody should understand this kind of cuisine. There's people who will never enjoy anything else than the simple basic food, and there's others who can go further. Nobody is better than the other it's just a matter of tastes, priorities and what we call in spanish palate :roll:

I haven't been to El Bulli but I've been to several 2* restaurants. Everytime I had the sensation that the money payed was extremly well invested. As agentundercover said, it's not eating, it's not about feeding yourself, it's an experience in all senses, actually five senses are stimulated with the food.

I know there's loads of people who, like you and stephen, consider is a waste of money, but IMO, it's the same case with wine, if you can drink a red wine for 5€, why paying 150€? It's a silly discuission, at the end of the day there's nothing written about personal tastes
 
anyone who pays that kind of dollar for food is dumb in my book
(just as i am no doubt a pauper in theirs)

its the cnuts who have normal-ish jobs who go out their way to eat in such places as some kind of status symbol. ****in twhaaats!!!
Calm down everyone... I think Phil boy is just trying to bait you. Right, Phillip?
 
My friends went to El Bulli a year ago. They booked their holiday around this restaurant. They said it was a real experiance and loved it. Apparently you get you're own waiter, and they make all sorts of crazy things which although they sound revolting apparently are quite nice... like otter brains and larks tongues.

Personally I'd rather have a Steak
 
nah it was just a throwaway comment, perhaps a little bit of baiting. i really do not get it though. food is food in my book. i appreciate a nice meal and will pay a wee bit more for that, but the kind of prices these places charge are ridiculous (in my humble opinion). and you would never catch me spending over 20 bucks on a bottle of wine.

i rarely eat battered food actually, but that made me smile! i drink WAY too much Irn Bru though. Bit of an addiction, although Im weaning myself off it. Bottled water past two days and its going not too bad. And ive stopped taking proplus so complete lack of caffeine now!
 
have never tried one to this day. bleurgh.

now, deep fried half pizza. mmmmm. takes me back to my schooldays 8)
 
i rarely eat battered food actually, but that made me smile! i drink WAY too much Irn Bru though. Bit of an addiction, although Im weaning myself off it. Bottled water past two days and its going not too bad. And ive stopped taking proplus so complete lack of caffeine now!




Qué? 8O
 
irnbrucan1.jpg


and

proplus.jpg



is now off the menu

as are...

friedmars.jpg
 
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