Traveling the Costa Brava: An Eating Tour
Fresh caught seafood, dream-worthy picture-perfect beach towns, flight delays, no air conditioning, confiscated jars of honey – ah the delights and perils of traveling through Europe.
I am at the tail end of a trip to the Costa Brava – most notably to Cadaqués. I’m writing this sitting in the Perpignan Airport, a tiny shoebox of an airport with just two flights in and out a day. Getting to the Costa Brava was easy enough; my friend Alabama and I traveled on a short one-hour flight and drove a rental car an hour and a half just over the French border into Spain.
Having spent all of 48 hours in Spain prior to this trip, I was excited to explore the food and beaches, but also eager for a bit of warmth after a few particularly cold, rainy, and dark months in Paris (I promise I’m not complaining about my life in Paris, just a very Vitamin D-deficient gal!). We chose to stay for part of the trip in a small town inland called Palau-Saverdera which proved to be an excellent home base for three days of hiking, swimming, driving the coast, and most importantly eating (duh). We then drove to Cadaqués for the remainder of the trip to stay near the water and explore one of the Costa Brava’s most beautiful hidden gems. Cadaqués is the type of quintessential place that comes to mind when you hear “European Summer” – pristine, aquamarine coves for swimming and tanning, picturesque white-washed apartments seemingly built into the arid, rocky hills, and drool-worthy coastal Spanish tapas.
We spent the majority of the trip contemplating our next meal – a specific type of anxiety that happens when your sole focus on vacation is to eat. The Costa Brava did not disappoint, and we left Spain unimaginably full.
Some favorite bites from our trip:
Tuna tartare quenelles with avocado and tobasco
Chocolate profiteroles (obviously not Spanish but delicious nonetheless)
A truffle butter candle (!) with warm bread rolls
Tuna and caper “cannelloni” with Mediterranean sauces
Bacalao cod fritters with a honey foam (best bite I have had in months)
Cod and potato stew in a garlicky broth
Sea bass with herb butter and spring veggies
The specific combination of chocolate, coconut milk, and apricot/ginger gelato (a giant scoop of each flavor, in a huge cup – no, we did not share –yes, we each got our own thanks for asking – and yes we ate this for dessert every night of our trip).
All in all, the trip was amazing, and the Costa Brava proved itself to be an unexpected culinary hub. If you ever find yourself in this region, here is a list of recs for where to eat:
Compartir (best meal we had, Michelin star resto with unpretentious food)
Joia (best gelato I’ve ever eaten in my entire life)
Love you lots, thanks for being here! Until next time,
Ava
