When I looked up restaurants to visit in Barcelona before my wife and I traveled to the city for a friend’s wedding, one restaurant that kept coming up from “best places to eat in Barcelona” lists on the Internet was Besta. After the festivities at the wedding, we spent our last day in Barcelona (just like our other days in the city, we walked around for a bit before retreating to our hotel room due to extreme heat) and had our last meal at Besta with our longtime friend who joined us to attend the wedding. We had a lot to like about the seafood-focused menu from the restaurant led by two chefs coming from different regions of Spain (one in Catalonia where Barcelona is located and the other in Galicia which I have yet to visit but one day would love to).

Besta has two tasting menu options, both below €100 per person and seasonally changing depending on the availability of ingredients at the moment. We opted for the shorter Degustación menu consisting of three snacks, four savory courses and two desserts. The high level of ingredients’ quality was evident from the beginning, with the way Jun (who is more sensitive to shellfish freshness than I am) enjoying the giant clams and razor clams (both from Galicia) without hesitation; I was particularly a fan of the latter that came with Meunier sauce made with Codium seaweed that was just so on point with a glace of white wine that I ordered. The best dish from the night was the third snack, a simple-looking tomato tartare and homemade bottarga on top of pumpkin seeds cracker. If there is a miniature version of pizza that I could eat every single day, this would be it, with each bite so delightful that made me wonder if this restaurant should get into a pizza business.

The larger courses that followed had some really delicious dishes and others that were somewhat mixed. I liked the smoked bonito tuna with fennel jus and dill as well as blow-torched yellowtail with red bell pepper consommé; on the other hand, Jun felt that dep fried skate fish cheeks could’ve stood out on its own without the yeast Hollandaise sauce that somewhat undermined the fish’s flavor. The last savory dish was a playful surf and turf combination of white prawns and roasted chicken, with truffle supplements we opted into; our only minor complaint was a somewhat modest portion (perhaps we should’ve opted for the longer tasting menu). Between the palate cleanser of pickled apricot sorbet and the main dessert of kefir peanut sorbet with brownie and spicy toffee, we preferred the latter which, as our server explained, was a deconstructed version of Snickers.

Getting a reservation at Besta probably won’t be too challenging so long as you plan in advance; the dining room was nearly packed by the end of our meal. The stylish bistro dining space of the restaurant makes Besta an ideal place for a casual night out with friends and family. The wine list from Besta is another thing you should pay attention to if you are a wine lover. The wines come from all across Spain, several of them made with relatively unknown grapes from outside of regions that you would normally know like Rioja. Besta is another exhibit for why Barcelona is such a heaven for food lovers, with the kitchen doing great work with a simple formula of fresh ingredients and solid execution.

Address: Carrer Aribau, 106, 08036 Barcelona, Spain

KenScale: 8.0/10 (Jun’s Score: 8.0/10)

Website: https://www.bestabarcelona.com/

Reservation via Website