This Saturday I got to go to a "calcotada" - a traditional Catalan meal. We took a bus(myself and some other architecture students along with a bunch of the language and culture students here) out from the city to a park. It was nice to get out of the city and get some fresh air! I hadn't realized how few parks there actually are in the center of BCN. The drive out was nice - went through a pretty little village with some pretty ornate villas. We arrived an hour before our reservation at the restaurant so went for a little hike in the hills and made it to a small petting zoo where all of my new city dwelling friends were very excited about the emu. It's been raining for the past couple of days so everything was pretty muddy, but still, nice to get out! Below is the view from the zoo at the end of our hike. See, no buildings!
Once we got back to the restaurant they sat us all along these big tables, each seat had a big bib on the chair and plastic gloves and wet wipes ready for the feast. We snacked on some yummy olives and chips til they brought out the calcotes, they're kind of like big green onions. They had cooked them all until they were blackened and you had to hold the calcote in one hand while you took the other and pulled off the outside layer and roots, then you dip the white part of the onion in a special sauce and eat it! It was really fun and interactive. They also served wine in a really funny looking thing. You can kinda see the calcotes in this picture of Laura below. I was too busy eating to take more pictures :)
After the calcotes they brought out tons of other courses - some sort of bean dish and some patatas fritas (french fries), some toasted bread w/ tomatoes and garlic to rub on top, they eat that everywhere here, it's really yummy and I forget what it's called. There was also this whole platter of different kinds of meats. I wasn't feeling too adventurous and was already really full by that point so I just had a little sausage and chicken. We think there was some blood sausage and rabbit meat there too, nobody was really sure. Then there was some delicious flan-type stuff for dessert and more alcohol and coffee. I believe I'm forgetting a salad in there too and some cooked vegetables? It was enough food for the entire day, for sure, and took 3 or 4 hours in all. If anyone comes to visit, we should go check it out again!
I'll update more later about classes and my host family, etc. It's time for dinner now!
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