The Talking Suitcase

We spent 2 weeks in Costa Brava and dined on some of the most incredible food – EVER!

Costa Brava  covers 2,272 square miles and is comprised of many different villages.  Each village offers a unique coast and gastronomic experience for tourists.  It’s not surprising that many of the dishes come from the sea, but the greater Catalunya area is also famous for vegetables, beef and wine.  This gives the chefs plenty of local ingredients as a palette from which to create their culinary masterpieces.

We visited the seven Official Family Holiday Destinations along the coast and ate at a restaurant in every village and sometimes two. Each restaurant has the Family Tourist Destination seal of the Catalan Tourism Agency, so you know that the restaurants you wish to dine at welcome children, have children’s menus and have highchairs for the little ones.

Now, that is not to say these restaurants are like Red Robin in the states, teaming with screaming toddlers.  All of these restaurants would be perfect for singles or a couple.  They all just welcome children and make accommodations for families.

Best Places to Eat in Costa Brava, Spain:

I initially intended to do one large post and write about all seven of the restaurants at which we dined.  As it turns out, that made for an extremely long article.  Click the links below to read a dedicated article on each restaurant.   Be prepared, you will be drooling after reading the first one!

El Ventall Restaurant in Blanes

We started our culinary journey from the Southern most village of Costa Brava in Blanes.  El Ventall Restaurant is conveniently located between Blanes and Lloret de Mar serving high quality food using seasonal, local ingredients.

Read all about our experience at El Ventall Restaurant in Blanes.

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Restaurant Sódemar in Roses

For the last meal of our Costa Brava food extravaganza, we dined at Restaurant Sódemar in Roses.  Roses is the Northern most village that is part of the Costa Brava family holiday destinations.  Keep a look out for the “Family Tourism” logo displayed in the entrance of establishments.  You know these locations have services that are especially designed with families in mind.  It just makes traveling with kids a little easier!

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Restaurant Sódemar is located at the water’s edge in the village of Roses.  It’s the perfect location for dining with a view. If you have a boat, you can dock at the pier and enjoy a waterside meal.

We were treated to a superb meal and an excellent wine selection as we concluded our culinary journey.  We learned all about the local food and libations and were were given a lesson on cooking paella as we watched the chef prepare our meal.

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Camping Les Medes in Estartit

Dinner at a campground?  Say it ain’t so.  No, it’s not like the US.  We weren’t served BBQ chicken, hot dogs or hamburgers.  The food was amazing and didn’t include even one squirt of ketchup.

Camping Les Medes is a family run campground.  We dined with the son while his mother prepared and served our meal.   We didn’t get to explore the grounds, BUT they had a giant chess board outside that the kids thought was awesome!

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Restaurant Guillermo in Sant Antoni de Calonge

We are now on day 3 of our Costa Brava tour.  After a bike ride and wine sampling at a local vineyard, we headed to lunch at Restaurant Guillermo.

Guillermo is located right along the promenade overlooking the water in Sant Antoni de Calonge.   We were able to gaze out the window at the beautiful sea vista, and watch Lucy play and take photographs when she needed a break from the table.

Restaurant Guillermo has been a family run restaurant for over 25 years.  You can sense how much the family enjoys running the restaurant just by watching the interaction with guests.  The daughter breezed in while we were finishing up lunch, stopping by tables and chatting excitedly with patrons.

Lunch started with another round of fantastic appetizers.  By this point, I was probably up about 3lbs. I’m an optimist!

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We had two types of calamari, both cooked to perfection.  My favorite dish was the little clams called coquinas.  YUM!  I even surprised my husband my munching on the little fried fish, sonsos.   Prawns and a green salad rounded out our first course.

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