Fifty metres down the road from El Celler de Can Roca is a Honda garage, on two sides of the restaurant are car parks and elsewhere in the neighbourhood, it is as far as we can tell, nondescript housing. Put another way, the venue itself is nowhere special, an ordinary suburb of Girona, but as a restaurant, as we were soon to find out, it's a place that serves very special food indeed.
The venue is worth noting because it is a trait that all the top restaurants seem to share: Costa Brava neighbour El Bulli is in the middle nowhere and totally inaccessible, Noma may be in Copenhagen but it's not even in the fashionable part (to the extent that Copenhagen has one) and The Fat Duck is in Bray; not a Manhattan or Mayfair in sight.
The most likely explanation is that property rental values in the most fashionable parts of the most fashionable cities result in restaurants that are more inhibited, forced to play a safer hand because they have to guarantee a full service every night to balance the books at the end of the month. Admittedly, even out of town, a restaurant has to make money to stay in business but with a lower break even point seems to come the freedom to operate the restaurant to an ideal rather than follow the commercial imperative.
The other factor about lower property rents in less fashionable areas is that space is less of a premium which means that restaurants can occupy more square footage which in turn has huge implications not only for the diner but also the kitchen. Think of those Parisien restaurants and how closely the tables are squashed in. Even the Mayfair restaurants are, for commercial reasons, required to have you sitting really quite tightly together; in Girona, this simply isn't an issue. In fact, the space that Can Roca operates from is nearly as stunning as the food itself and significantly enhances the overall experience.
From the outside, it's difficult to visualise the restaurant. There's some wood panelling around an entrance to an alleyway that leads us to somewhere and there's a long wall decked in climbing greenery that prohibits a better look at what's inside. From the back, we can see above the wall the top of a grand house against a backdrop of a brilliant blue sky but it doesn't prepare us for what's inside.
Heading up the alley we're totally excited and on reaching the top, find ourselves in the courtyard of the building. On our left hand side is the old house that we saw peeking above the wall, to the right is a single story ultra modern glass and stone construct and connecting them is more of the wood panelling of the type seen earlier. It's not clear where the door is and we wonder if we've strayed into their back garden rather than the restaurant. The wood panelling looks our best bet and we make our way over; we find the door.
The place has a sense of calm to it and radiates that to its guests. There's almost no one around, even inside the restaurant, and we wonder if we've got it wrong and they're closed or something. No, they're expecting us and show us to our table. Despite the fact it's 1pm, we're the only guests in the restaurant, it's totally weird.
The venue is worth noting because it is a trait that all the top restaurants seem to share: Costa Brava neighbour El Bulli is in the middle nowhere and totally inaccessible, Noma may be in Copenhagen but it's not even in the fashionable part (to the extent that Copenhagen has one) and The Fat Duck is in Bray; not a Manhattan or Mayfair in sight.
The most likely explanation is that property rental values in the most fashionable parts of the most fashionable cities result in restaurants that are more inhibited, forced to play a safer hand because they have to guarantee a full service every night to balance the books at the end of the month. Admittedly, even out of town, a restaurant has to make money to stay in business but with a lower break even point seems to come the freedom to operate the restaurant to an ideal rather than follow the commercial imperative.
The other factor about lower property rents in less fashionable areas is that space is less of a premium which means that restaurants can occupy more square footage which in turn has huge implications not only for the diner but also the kitchen. Think of those Parisien restaurants and how closely the tables are squashed in. Even the Mayfair restaurants are, for commercial reasons, required to have you sitting really quite tightly together; in Girona, this simply isn't an issue. In fact, the space that Can Roca operates from is nearly as stunning as the food itself and significantly enhances the overall experience.
From the outside, it's difficult to visualise the restaurant. There's some wood panelling around an entrance to an alleyway that leads us to somewhere and there's a long wall decked in climbing greenery that prohibits a better look at what's inside. From the back, we can see above the wall the top of a grand house against a backdrop of a brilliant blue sky but it doesn't prepare us for what's inside.
Heading up the alley we're totally excited and on reaching the top, find ourselves in the courtyard of the building. On our left hand side is the old house that we saw peeking above the wall, to the right is a single story ultra modern glass and stone construct and connecting them is more of the wood panelling of the type seen earlier. It's not clear where the door is and we wonder if we've strayed into their back garden rather than the restaurant. The wood panelling looks our best bet and we make our way over; we find the door.
The place has a sense of calm to it and radiates that to its guests. There's almost no one around, even inside the restaurant, and we wonder if we've got it wrong and they're closed or something. No, they're expecting us and show us to our table. Despite the fact it's 1pm, we're the only guests in the restaurant, it's totally weird.
As we're shown to our table we are totally blown away by the restaurant dining area, it's like nothing we've seen before. It comes back to what we've already discussed on space - they've got it, a lot of it, and they've used it well. This modern wing attached to the old villa has clearly been purpose built and combines simplicity of design, sense of purpose and harmony of integration. You feel the space could be many things, a health spa perhaps, a wing of the Museum of Modern Art, a top end design studio, but as a restaurant dining area, it stands alone in our experience.
The shape needs to be considered first. It's triangular with a central atrium where silver birch trees grow with the interior space being the three sides of the triangle enclosing the atrium. Of these, two are given over to the restaurant and one to an after dinner lounge area. The triangle shape lends itself to a single main pathway hugging the glass wall of the atrium with the tables lining a larger strip that hugs the exterior walls. No more than two tables are in proximity without a waiter station between them. The totality of this makes for a brilliant dining concept: huge spacious tables for the diner, privacy of your area without blocking the atmosphere from the restaurant, the main walk way set apart from your table so that waiters are never brushing by you as they deliver the orders and the proximity and quantity of the waiter stations means that staff can do their job in the most efficient manner possible rendering service completely unobtrusive.
The shape needs to be considered first. It's triangular with a central atrium where silver birch trees grow with the interior space being the three sides of the triangle enclosing the atrium. Of these, two are given over to the restaurant and one to an after dinner lounge area. The triangle shape lends itself to a single main pathway hugging the glass wall of the atrium with the tables lining a larger strip that hugs the exterior walls. No more than two tables are in proximity without a waiter station between them. The totality of this makes for a brilliant dining concept: huge spacious tables for the diner, privacy of your area without blocking the atmosphere from the restaurant, the main walk way set apart from your table so that waiters are never brushing by you as they deliver the orders and the proximity and quantity of the waiter stations means that staff can do their job in the most efficient manner possible rendering service completely unobtrusive.
As for design aspects, we wouldn't be surprised if the whole place had been a giant experiment in Feng shui, and more remarkably, one that had in fact worked. The trees in the atrium area are of course nourished by soil that gives rise to a natural brown 'carpet'. But then, as you sweep your eyes from the outside in, the hardwood floors pick up the brown and the scheme runs yet further with actual brown carpets under the tables which means the continuity of colour unifies the outside and inside to a single space. And with the colour schemes of natural wood, bright white, and flashes of green from the internal atrium and the external wall climbing plants, not to mention the significant effect of sunlight that the open design allows, the whole place has the feeling of a relaxing and natural retreat.
Before we move to the food, a quick word on the wine lists just because this in itself was amusing. So substantial are the two books that make up the wine list (one red one white of course) that they are not carried over to the table but wheeled over because of their weight. Our own choice of wine was simplified by ordering the tasting menu and therefore we opted for the suggested paired wines but it was fun seeing the books just the same.
Part 2: snacks
Before we move to the food, a quick word on the wine lists just because this in itself was amusing. So substantial are the two books that make up the wine list (one red one white of course) that they are not carried over to the table but wheeled over because of their weight. Our own choice of wine was simplified by ordering the tasting menu and therefore we opted for the suggested paired wines but it was fun seeing the books just the same.
Part 2: snacks
