Volcanic Valleys, Medieval Cities and More: Join us in Catalonia

Catalonia is making big waves in the food world, a feat considering it’s the size of Maryland. Sandwiched between the towering Pyrenees and coastal villages of the Mediterranean, this Spanish region is known for culinary traditions that blend the old world with the new. And on our trip to Catalonia—where we’ll taste our way through Barcelona backstreets, volcanic valleys, medieval Girona and bustling fish markets—we meet the chefs, families and producers whose mission is to further Catalan culture. You’ll uncover the culture and gastronomy many tourists miss, from tasting elegant Catalan-style breakfasts to walking through volcanic valleys famous for legume production to sampling ancient Arbequina olives straight from the press.

Are you tempted with a good time? We tapped expert insider and Catalonia trip leader Paula Morenza to pull back the curtains and dive deeper into this tour of culinary greatness. See you in Catalonia in May 2026?

Give us a primer on Catalan cuisine. What is it?

It’s a cuisine of the Mediterranean and the mountains. We have game, we have mushrooms, we have snails. A lot of elements came directly from the wild and agriculture. Traditionally, it’s very humble and rural, but modern evolution and innovation [introduced] contemporary cuisine. People coming down the mountain with a basket of mushrooms and arriving at a super chic restaurant [reflects] Catalonian cuisine. It can be very rich and very sophisticated with a lot of components. It also connects some French and Italian influences with its own idiosyncratic Catalonian uniqueness.

Someone asks for an elevator pitch on visiting Catalonia with Milk Street. Give us your best shot.

This area of Catalonia is absolutely amazing. It has a combination of elements that are pretty unique in the context of Catalan cuisine: the coast, the mountain and the city. We are going to see a contrast between the big city and the rural life. Everything belongs to the same system. Inland, we have a type of cuisine that’s more connected with the Pyrenees and another one that’s more related to dormant volcanoes of La Garrotxa. This region involves a type of volcanic soil—a kind of terroir, like wine—that produces amazing cheese and mostly legumes. The legumes are very creamy and the skin is very thin.

We will visit two bigger cities—Barcelona and Girona—from a culinary [perspective]. The idea is to give a general view of Catalan cuisine through all these different environments. In Barcelona, we start with a tour of the city to have an introduction to all these elements. Girona is beautiful and contains the most traditional part of Catalonian history. It’s important to be here to understand the real heart of the Catalan identity. We’re going to have a historic tour there [before visiting] Can Roca and El Celler de Can Roca, a major culinary project of Catalonia—and the world. That one is made by the Roca brothers, who own the famous Michelin-starred restaurant [of the same name].

El Celler de Can Roca blends family, Catalan tradition and innovation through many culinary landmarks throughout Girona. Does that speak to Catalonian culture?

We are going to be in contact with a few great culinary families. This sort of food started small, in the context of a house and a family. And now they have a whole multi-generational rise. In at least two generations, they made their familial passion grow and transform into a type of cuisine that has an international relevance. At Can Roca, we taste the cuisine the brothers inherited from their mother and are now reinterpreting. We also visit their “museum” to understand the relevance that goes beyond the restaurant: Girona has a huge impact thanks to these brothers. We finish up with a botanic tour with Esperit Roca’s in-house botanist around the garden. He’ll explain the landscape and the edible plants they use for the distillery or cooking. This is the “other side” of the trip. There is always this double connection: the human one and the territorial one.

We’re also visiting La Garrotxa’s volcanic area, where you’ll find a project of Martina Puigvert—the main chef of Les Cols, another Michelin-starred restaurant—between a mother and her daughters. You cannot put this project in any other place besides Catalonia. It’s something that you can’t reproduce. We actually want to explore specific elements that connect the environment, the cuisine and the social life that’s intimately connected with the kitchen. It’s not only about the business and how well they do. It’s more than that. It’s a very real relationship between these families and their environment and their cities. It’s something that is very authentic, very human and very powerful.

The tour starts in Barcelona. But rather than “tourist traps,” you take to the roads less traveled?

It’s not [always] about the patatas bravas and the paella. We want to go into the real history of Catalan cuisine—the real identity—that are important for the locals. Sometimes the information we transmit to tourists about Spanish cuisine is very generic; it’s a melting pot of everything. We try to put some light on this and identify what’s part of Catalan culinary legacy and heritage. What are influences from other regions? The idea is to connect the society with the neighborhood and the culture, and then taste it with the food that we eat. We try to look a little bit deeper, which is what we do in Gràcia Barrio.

Gràcia is a very special neighborhood. It has a combination of factors that make it perfect for us to tour and get an introduction to Catalan cuisine. Originally, it was a village that wasn’t inside the walls of Barcelona, so it was [impacted by] rurality. Then it became a proper village with factories in the 19th century, which created types of food businesses like masias and bodegas that were very important to the working class living there. While the working class was in Gràcia, the bourgeoisie was in Catalonia. All these factors gave the city its shape. In the case of restaurants, that means there are a lot of old-school businesses [run by] the same family for generations. But at the same time, we have also contemporary Catalan cuisine. The concentration of interesting bars and restaurants in Gràcia makes it the most interesting [neighborhood] of Barcelona. It’s not the touristic epicenter. The neighborhood is kind. It has public squares and plazas with terraces with their own personality. It’s very pedestrian. It’s very walkable.

The next day in Empordà calls for exploring vineyards with indigenous grape varieties and ancient olive groves. How does the trip put a spotlight on fusing the old world with the new?

Wine and olive oil are the two biggest things of Mediterranean gastronomy. At the winery, we’re going be collaborating in a meal that’s going to be made by the winemaker, Jordi Esteve. The region is very interesting because it’s in the original point of the border where the phylloxera—a bug that killed the vineyards in Europe—caused the end of the old viticulture and the beginning of a modern one. The modern one had two stages: The 20th century [directly] after phylloxera and the 1980s, a more contemporary one with all the technological industry. We’re going to visit the area that has all this history behind. Empordà has a lot of vineyards in between terraces, slopes and little valleys. The winery we visit tries to respect the natural process of winemaking and make wine with minimum intervention. This is also relevant because a great part of the natural wine movement of Spain started in Catalonia. We’re going to be caught between the old traditional cellars and the modern vision of wine. Jordi loves to explore and feels a bit like an inheritor of our legacy connected with wine.

For olive oil... I don’t want to reveal all the surprises! We’re going to visit the fields and beautiful trees with a lifespan of hundreds of years at a cooperative. Many producers in the area [work here] and have a big shop where we can buy all types of products from different producers.

It wouldn’t be farfetched to say Catalan environment and cuisine are inextricably intertwined?

In Catalonia, the gastronomy is always a dialogue with nature. It’s always a conversation between the people and the landscape. We transform nature in recipes and create culture around that.

Later in Cap de Creus, the tour reveals that Salavador Dalí was not just a prolific painter... but a foodie?

Many tourists go to the Dalí Museum. But what’s not so well known is the connection to gastronomy. Many of Dalí’s paintings actually include the landscape that we are going to see in Cap de Creus. In fact, there is a geological park with amazing rock formations—some even connect the rocks with specific paintings. Dalí also has a very cool connection with the gastronomy. He was painting [eggs] and breads and lobsters and more. Food was another symbol and cultural asset of his stories. Another reason we visit Dalí’s house is because the innovation, adventure, surprise and a little bit of surrealism is part of the Catalan culture. We’re look into his house right in front of the port and then take a boat to explore the area before a fantastic meal with a fisherman. He’s going to cook for us. We’ll enjoy this meal in a very small cove surrounded by the beautiful Mediterranean landscape.

Time in the harbor village of Llançà tracks coastal cuisine from a wholesale fish auction to prep work at a seaside lunch. Why is it important to unveil Catalan cuisine from start to finish?

We’re going to visit the biggest fish market in the area where many chefs buy fish. The idea is to better understand how these tiny village fish markets work. It’s beautiful to add a dimension of the profession behind the effort of so many people—the fishermen, the buyers, the sellers, the system. We would never have the beautiful recipes of the Michelin-starred restaurants if these guys cannot do their job. I think it’s important to be aware of where the food comes from, the impact that it has in our lives, how connected we are at the end of the day and the natural elements around us.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Join us in Catalonia in May 2026.

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Francesca Furey

Francesca Furey is the Commerce Editor at Milk Street. A writer passionate about the intersections of gastronomy and culture, she edits and produces content for the Milk Street Store, blog and more.