Barcelona has restaurants to suit every taste and pocket. Most are located in Old Barcelona and El Ensanche. The most expensive can be found in El Ensanche and the residential area, whilst those frequented by young people are located in Gracia and La Ribera. Restaurants specialising in fish are found in La Barceloneta. The most typical are the “tabernas Catalanas” (Catalan inns) which offer traditional home cooking. Modern restaurants have been set up by young university students specialising in the “nouvelle cuisine”. The inns offer quantity and home cooking whereas the modern restaurants offer selection, imagination and extravagance. Between these two extremes there is also a very wide selection. There are two important and long established restaurants. One is “Can cullaretes” in Quintana street and the other is “Les Set Portes” in the Plaça del Palau. Foreign restaurants include Arab, Argentinian, Korean, Japanese, German, French, Chinese, etc.

The main Catalan dishes include “escudella i carn d´olla”- (vegetable, stew, rice, noodles and potatoes served as a soup), followed by “el cocido” (stew) with haricot beans, “botifarra” (Catalan sausage), “pilota” (minced beef), bread, eggs and selected spices. Valencian “paella” comes under the name of “arros a la cassola”. “La Zarzuela” is a dish consisting of monk fish, grouper, prawns or king prawns, squid and mussels. If lobsters used instead of king prawns it is known as “opera”, “Suqet de peix” is another dish containing a variety of fish. Other typical dishes include “bacalla a la Llauna” (cod cooked and seasoned in a metal boiling-pan), “faves a la catalana” (large haricot beans), and “botifarra amb mongetes” (Catalan sausage with beans). There is also a wide variety of confectionery. For example “crema catalan”, “mel i mato” (cottage cheese with honey, “torrons” (a kind of nougat), “postre de music” (pine kernels and raisins), etc. Important wines include those from Peralada, Alella, Taragona, Priorat (red wine), El Penedes (red and white) and the sparkling wines from El Penedés and Peralada.

For weekly information regarding bars, restaurants, cinemas, theatres and concerts there is the magazine “Guia del Ocio” (Leisure Guide), and for news items and information about the city there is the magazine “Barcelona” and another called “Vivir en Barcelona” (Barcelona Life). Tourist Information Centres provide leaflets on the different cultural and business aspects of the city as well as the different public services.