It looks simple and not too hard to cook when you look at a plate served at Sant Pau, an amateur chef might think that it is something which can be made at home. The amazing cooking performed at Sant Pau is nothing you make at home or ever consider to create in the first place. The cuisine made at Sant Pau is inviting, intelligent, creative, imaginative, sophisticated, exciting and most of all absolutely delicious. Cook Carme Ruscalleda is the queen of cooking.

Only the very best local Catalan ingredients from the Maresme region are used and nothing you will have will disappoint. Yes, that is right; nothing will disappoint you even if you enter the dining room with expectations higher than Mount Everest. A small piece of paper will be handed to you in the beginning of your meal with illustrations made by Carme Ruscalleda herself of what you are going to have and when it is time for the innovative cheese plate you will have another piece of paper with illustrations of the different cheeses and belongings. The menus are changed regularly, but expect classic Catalan recipes executed with modern interpretations and personality à la Cook Carme. Delicious Catalan flavours from the cod brandada, coloured peppers and black olives or from the appetisers golden garlic and toasted pine kernel & spiced almonds polvorón. But you can also have Japanese inspired food like the dish simply called “Squid 2011” which is inspired by the Japanese culinary culture.

Carme Ruscalleda opened Sant Pau together with her husband Antoni (nicknamed Toni) Balam back in 1988 after they bought a beautiful piece of property in the summer of 1987. The restaurant was founded in the same village where Carme and Toni grew up, Sant Pol de Mar, just some 40 minutes of driving northeast from Barcelona. The colourful couple has known each other the major part of their lives and they got married in 1975. Today they have expanded their business into more restaurants such as the Japanese Restaurante Sant Pau de Tokio.

A person like Cook Carme Ruscalleda is both fascinating and inspiring and we are all blessed to have talented people such as her who are prepared to pursue a dream and share it with everyone who makes a reservation. It demands a lot more than just a talented and skilful chef to offer one of the finest restaurant experiences in the world and luckily Carme is surrounded by a team which is prepared to walk the extra mile to give you an evening never to forget.

Written by Andy