12 Bottle Bar

The road winding above the rocky seaside had been so twisty and the night so endlessly black that Jonathan Harker himself may well have turned around, assuming that no good could be met at the end of such a journey.  Yet there, in the warm salty air of a Costa Brava summer night, the spark for 12 Bottle Bar was lit as Lesley and I cozied up behind a table at what was the most unassuming, yet exclusive restaurant in the world.  El Bulli.  It’s been said that each year, somewhere between 800,000 and several million people (depending upon which source you believe) applied for the 8,000 reservations available annually; yet, despite all the clamor and all the accolades, El Bulli was a money loser, and, after 24 years, chef/owner Ferran Adria finally announced that he would be scuttling the restaurant in pursuit of new horizons.  Well, the final weekend of the great El Bulli is here, and we couldn’t let it pass by without an appropriate salute of appreciation and gratitude. Read More…

The pomegranate is a seductive natural wonder.  The leather-like skin, which can range from soft rose to deep crimson, conceals literally hundreds of jewel-like “berries” called arils.  Imagine eating one of these fruits for the first time, experiencing the luscious pop of the aril with its sweet-tart juice followed by the unexpected crunch of the edible seed.  It is not surprising that the pomegranate has been considered an aphrodisiac throughout history.  Nor that it has myriad uses in cuisines worldwide. Nor that it brings out the child in us all with its whimsical, almost alien appearance and fruit-delivery system (what other fruit conceals so many treasures inside?)

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Today is officially 12 Bottle Bar’s first birthday/anniversary/however-you-measure-such-things, although we admittedly got off to a very slow start.  We have a lot more readers today than we did back then, so I thought it only proper to re-post the very first post — one which explains why we exist at all.

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