I was in Spain for 2 weeks in mid October. I went to Barcelona, Granada, Seville and Malaga. Although each city has its own charms, I thought Barcelona definitely has the most varieties : Architect, Antoni Gaudi, beach, club, shopping, culture and gastronomy. I was lucky to be able to make a reservation at Tickets in Barcelona at the last minute. Tickets is run by Albert Adria, brother of Ferran Adrià, the famous chef of El Bulli. These two brothers used to run El Bulli, a Michelin 3-star restaurant known for its molecular gastronomy and also known as one of the hardest restaurants to make a reservation. Sadly, it was closed in 2011, and yet his brother Albert has opened a new but more casual tapas restaurant in Barcelona, Tickets. It has some similar molecular gastronomic styles from El Bulli but Chef Albert has successfully brought new identity in this restaurant. Tickets was selected as 29th of the world 50 best restaurants.
The reservation is open for 2 months in advance on its website. Despite the fact it was (of course) already fully booked when I decided to go to Spain last minute, I heard that a great news! Tickets offers a tasting menu for 250 euro per person and there were seats available! There, we booked the seats right away.
The tasting menu is basically all you can eat tapas. Food is exactly the same as on the a la carte menu, but they bring you each dish based on your preference and how hungry you are. You can basically request tapas on the menu.
To see if 250 euro/ person was worth it, I’ve put down the price on the regular menu. I will tell you at the end if this tasting menu is worth doing it.
Iberian Ham 13,40€ & tomato bread 3,20€
I don’t usually like cured ham but this iberico ham just melts in your mouth!
Tomato breads : tomato pastes with olive oil on top of flat breads.
These tomato breads are very common in the Catalonia region, Spain. In the cities of Andalusia region (the southern Spain), no restaurant served tomato breads. On the other hand, in Barcelona, every restaurant offers this as their regular bread and each restaurant has different styles of tomato breads! So delicious!
White anchovy toast 4,90 €/u
When you are in Spain, you will eat lots of tomato breads, olive, sardines, potato, and anchovy! I’ve eaten them almost every single day with a glass of sangria, and I wasn’t sick of it!
TICKETS`S Olives 2,50€/u
Here comes the famous Ticket’s olive! Molecular cuisine!
Fresh juice from perfectly handpicked olives is transferred into a solid olive through a spherification process with calcium chloride, alginate, and xanthan gum. Sounds fancy? To be honest, I don’t know what it means, but it tastes more olive than olive! as if they’ve extracted 100 olives into one single fragile soft pudding!
Chipirón con emulsión de piparra (Baby squid with piparra) 2,90€/u
“Burrata” with sea urchin and mushroom 4,20 €/u
Ma uni <3 <3 <3
Pizza TICKETS “ Gorgonzola” and Basil air Waffle 3,90€/u
Yes, we had a little picnic time during our meal! They shave the hard gorgonzola cheese on top of the thin crust pizza which almost tastes like a cracker.
you can taste basil with a bite of this waffle
Codium tempura (seaweed) 29,00€
dipping sauce
Porex of Cálix 4,80€/u
My least favorite. A bit too fishy with a weird texture. The white part is almost like a foam texture!
“Canapé” of Sea urchin
Eggplants Nigiri 3,90€/u
The fire flavor of these eggplants is so good! I believe it is meringue underneath the eggplants. It melts in your mouth as soon as you put it.
Hub of potatoes Crab salad with ceviche mayonnaise and romesco 29,00€
Potato and nori cube with spicy tuna tartar 4,20 €/u
Mini airbags of manchego cheese 3,00€/u
Besides lots of olive and tomato breads, we found that Spanish people love manchego cheese!
Airbagette of cecina 6,50 €/u
Why is it called “Airbagette?” Because inside is empty!
FOIE GRAS “MAISON MITTEAULT” 23,00€
Oyster, Trip to Lima 5,60€/u
Tickets offers a dozen different flavors of the oyster, named after the city all around the world! Each oyster is prepared with the distinctive ingredients of each city! For instance, they have trip to Seoul, Korea and they prepare it with kimchi (the spciy fermented cabbage that Korean eats with every meal). This time, they brought me trip to Lima, Peru and it was very interesting! Now gotta go to Peru to find out if this oyster represents Lima correctly.
Crunchy Octopus with its pickled cucumber 16,80€
My ultimate favorite tapas at Tickets!
Just soooooooo goooooooooooooooooooooood!
#nomz
They bring you this beautifully cooked octopus with pickles. I want to know the recipe! so refreshing! perfect combo with octopus!
Suckling Pig 5,40€/u
Quail stuffed with eggplant 18,50€
we requested to eat the stuffed quail for the final dish.
just perfectly roasted!
The stuffings with perfectly well cooked meats and sauce were just so delicious!
NOW SWEET TIME!
They took us to another room behind the theater curtain as if it was a hidden secrete place. This beautiful cherry on top of rose was waiting for us on the table!
TICKETS`S Ambar Rose 3,20€
More cherry than cherry! just like olive, it seems that they’v extracted 100 cherries to make this one single cherry!
I feel like I was in the wonderland! Strawberry and raspberry are all over the ceiling!
the dessert bar where they make all this amazing desserts!
Green Coconut with lime sorbet and basil water 8,20€
Ratatouille was playing on the screen! One of my favorite cartoon movies! just the right choice!
Green mandarin soup with Pumpkin sobert 8,70€
This pumpkin with mandarin dessert was just so refreshing! My husband does not like pumpkin but he really liked this pumpkin dessert!
And the famous dessert trolley! I love every detail of Tickets! How fun and witty! Even more, this beautiful lady makes you chocolate ice cream right in front of you! Who can say no to this? seriously!
Bread with oil and chocolate nitrogen ice cream 12,50€
“Mortero” of chocolate cork stoppers
They bring you chocolate cork stoppers with an actual cork. Be careful not to be confused!
Outside
just like the theater! lots of posters and lighting! Where do I buy tickets for the next show?
Albert Adria’s Tickets was fun and delicious. The whole restaurant is like a theater where food is the main actor. It will be a whole another experience for someone like me who never tasted the molecular cuisines before. The olive and cherry was very unique! Do not leave without having the crunchy octopus too! And their desserts were exquisite! Please do save some room for desserts!
I would definitely recommend Tickets to those who are planning to visit Barcelona. But remember to book 2 months in advance! I’ve added up all the tapas to see how much we roughly ate. (drinks were also free of charge but I just drank a glass of wine and my husband drank a glass of beer) It was about 150 - 180 euro per person. Unless you can eat a lot (literally order every single menu), I do not find it worth of 250 euro tasting menu. All the tasting dishes can be found on the regular menu (people next to our table were getting exactly what we were having but at much cheaper price!) and I have relatively small stomach and low tolerance. It was definitely not worth 250 euro at least for me.
Nevertheless, I do not regret that we tried the tasting menu at Tickets this time. If you have limited time in Barcelona and you want to have fun and unique experience at Tickets, but cannot get a reservation? 250 euro is worth after all.
Tickets, Barcelona, Spain
- Location : Av. del Paraŀlel, 164, 08015 Barcelona, Spain
- Phone : 606 225 545
- Hours
- Tuesday – Friday 6:30 am –10:30 pm
- Saturday 1:00 pm- 3:00 pm, 7:00 pm - 10:30 pm