The Rain it Raineth....

Believe it or not, the sun doesn’t always shine in Barcelona. When it rains, it really pours, and yesterday was a complete wash out as it never seemed to stop bucketing down. This scuppered my plans to go out to hunt down new shops for this blog, but it did mean that I remembered that there are two shops right here in Barceloneta that are absolute life savers on a day like yesterday.

I really didn’t feel like doing my weekly shopping but the cupboards were pretty bare. Our local favourite deli / take away La Casita had to come to the rescue, as it has a couple of times, to be honest. (I haven’t really got the hang of being a domestic goddess yet, clearly.) I wish I could link to La Casita but it's nowhere to be found on the internet. I guess this means you're really getting local information here. If you do come to Bareloneta, head for C / Atlantida, by the side of the market, and you'll find it. There isn’t a menu at La Casita, you select from a choice of dishes they’ve prepared that day. There’s usually a meat, chicken and vegetarian option with a selection of vegetables. Last night we had some excellent botifarra with fried potatoes and green beans and chicken in a creamy sauce with raisins and some red and green peppers, and all for the princely sum of 5.80 euros. I would have taken a picture but we were too hungry to wait to eat it. They also make amazing pizzas, with a small but good quality range of toppings.  A lot of people pop in there on Sunday to grab pizzas which they take to the beach for a picnic, usually accompanied by cans of Estrella purchased from one of the many guys selling them for a euro, who can be found peddling beers all over the city.

However, we didn’t have to wash our meal down with fizzy lager, as we have the most wonderful wine shop about 2 minutes away from the flat. It’s called Vinoteca Voramar and has a massive selection of wine, cava, champagne and even a few bottled beers.  We bought a bottle of a xarello and chardonnay blend.  I don’t usually like chardonnay but it was an 80% xarello and 20% chardonnay blend from the Penedes wine region. I can remember all of that, but I can’t remember the name of the wine itself. Typical of me and of course the bottle has already gone in the recycling bin. I do remember that it was delicious and only 4.80 euros.

We finished off the evening by watching Pedro Almodóvar's ‘What Have I Done to Deserve This?’ (Qué he hecho yo para merecer esto?) which is one of his earlier films starring Carmen Maura, one of my favourite actresses. I love Almodóvar's films and even though I still need the English subtitles, I’m starting to understand a lot more of the dialogue without them.  So, even though it was horrible outside, I had a really enjoyable time and probably saved some money too.

The weather today was bright and sunny and the trees are starting to bud now, so it really does feel like winter is over.  Check out His Nibs blog for pictures of what we got up to today.

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