Ultimate Guide to a Food and Art Vacation in Spain

Barcelona

Barcelona is the beating heart of Catalonia and the centre of northern Spain’s food scene. Exploring tucked away bars, cafes and restaurants is the perfect way to get acquainted with Catalonia’s capital. True foodies can accompany a gastronomic writer, who has spent a decade immersed in Spain’s food scene, on a gourmet walking tour of the city. The tour begins at La Boqueria – Spain’s most iconic food market – that plays host to stalls selling all manner of local products from Iberian hams to swan eggs. After the tour, travellers can taste a selection of local products accompanied by a local wine, before stopping off at a patisserie for some Spanish sweet treats.

Pintxos tour of San Sebastian

Sitting on Spain’s northernmost tip, San Sebastian is a relatively undiscovered foodie haven. Travellers with discerning palates will fit right into sophisticated San Sebastian, which has the highest concentration of Michelin star restaurants per capita in the world. Pintxos is a staple of Basque country cuisine, and going out for pintxos has been a tradition for decades. As Pintxos are small morsels of delicious food, locals will typically visit three or four bars and sample one or two dishes in each establishment. On a pintxos tour of San Sebastian, you’ll be able to taste a world of Basque country flavours. Then, you can wash the wonderful taste down with a glass of txacolí – the lightly sparkling wine that is a Basque country export.

Cooking class with Pilar Latorre

Spain’s Costa Brava is perhaps best known for its dramatic coastline and Catalonian heritage, but it also has a fantastic food culture. In Spanish culinary circles, chef Pilar Latorre is well respected for her Mediterranean cuisine, as well as her French and Asian specialities. An intimate cooking class in her own home allows travellers to learn from this incredible chef, who trained at the prestigious Cordon Bleu School in Paris. Lasting between three and four hours, participants will cook four courses, and once you’ve finished cooking, you can enjoy your delicious meal in Pilar Latorre’s living room, along with sumptuous Spanish cava and wine.

For travellers who would rather avoid the hard work of cooking up a storm, there is also the opportunity to experience a private dinner in one of San Sebastian’s best restaurants. Held in the kitchen of a secret establishment, an exclusive menu will be created just for you and elaborately paired with select wines.

You’ll start with a visit to a speciality chocolate shop to learn about and buy local ingredients. Once you’re all stocked up, wander through Barcelona’s cobbled streets to a cooking school. Here, visitors can learn how to make different types of hot chocolate and melindros, the Catalonian version of churros.

Gaudí’s architectural wonders

Besides food, Spain is renowned for its artistic scene. Filled with iconic structures and modernist buildings, Barcelona boasts architectural astonishment around every corner. On a Gaudí tour of Spain’s second biggest city, architecture enthusiasts will be able to discover some of Gaudí’s most famous works. The bright mosaics of Güell Park and La Sagrada Familia, considered to be Gaudí’s masterpieces, are a perennial on Barcelona bucket lists. On this tour, you’ll learn about Catalan Modernism – an eclectic type of architecture that flourished between 1888 and 1906. Besides the classics, participants may also get the chance to visit the Casa Batllò and Casa Milà, popularly known as La Pedrera, or the stone quarry.  

Salvador Dali excursion

The Costa Brava’s art scene is on par with the region’s delicacies. A long term muse to Dali sits in the last resort on the coast before the French border. Cadaques is filled with whitewashed houses and a beautiful 16th-century parish sitting atop a hill. On Jacada’s Salvador Dali excursion, travellers can visit Port Lligat – a fishing village that inspired Dali’s work during family holidays – and the picturesque town of Figueres, where the Dali Theatre and Museum are located. Built by Dali from the ruins left by 19th century Spanish Civil War, this museum is an institution. The museum itself is the largest surrealist object across the globe, playing host to a vibrant collection of the artist’s works.

Painted forests in San Sebastian

The small neighbourhood of Oma, not far from San Sebastian, contains a magical spot known as Bosque Animado, or the Animated Forest. Painted by Bilbao sculptor and artist Agustín Ibarrola in 1984, this enchanted forest symbolises the connection between nature and art. With this innovative project, Ibarrola aimed to link the works of the ancestral Paleolithic artists with the modern movement known as land art. He set about painting the trees in the forest, aware that the representation of his work would change as the trees grew. As each visitor walks through the paths in a different way, Ibarrola’s land art collection takes on a different meaning for everyone who sees it anew.