People tend to fall into two camps with barbecues. The first, the pro camp,
get all excited about crisscrossed steaks, the perfect banger, bananas and
chocolate wrapped in silver foil and – okay, then – just one more bottle of
rosé from the cool bag.
The second, the miserable lot, think only of a childhood spent watching as dad
tried to rescue another rotten weekend with the last firelighter and a
bottle of meths, or of a particularly virulent bout of “Of course it’s done”
disease after a somewhat laissez-faire approach to cooking chicken.
If you are in the first group, read on: this is for you. For those in the
second, consider this therapy. It can, and will, get better. There is
another way.
It’s called Els Tres Tombs. It’s about 25 miles west of Barcelona. And it’s
the most perfect barbecue experience you’ll ever have.
The premise is simple: as an add-on to selling the warm red wine and
dangerously drinkable cava that its small vineyard produces, Tres Tombs has
erected 18 kilns for your barbieing pleasure. On site are an outdoor stove
where huge paellas are prepared in vast black lids, plenty of benches, a few
chickens and a peacock. And that, apart from the shop, which we will get to
in a minute, is pretty much it. The idea – you bring your own food, you make
your own fire, you put the two together and you’re as happy as Spanish
Larry.
Now, those of you in the second group, the BBQ cynics, might interject here to
ask: “Why on earth would you bother traipsing miles from Barcelona with
plastic bags full of raw meat and prawns, when all you have to look forward
to is cooking the stuff yourself?”
As usual, you’re missing the point.
To be here – among the families, the kids with bare feet playing on the
swings, the imposing matriarchs with their headscarves and voluminous
skirts, the men grouped round the fire, staring into the flames, arguing
over tong technique and passing round the porron (a traditional
decanter used to share wine by pouring the juice straight into your throat
from its thin spout) – is to be part of local, rural Spain. Not the Spain of
the city or of the tourist posters, but the Spain of the family, of three or
four generations gathered round a huge table, an eating, drinking, shouting
community of noise and flavour.
To prove it, sat next to us were three old boys playing dominoes, their ears
growing longer and hairier by the hour. They looked as if they’d been
playing every weekend for years. They looked as if they’d got years left in
them, too. As the place filled up around them, they simply took another sip
of wine and began another game.
The whole thing couldn’t be further away from the barbecue experience of your
back garden. There are no anxious glances toward the heavens, no rages at
the other half because they got the wrong sort of coal from the garage, no
timers clacking out the correct duration for a baked potato. It all seems so
simple.
Here’s the drill. For £2 a head, you get a grill, and the right to be there.
Find your plot, and your tables, then start the fire – there’s loads of dried
wood and vines scattered about the place. While you’re waiting for a
manageable heat, stroll over to the store and treat yourself to a bottle or
four of their most expensive cava, a crisp sparkler with vanilla and
grasses, for all of £3 a pop.
Near the door is a basket with 15 or so unlabelled bottles of red. A sign
says: “Cabernet, €2.50”. The cheapest plonk they do, which I suspect would
be perfectly quaffable, is yours for a quid. Chorizo and garlic hang from
the ceiling; potatoes, eggs, olives and condiments are stacked on shelves;
wine barrels big enough to house a family of four line the walls. The entire
establishment hasn’t seen an inch of pretension in years.
During the week, Tres Tombs gets on with the serious business of making wine.
This is a weekend-only, blink-and-you-miss-it affair – by 6pm, the kilns are
being swept clean and the car park is emptying. In those few hours, however,
it will change your idea of what a barbecue should be about.
Travel details: EasyJet (www.easyjet.co.uk),
BMI Baby (0871 224 0224, www.bmibaby.com)
and Jet2 (0871 226 1737, www.jet2.com) all
fly to Barcelona. From the city, take the A2 north, which merges into the
B24 toward Vilafranca del Penedes. Take the Vallirana exit on the N340a and,
after 20 minutes or so, you’re in wine country, with vineyards either side
of the road. Up ahead, you’ll see the name of a vineyard, Vallormosa, on the
side of a house. Eventually, you reach the village of Avinyonet del Penedes;
there’s a small sign for Els Tres Tombs on the left.
'Extinguishing' is what you're doing to any language that is not Catalan in the independent 'nation' that is Cataluna whilst at the same time taking water from one of the driest places in Spain, Almeria. As for the headscarves and volminous skirts come down to Sevilla and you'll see plenty of them.
patrick, Sevilla,
"Venta Luciano" restaurant very close to Almuñecar , has given my visitors and myself a perfect barbecue on every occasion. At only 25 euros each ,we are treated to costumed musicians and vocals , whilst sitting around the huge central barbecue area. As much food and wine as you want & flamenco .
wendy, Almuñecar, spain
So, we fly to Barcelona, rent a car and spend an hour trying to find a vineyard just to watch Spanish families have a good time around a barbecue. Next week, the Times flies to a barbie in Australia's outback, complete with flies and authentic locals wearing cork hats. Carbon footprint, moi?
geoff, donostia, spain
Ditto about the headscarves etc. I spent three years in Spain in the mid seventies and even then it would be a stretch to find such a backward image.
G Blake
London
Geraldine Blake, London,
Being a Catalan myself, I have been shocked by the extreme unaccuracy of the description of a "Spanish family". Children would NEVER play barefoot unless on the beach, and women with headscarves and voluminous skirts were extinguished more than 50 years ago. I believe you are making it up.
Margarida Calpena, Barcelona, Spain