A family in Girona
El Celler de Can Roca began in 1986 beside the Roca family's original restaurant in Girona, and moved in 2007 to a purpose-built house on the edge of town, a triangular dining room wrapped around a garden courtyard. A wall clad in old wine crates marks the reach of the cellar.
It is run by three brothers: Joan in the kitchen, Josep on wine, Jordi on pastry. Twice ranked the world's best, it has stayed generous and human with the accolades, a family table at the summit of the profession.
Savoury, cellar, sweet in balance
Joan's contemporary Catalan cooking is held in balance by Josep's encyclopaedic cellar and Jordi's desserts, the last of which have changed how pastry is thought about. Emotion behind the technique: dishes built on memory, perfume, even childhood sweets.
The three disciplines are treated as equals, which is rare, and it is what gives a meal here its unusual completeness.
Kitchen, cellar and pastry, treated as equals.
A family table at the top of the profession that never turned cold or corporate. One of the warmest great restaurants anywhere.
VANE selection. Chosen with a critic's eye and judged independently. It's here because we judged it, not because it paid. This is a researched profile, not yet a first-hand VANE verdict; where we have eaten there, the review says so.
Image: Photo: e_calamar, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)
