Restaurant Leku: excellent home cooking near the Barça stadium
As soon as you step into Leku (lay-koo: “place”, in Basque), you feel truly welcome. Everyone is friendly, and the atmosphere is relaxed and homey. You don’t have to go far to see why…
In the Leku family, I’m looking for… the son. Easy, he’s in the kitchen: Sergi Amor, the chef. You could say the food is, quite literally, cooked with love (amor, in Spanish. Why yes, we do bilingual puns here). Now, I’m looking for the mother: Maria is behind the counter. The uncle, you say? In the dining room, taking great care of his customers. The sister-in-law? Working the till!
Basically, Leku is one big happy family.
There are a variety of options on offer, depending on how much you have to spend.
Tasty, tasty Leku tapas
Our top picks (among others) are:
- The Cantabrique anchovies: served with tomato bread, well worth the trip in their own right.
- Cep mushroom or beef croquettes: these are famous amongst the gourmet community in Barcelona, and for good reason: they’re delicious and ultra-fresh.
Local food at Leku
The Friday morning omelette-fest
From seven until noon, every Friday, Maria is kept busy cooking up a feast of fine and tasty omelettes, from a classic version with potatoes and onions to more original concoctions, such as the artichoke omelette, the chistorra omelette with spicy Basque sausage, the escalivada omelette, featuring a Catalan speciality made from aubergines, peppers and onions, or the bean and butifarra negre omelette, with a type of Catalan black pudding. All are served cold with generous slices of pa amb tomàquet – tomato bread.
Eat them, like the locals, for breakfast or for a mid-morning snack. Just don’t leave it too late, as they sell like hot cakes. Still not adapted to Spanish meal times? No problem, get one for lunch! Well, why not?
The lunch menu
On weekdays, a simple, but fresh and high-quality menu is served from 1pm. It’s best to book ahead, just to be on the safe side.
The gourmet side
If you’re looking for something special and have the budget to match – from 30-40 euros and up – then the a la carte menu is for you, with a range of original dishes which vary with the seasons.
In any case, remember to reserve a table in advance – the restaurant is held in high esteem by local connaisseurs.
Sergi Amor is a people person, and likes to walk around the restaurant, greeting his clients. As a chef, he excels in flavour combinations; he loves his work, and it shows! The seasonal a la carte menu is the most expensive option, but it truly showcases Amor’s talents as a chef. Standout dishes include salmon cubes marinated in wasabi mayonnaise, and the squid tallarines.
As any self-respecting historia de amor needs its happy ending, it would only be right to finish with dessert – perhaps the lightest of light mojito mousses, or, in the right season, a beautiful wild strawberry soup with white chocolate.
And they all lived happily ever after.
