Having recently spent a lovely long weekend in sunny Barcelona I wanted to document my journey and in particular my tea experience in the BCN.
Between sightseeing at the Sagrada Familia, exploring the Parc Guell and topping up my tan on one of the many beaches- I developed a thirst that could only be quenched by a delicious cup of “cha”. I am one of these people who can equally enjoy a cup of hot tea on a sunny warm beach as much as a cold, snowy mountain. So the glorious, warm and picturesque city of Barcelona was an ideal place for a cuppa.
But, not being accustomed to Barcelona I was not overly sure of the best location to find my desired drink. And so the quest began!
It was soon evident that finding not only a quality cup of tea but a cup of tea at all proved more challenging than first expected.
The search began at one of the many locally operated boutique ‘cafes’ scattered around the tourist locations- Las Ramblas, Place Catalunya as well as the main shopping centre. But sadly, to no avail. Coffee was the ‘order of the day’- but not for me, not on this day, not on any day!
So the journey then resorted to a more familiar establishment- Starbucks. This would not be my first choice of destination- not that I have anything against Starbucks but my desired tea drinking establishment would ideally have a larger selection of teas and preferably these would be of the loose leaf variety. Any who, when in Rome do as the Romans and when in a foreign city (where you are struggling to find a cup of tea) drink at a known entity!
Starbucks as such felt like a safe bet and Hurrah I was not disappointed. Or am I -perhaps I may have celebrated too early!
Upon reaching the front, of an expected long queue, I was greeted by a lovely lady at the counter, to whom I asked hopefully “Tea con leche” (Tea with milk)? To my delight I was welcomed by a tea box containing 3 different coloured tea bags- Green Tea, Earl Grey and Mint. For those who have read my previous posts it would be of no surprise that I jubilantly elected, my beloved, Earl Grey.
However, jubilance turned to despair, when I watched the poor server look in confusion at the plastic packaging (which contained the tea bag).
Attempt Nr.1- the unopened tea bag sheathing/ packet was placed in the mug. The server looked at this for a few moments in confusion and then Eureka the packet was removed, opened and the tea bag was placed gleefully in the mug. “Great” I thought, we are now getting closer to my long awaited cuppa
Attempt Nr.2- With the tea bag now sitting eagerly in the mug the server proceeded to pour half a mug of cold milk into the cup. My heart sunk! At this point upon seeing this, a colleague took the cup and emptied the whole of the contents down the sink.
Attempt Nr.3- Back to square 1. The server returns to the tea box to rebegin the process. But to my horror he informs that that was the last Earl Grey tea bag, which was now sadly lying limply in the sink . The choice of 3 teas has now been reduced to 2! Deflated, I elect for the green tea as a replacement. Don’t get me wrong I do usually enjoy a nice loose leafed Green Tea, particularly when infused with Jasmine, but a standard Green Tea tea bag does not overly excite me, especially when it is a replacement for my favoured Earl Grey.
To be fair, I was in great need of a tea and in the warm Spanish heat the Green Tea actually ‘hit the spot’ very nicely.
Please do not think that the telling of the above encounter is to shame the server or to cause any malice in any way, it is to merely show that tea drinking and tea preparation is not (from my very short experience in Barcelona at least) as common in Spain/ Barcelona as it is in other locations around the world.
However, despite the above statement I did later on in the holiday find a delightful and charming little tea shop, aptly named the Tea Shop. Selling an array of different tea pots, mugs and loose leaf teas. So tea drinking must have some popularity in Spain. Sadly, however they only sold packaged tea and there wasn’t the ability to purchase a cup of brewed, take way tea.
All in all Barcelona was a lovely long weekend escape which I would highly recommend to anyone. Unless your goal is to go on a tea drinking holiday and then sadly it was somewhat lacking, in my own experience at least, in the tea fulfilment department.
I wonder if this was solely my experience at finding tea in Barcelona or whether others have also had similar or even a contrary experiences?
