Josep Bartolí Balcells arrived in Barcelona in 1934 and founded the Bar Bodega Bartolí in the Sants neighborhood. Specifically, on Vallespir Street. “Those were other times,” says Vicenç, the grandson of old Josep. Vallespir Street continues to be a commercial hub, but many of the workshops whose labor supplied the tables of a place that opened at six in the morning and smelled of carajillo and cheap tobacco have disappeared.
Albert and Vicenç are brothers, and their wives, Kati and Pili, are also sisters, and together with Marina, the 85-year-old mother, they run the engine room of a ship that continues to fill its fifteen tables every day from Monday to Saturday. and in turns. Everything stays in the family. At Bartolí they close at night because, as Vicenç says, “he doesn’t want to be the richest person in the cemetery.”
I am passionate about locals that resist globalization. The establishments with strings of hanging garlic and ñoras and with chairs in which thousands of innkeepers have rested. On the wall hang photographs of Serrat, Estadella, Manolo García, Toni Falgueras and a long list of VIPs wanting to eat some tripe or some snails, two of the star dishes on the menu.
If you wake up hungry, at Bartolí they prepare a potato omelet sandwich in which the anchovy balances the sweetness of the onion. An anchovy that also pairs with tuna and olives tightly packed in crusty bread. On the menu they have good DO wines available to diners, although they opt for novell wine and a trip to the origins with barrels full of wine and bulk vermouth. It is the mark of a house that adapts to the new municipal ordinances. They requested a terrace in times of pandemic and were allowed to place three tables for the pigeons to enjoy. “We have asked them to let us play CDs to scare them away, but as my father said, a sermon in the desert, a lost sermon.” With Vicenç, the conversation never falters.
They have a menu, of course, and at 16.50 euros. But the letter, written on a blackboard as the canons dictate, is extensive. There is no shortage of stewed lentils or a Russian salad that would make Vladimir Putin himself a pacifist. Among the meats, a magnificent fricandó or a casserole knuckle. And among the fish, a cod with sanfaina or some pickled sardines. Without forgetting the seasonal dishes, like that mess of trumpets of death with black sausage. And one of his desserts, the Santiago cake, deserves a promise: to walk the entire holy road to the doors of the Compostela cathedral.
Eating at Bartolí makes you feel like a member of the neighborhood. Once you sit at the table, it seems like we all know each other. And the miracle is achieved by the tenacity of a family that, as Vicenç says, remains faithful to an identity. “If we weren’t in Sants, maybe the Gràcia neighborhood…” says Vicenç. But he leaves the sentence unfinished and shakes his head no. Whoever wants to enjoy Bartolí, come to Vallespir Street and walk through the neighborhood of neighborhoods.
