I brought two guide books with me to Barcelona. One from Time Out (TO) and another from The Rough Guide (TRG). TO is 100% in color, while TRG is black and white (and orange) with some color pictures. In the end, we used TRG. I really like how the book is organized; every chapter has a map related to the content of that chapter. While with TO, we had to flip back and forth between chapters and the only maps in the book (the last pages of the book). TRG was also quite useful for finding places to eat. That second night we picked Euskal Etxea, which TRG recommended. They serve Basque cuisine, and it is said that they serve good pintxos (Basque tapas). Despite all the hypes in Holland about tapas, we were and still are clueless about the custom of how to eat them, the do’s and don’t. When we got there, there were already lots of people (most likely local people) standing by the bar, which I found a bit intimidating. We didn’t know that was the part where they served the pintxos. Instead, Nor went straight to the back and picked a table (which was set). We ended up ordering a la carte. Nevertheless, their food was quite good and the price was quite reasonable. I had a hake fillet and clams in parsley and garlic sauce, which tasted wonderful. Nor had a roast leg of lamb. He thought it was ok, but not really that great. I was satisfied with my hake. We both think that the house wine was great.
NOTE: The image shows the business card from Euskal Etxea, which we have received at the end of our dinner.