Santa Rita Experience

Forget the white tablecloths and the hushed, reverent whispers of the Eixample dining rooms. To find Santa Rita Experience, you have to head out to Sant Martí, a neighborhood that still smells of its industrial past—a landscape of brick warehouses, tech startups, and the kind of grit that hasn't been polished away by the tourism board. You’re looking for a door on Carrer de Veneçuela that looks like it leads to a graphic design studio or a high-end chop shop. Instead, you step into a loft that feels like the ultimate chef’s playground.

This isn't a restaurant in any traditional sense. It’s a 'showcooking' space, a private kitchen, a culinary theater where the fourth wall was smashed to pieces long ago. At the center of it all is Xabi Bonilla. Xabi is Basque by birth but has spent years decoding the Mediterranean pantry. He isn't hiding behind a swinging door or a brigade of terrified line cooks. He’s right there, three feet from your nose, wielding a blowtorch or a pair of plating tweezers with the calm focus of a bomb technician.

The concept is simple: one table, one menu, and a handful of strangers who, by the end of the night, will likely be sharing life stories. It’s the kind of communal dining that usually makes introverts break out in hives, but here, it works. The industrial bones of the loft—high ceilings, open spaces—keep it from feeling claustrophobic, while the heat from the stove and the steady flow of wine turn the room into something visceral and warm.

As for the food, it’s a high-speed chase through seasonal flavors. This is one of the best tasting menus in Barcelona because it refuses to be boring. You might start with a dish that looks like a forest floor and tastes like the essence of autumn, or a seafood preparation that reminds you the Mediterranean is just a few blocks away. Xabi’s Basque roots show up in the technical precision and the respect for the ingredient—if he’s serving hake, it’s going to be the best damn hake you’ve had in years, cooked to that precise point of translucent flake that most chefs miss. The wine pairing is equally thoughtful, leaning into small producers and labels that actually have something to say.

There is an honesty here that you don't find in the big-name gastronomic temples. You see the sweat, you see the prep, you see the passion. It’s a one-man show (mostly) that manages to feel effortless. You aren't just a cover number; you’re a guest in Xabi’s house. He explains the dishes not with a rehearsed script, but with the genuine excitement of someone who just discovered a new way to make a tomato taste more like a tomato.

Is it for everyone? No. If you want a private corner to whisper sweet nothings or a menu where you can demand substitutions, stay in the Gothic Quarter. But if you want to see what happens when a talented chef stops playing by the rules of the industry and starts cooking for the sheer hell of it, this is where you go. It’s a reminder that at its best, eating out is about connection—to the food, to the person cooking it, and to the person sitting next to you. Santa Rita Experience is a raw, unfiltered look at the heart of modern Catalan cooking, served up in a neighborhood that’s still figuring out what it wants to be.