Telferic Platform Café

A trip to Barcelona usually would include a customary trip on to the cable car ride up the hill towards Barcelona’s fame castle, The Castell De Montjuic.  However prior to getting all the way to the top, there is a pit stop prior to the highest point where you can have lunch and observe all of Barcelona on its spacious patio lot. When one takes the Transbordador Aeri del Port or Port Cable car to take in the spectacular view of Barcelona, the end of the trip offers a couple of restaurants that people can sit and relax and enjoy the spectacular view on Montjuic mountain side.  There are two restaurants there, one on top of another.  The more expensive fine dining restaurant is located on the bottom while the Telferic Platform Cafe is located on top.  My wife and I were quite famish so we decided to go for something quick after spending the morning high above on the cable car.  After checking out the menu of this cafe, we noticed that they offer a variety of items including pizzas, salads, sandwiches and paellas. 

We were greeted at the door by a very enthusiastic gentleman who promptly gave us a seat inside the restaurant.  It was a tiny bit chilly that afternoon so despite a patio full of people, we opted to stay indoors and enjoy our meal and enjoy the view of Barcelona from within closed windows.   After checking out their menu, we decided to go with their Paella Marisco which was a seafood mixed paella. Since we had one the night before at Portovono Restaurant, we wanted to see if there was a marked difference from this place or not.

Paella Marisco

It arrived within ten minutes and it was served in its traditional pan.  The paella smelled alright but not as aromatic as the one we had the night before.  There were about three pieces of shrimp, some calamari and a piece of chicken meat as well.  The funny thing is that on the menu the chicken actually went with their Paella Mixta and not their Marisco so obvious I was a little surprised to see a piece of meat in our seafood Marisco paella.  I guess it was our bonus addition. After mixing the rice, we could tell that the entire pan of rice was a bit soggy and soft.  There wasn’t that crunchy edge on the bottom on the side that really makes a paella stand out.  Taking a bite into it, although one could taste a bit of seafood taste to it, it was overall bland and certainly quite different than the one we had from the night before.  The shrimp lacked that true seafood taste to it which I think contributed to the lack of overall taste to the paella.  As the lady said from the night before, the difference between a good paella and an average one was the amount of time you leave the rice simmering in the pan and whether fresh seafood is used when cooking a mixed seafood rice. I'm not 100% sure but I'm sure the mussels and calamari used here were not of the fresh type.

Yes I was a little disappointed with the overall meal although truthfully it could have been a lot worse.  When your high up on the hills and there is little to choose from then what you pay for is what you get.  The fine dining restaurant actually looked good from the outside and there were a lot of positive reviews from various blogs and websites.  There were a lot of tourists there and staff was at least helpful and courteous at all times.  Just wish the paella was a little better.  Overall I give it a 2.5 out of 5.  

Telferic Platform Café