Review: El Poblet Restaurante, Valencia (⭐️ Michelin)

I stumbled upon this restaurant purely by chance. I wanted a restaurant in the middle of Valencia which is close enough to my hotel. There are several other Michelin restaurants in the area but for some reason El Poblet caught my eye. I checked its website and the menu looked good and it was open for lunch! Great! I booked a table a couple of days before and got a confirmation straight away.

On the day, I looked at my Google Map and I could see it was only 5mins walk from my hotel at 8 Carrer de Correus. The front doors were white and the restaurant was actually on the first floor. Upon entering the restaurant the Head Waiter greeted me and knew exactly who I was. The dining area was spacious and there were an area for group dining towards the front. At the time of arrival, there was a group having a business lunch.

First impression was great. The restaurant was not too big, friendly waiting staff and Modern. You knew it’s going to be a nice meal just by looking at its decor. Simple yet classy.

The lady introduced herself and handed me the menu. Just like the decor, the menu was simple yet classy too. 3 different types of tasting menu: El Poblet, Historic and Festive. El Poblet is the simplest among the 3 and Festive being the extensive one. I chose the mid tier one: Historic tasting menu. I asked the maître d’ what is so Historic about this particular menu. He said most of the items in the menu are based on traditional cuisine with a bit of a modern twist. Sounded a bit tacky to me but worth a try I think.

The amuse bouche were seafood crackers serve on a moss with tomato salsa.

First course were Petal of Rose and Apple gin and tonic. The edible bit of the flower was in the middle it, using a pair of food tweezers to pic the ‘petals’. This was complemented with Apple gin and tonic, and Stone of Parmesan. Only one stone was edible and the rest were real ones. The edible Parmesan stone was actually a Parmesan icecream coated with black chocolate, but like Magnum but tastier.

The next course were Cubalibre of foie gras and Tobacco leaf of Toro

Mains: grilled red mullet in hot ceviche sauce followed by Red King Prawn from Denia cooked in its own seawater.

Next course was the cod tripe stew, followed by malted taco.

Next was the rice ashes. The black stuff tasted like seaweed, I don’t know what it is but it was delicious. Underneath was the rice cooked like paella.