Boqueria Guided Market Tour and Paella Cooking Class

About this tour

Spend your morning hunting for ingredients at Barcelona's legendary Boqueria market, then head to a local kitchen to cook paella and other Spanish classics alongside your chef guide. Over four hours, you'll work through the market's stalls with an insider's eye for quality produce, taste along the way, and finish by sitting down to eat what you've made—with wine and drinks flowing throughout. This is cooking stripped of pretension: hands-on, social, and rooted in how real Catalan food actually gets made.

Highlights

• Navigate Boqueria's labyrinth with a chef who knows every vendor
• Taste cured meats, cheeses, and seasonal produce at market stalls
• Cook paella from scratch in a working Barcelona kitchen
• Learn technique for three or four traditional Spanish dishes
• Eat your own cooking with wine, beer, and aperitifs included
• Pick up practical shopping and cooking tips for home

What to expect

You'll meet your chef at Boqueria and walk the market for roughly an hour, stopping to sample jamón, seafood, and produce while discussing quality and seasonality. Then it's back to the kitchen, where you'll prep and cook paella together—the chef guides, you handle the pan and the timing. Expect some chopping, some heat, and real instruction on how to get the socarrat (crispy bottom) right. Two or three other dishes may round out the session depending on the day. By the end, you're plating and eating at a table with wine and coffee, talking through what worked.

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