I was sworn to secrecy by the friend who took me to Mutis, but since I uncovered a reference to it on www.foodandwine.com this morning, I figure I little blogette won’t do any harm. Especially since it’s one of the most talked about places of the moment. I couldn’t take any photos so you’ll just have to imagine.
The deal is that you have to be invited by a member and I’ve no idea how to become one, or indeed if I really want to be one. I can’t actually afford to hang out in places like this on a regular basis though I did enjoy being in the enigmatic owner's rather gorgeous apartment for the night, all velvet chairs, darkness and candles, and a very sexy jazz singer crooning away on the stage. Staff are benevolent, oozing a warmth that is rare in the service industry, while the place itself packs a lively, groovy vibe. One that makes you feel quite bad and wicked, which is rather lovely.
OK. So, you enter the building, announce yourself and get buzzed upstairs where a room opens up to reveal an old-fashioned bar with a well-worn Chesterfield and matching armchairs that look like they should be filled with men with slicked back hair and gals in flapper dresses. They are not—they are filled with the band, but that’s by the by. The menu is clad in red velvet, the wine list is European and expensive, as is Mutis’s particular brand of jet-set cooking, which is all oysters and lobster and foie gras, followed by more lobster, monster steaks and slabs of tuna. Oh well, having made it through the door in for a penny in for a good many pounds, as they say.
We had a simply, yet superbly cooked lobster salad with green apple vinaigrette—lobster nearly always leaves me disappointed, this one didn’t—and the house special described on the menu as fried egg carpaccio. Hmm—how does one resist such a delight? It sounded horrid but, as it turns out, is irresistible and Bar Mut’s signature dish of fried eggs over-easy and oozing golden yolks onto a plate piled with delicate sticks of fried potato and scattered with prawns. Mix it all together, gobble it down and glory be—yes, it is indeed one of the most delicious creations ever. This curious combo we ate with a bottle of Lurton y Belondrade Verdejo—one of my favourite whites on earth, so I was a happy bunny.
The half kilo chuleton (€40) we shared: I like mine rare, my friend likes his well done, and the kitchen were more than happy to cut the thing in half and accommodate us both. Another thumbs up. It was beautifully cooked, a little chewy in that way that Spanish beef can be from not really having much by way of a hanging, but was served on a piping hot plate with baby potatoes, carrots and leeks. Simple stuff granted, but the best things usually are.
We shared a chocolate coulant and some chestnut ice-cream to help finish up our second bottle of wine (it’s that kind of place, decadent and boozy)—this time the reliable Predicador from Rioja, which I like because it’s not a fruit bomb, just a nice, slightly vegetal sipper that does well with food—and as two rather tipsy little punters sashayed our way onto the dance floor as the place filled with the privileged few who get the get the nod to come up for drinks after tapas in Bar Mut.
Avda. Diagonal 438, 93 415 8515. If you’re lucky enough to get invited expect to spend at least €75 a head.
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