Restaurant El Cairat — Restaurant in Falset

We had lunch at El Cairat for my wife's birthday, based on a recommendation from a friend who grew up in Falset. It was a wonderful experience! Every point of contact with Mercé, who owns and has cooked for El Cairat for 40 years, was perfect. She is a fantastic hostess: kind, attentive, accommodating and friendly on email and in person. She was very helpful with my wife's dietary requirements and made us feel at home the moment we stepped through the door. The food is really good, based on the produce of the Priorat, and a little more creative than most restaurants in the area, eg some dishes are influenced by Jewish Sephardic style of cooking. We started with the house vermouth and chose from the 'Suggestions' menu. It was well cooked and very tasty. The wine Mercè chose was excellent. But it is the warm, informal and relaxed atmosphere that Mercè creates st El Cairat which makes it really special; the care, the conversation, the feeling that you are family. It was a very memorable birthday....

After reading the reviews and website of the restaurant I was really expecting high quality dishes. I could not have been more mistaken. Person attending us was nice until we raised a first complaint. Dishes (price range €10-€15 per dish!) were not really dishes just a product without any type of spices nor taste. Tomato salad - 3 tomatoes cut with 3 tiny pieces of cheese, no value added in the kitchen Beetroot tartar - (I ordered vegetarian option) - what I got was grated beetroot with corn from a can NOTHING ELSE, not even a salt. Grilled meet was very chewy a tasteless

After I tried to explain why I find the ordered food very questionable what I was told was that it is my fault because I'm a vegetarian so the plates are just like this. Person attending us was very rude in general. It was very clear that her knowlwdge about good cusine was very limites. I would not recommend this place to anybody!! It's a pity because the area is...

I suppose the restaurant was having a bad day but for us, it was not the experience the reviews suggest. We were asked to pay a deposit to reserve (which was odd but fine) and then when we arrived at the time we booked we were asked to return in half an hour. We didn't actually sit down until an hour after our initial reservation, and then had to ask for menus after waiting 15 minutes and then didn't get our wine until we'd almost finished the first course. The food was nice and the service was ok (the owner was nice, the rest fairly unfriendly) but by that point we'd pretty much lost interest. All things considered, the price definitely was not worth it. A shame as we often come to Falset and have been wanting to try this place for a while, but we won't...