Taste of the Town – Barceluna

Taste of the Town – Barceluna

Third Time’s the Charm

BarCeluna

Great Digs, Delightful Small Plates

The third time may be the charm for BarCeluna, in terms of making a go of it in the Park Street business district. But co-owners Chuck Carlise and Melanie Hartman weren’t leaving anything to chance when they reopened on Santa Clara Avenue in July 2008. Taking over the space previously occupied by Luciano’s, Carlise (who started BarCeluna in 2004 on Central Avenue where BurgerMeister now resides) and Hartman (a bartender at the original location) took the best of what BarCeluna regulars remember of the old place—the lively, neighborly vibe of the bar, favorite items on the Southern European small plates–dominated menu—and transplanted it all into dramatically larger and beautifully appointed digs.
“We had been looking for a place ever since we had to move out of our original spot in the Alameda Theatre building when they started the renovation,” says Carlise. A brief incarnation as BarCeluna at Kelly’s, on Park Street where The Hobnob currently thrives, didn’t do the trick. But when he heard that the proprietor of Luciano’s was ready to retire, Carlise seized the opportunity. “It was always a gorgeous-looking restaurant on the inside,” he says, “and with a little—well, not a little—with quite a bit of work, I knew it could really be something special.”
By sprucing up the sidewalk seating, revamping the entrance to bring diners directly into the spacious bar area, opting for a warm color scheme accented by amber wall sconces and broad, dish-shaped chandeliers and defining discrete dining areas down the sides of the long, high-ceilinged space, Carlise and Hartman succeeded in giving the interior a facelift that communicates casual sophistication.
The centerpiece of the remodel was the construction of an elaborate new bar in the front of the restaurant. “At the original BarCeluna, people liked to eat at the bar,” Hartman notes. “It was a lively scene.”
“It’s fun to do,” Carlise adds. “You sit at the bar and have a cocktail and order pomme frites or something and not empty the wallet. So we definitely wanted to have a landmark bar—something you can see from the street and says ‘come on in.’ ” Hartman took advantage of the new bar to advance BarCeluna’s libations program with an expanded list of wines (nearly 20 offered by the glass) and a menu of classic mixed drinks and specialty cocktails crafted with “interesting artisan spirits you can’t find in lots of other places. We use all house-made syrups and fresh-squeezed juices,” Hartman explains. “If you order a Greyhound, you’re going to get a fresh grapefruit cut and squeezed right in front of you. We’ve got a cocktail program that can probably rival any restaurant in the East Bay.”
On an especially warm Friday evening in late October, as dusk melted into twilight and shirt-sleeved Alamedans bustled around Park Street, all the seats were taken at BarCeluna’s outdoor tables and at the bar. But my wife and I were quickly seated across from the semi-open kitchen toward the back of the restaurant. It was a good night for BarCeluna’s tasty sangria ($7, red or white), but a glass of a 2006 Portuguese Alentejo ($8) went down easily, as well.
In surroundings that never felt cramped or noisy, we enjoyed an efficiently served and attractively presented meal of BarCeluna standby dishes carried forward from the past—a small house salad ($5) made interesting with the addition of dried cherries, Fuji apple, Gorgonzola and garlic croutons; the popular Tuna Luna ($11), small chunks of seared ahi tumbled in a large martini glass with tofu, cucumber, avocado and a (very) spicy miso vinaigrette; and the paella de BarCeluna ($20), a bountiful pan of saffron rice studded with perfectly cooked prawns, clams, calamari and mussels, given a slight kick by bits of Spanish chorizo. We had to pack some of the paella to take home, perhaps because we ate every morsel of an excellent example of chef John Ehlers’ most important addition to the menu, a thin-crust pizza ($14 for that night’s blanco special) from Alameda’s only wood-burning, brick-lined pizza oven.
The menu will continue to feature such signature tapas as pulled pork sliders ($8), braised lamb tacos ($8), tea-smoked baby back ribs ($9) and grilled chipotle prawns ($9), plus the warm pistachio-crusted goat cheese salad ($11) and such entrees as grilled rib-eye steak ($28) and grilled chicken breast with smoked Spanish paprika sauce ($15). And in November, Ehlers was making plans to introduce such new dishes as duck lumpia, Rosenblum Zinfandel–braised lamb shanks, a grilled pork loin chop with sherry mushroom sauce and Tempranillo-braised boneless beef short ribs.
But judging by the rate the kitchen was turning them out when we visited, the pizza is BarCeluna’s new smash hit. Ironically, this Italian thoroughbred might be the most authentic item on the fusion-friendly menu. “Because we have the wood-burning oven,” explains Carlise, “and it can get up to 900 degrees, we can make classic Neopolitan pizza. In fact, we follow the Verace Pizza Napolitano Association rules of pizza making.” Those call for using only imported Caputo 00 flour, which crisps especially well because it is low in protein and gluten, and (yes, canned) San Marzano Italian plum tomatoes.
Priced at $12 to $15, the pizzas fit well into BarCeluna’s dining philosophy and price-point strategy. “With the small-plates approach, it’s social,” says Hartman, “and you can sample a lot more things on the menu and get a better idea of what the chef is doing.” And Carlise concludes, “We wanted to make a nice, warm comfortable place—and I think this is one of the prettiest restaurants in Alameda—where you could take somebody out for a nice light dinner, share a couple of tapas, a pizza and a salad, not have to break the bank—and get out in time to hit a movie.”

—By Derk Richardson
—Photography by Lori Eanes

The Details

BarCelunaCalifornia, Mediterranean. 2319 Santa Clara Ave., (510) 521-5862, www.barcelunaalameda.com. Serves dinner 5 p.m.–10 p.m. (or later if warranted) Tue.–Sun. Credit Cards Accepted, Full Bar, Reservations, Wheel-Chair Accessible, $$-$$$$

This article appears in the January-February 2009 issue of Alameda Magazine
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