RíasKru

It was a grey, blustery evening in Poble Sec, the sort that calls for stew, and I had booked a table for raw fish. Rarely has a plan looked so wrong and ended so well. The house style marries Galician product to a Japanese blade: buy superbly, cut precisely, then have the confidence to stop. There is nowhere to hide in cooking like this, and nothing here needs to. The pedigree is the Iglesias family, whose earlier rooms were Espai Kru and, before that, Rías de Galicia; that buying power is visible on every plate. Better still, the room refuses solemnity; you are expected to have a good time, not take notes. It sits at the dear end of casual, yet the gap between the bill and the pleasure runs, for once, in the diner's favour. Four or five dinners a year, and I resent none of them.