De tapas con Quique Dacosta

The thrice-Michelin-starred chef has presented his latest book, De Tapas con Quique Dacosta, at his restaurants in Valencia, offering a tour of the experiences and flavours of MercatBar, Vuelve Carolina, El Poblet (1*) and Quique Dacosta Restaurante (3*) in Denia. Those present enjoyed an in-situ sampling of the creations that the Extremaduran chef included in his most recent book.

This fifth publication by the chef includes 80 recipes: 20 from each of the concepts currently on offer in each of his restaurants. Dacosta, whose creative roots are nourished both by the Mediterranean and by new cuisines from all over the world, offers readers a journey that will delight food lovers.

Published by Grijalbo, it begins with a prologue by the well-known Spanish actor Juan Echanove, who highlights the value of the book and reveals his love of these kinds of dishes, and declares: “I’m a Dacosta-ist.”

“I wanted to commit to paper this gourmet journey revolving around tapas, staying true to my principles, because I owe it all to books and I wanted to give something back. With this work I am also trying to encourage people to cook, and it is just as suitable for cooking enthusiasts as it is for professionals,” said the chef during the El Poblet launch.

Last year was one of the most rewarding of Quique Dacosta’s career: Thanks to his research and dialogue with other disciplines, it was a period during which he led a multitude of projects that allowed him to evolve and implement new concepts and methods of expression in his cooking.

Throughout his professional career, he has always captured his culinary creations in several books: Más Allá de los Sabores (Beyond Flavours, 2001), Arroces Contemporáneos (Contemporary Rice Dishes, 2005), and Quique Dacosta 2000-2006 (2009), which was awarded the National Gastronomy Prize for publication of the year. In 2015 he published 3. Quique Dacosta, covering the dishes served in 2012, the year in which he received his third Michelin star. At the end of last year he published the catalogue of the exhibition Quique Dacosta: Paisajes Transformados (Transformed Landscapes) which compiles new unpublished material and other collaborations with important figures from the world of culture and the media, via a conceptual route revealing the inner world and creative process developed by the renowned chef to construct and define his cooking style.

The chef, Extremaduran by birth and Valencian by adoption, recently launched the menu “Fronteras” (Boundaries) for the 2016 season and has turned the Quique Dacosta Restaurante, which has received maximum recognition from the Michelin guide and features on Restaurant magazine’s prestigious list “The World’s 50 Best Restaurants”, into an international symbol of haute cuisine.