Earlier this month I wrote a post asking for your suggestions for my solo trip to Barcelona.  I got some great suggestions (thanks again!) and I will be following up with a full trip report soon….stay tuned :)  One of the things I mentioned wanting to try was EatWith.com and since I haven’t heard much about it from other people I wanted to share my experience with you.

The website was pretty easy to use, I’d say even easier than AirBnB.  Just type in your city and the date that you want to dine.

As you can see the options are listed in chronological order and the price as well as rating are displayed.

Clicking on one of the options through to the detailed page is very much like the AirBnB site.  From here you can book the experience, view pictures, and read a short description, the menu and reviews from past guests.

As soon as you book your event you get an email telling you that they are saving your spot.  The host is supposed to confirm your spot within 24 hours.  Once they do, you get another email confirming your spot and this time they provide the address of the event location.  A word of caution: after my first event went so well, I booked another event but the host cancelled the day of.  This actually happened to me twice while I was in Spain due to a low number of people signing up for the event.  It was a bit frustrating because by the time they cancelled on me, the other events that I could have attended instead were already full so I was SOL for the evening.

While I was in Spain I attended 2 eatwith.com events.  The screenshots above are from the first event.  This was a fantastic experience, as you can see from the 5-start review that I left.  Angels & Carmen were the best hostesses (link to their events).  The cost was $72, there were 7 total guests, it lasted about 4 hours and wine and sangria were included.  The event was supposed to start at 5pm with a tour of the Boqueria Market but I didn’t show up until 6pm because google maps told me that the address was a 5 minute walk from my hotel which turned out to be very wrong.  They were kind enough to offer that I attend the tour portion of their next event and I’m so glad that I did.  I brought saffron and sopresada back to the US, both from the market.

After the market tour, we head back to their kitchen and start cooking.  Some eatwith.com events are not interactive but this one was a cooking class so all of the attendants got the chance to prepare something we would be eating at the end of the evening.  We made the exact menu that you see in the screenshots above and all of it was delicious!

The 2nd event that I attended while in Barcelona was a dinner prepared by a chef that is well-known in Ibiza.  Winter is slow season in Ibiza so he rented an apartment for the winter in Barcelona to host eatwith.com events.  The event was $42, included wine and lasted about 3 hours.  There were a total of 8-9 guests.  Everything that he made was incredibly delicious and incredibly interesting (in a good way).  Unfortunately I didn’t get any photos from that evening because it was more of an intimate atmosphere (smaller venue, dimly lit, etc) and I didn’t want to bother the other guests by using a camera flash for every course.  I was also busy mingling with the other guests.  I do highly recommend checking him out if you are in Barcelona (link to his events).

In summary I really enjoyed these 2 experiences and I look forward to trying more eatwith.com events in other cities during my travels.  Everyone spoke English which was very nice, although I cannot say that about every EatWith.com city.  Let me know in the comments below if you have any questions and please let me know your thoughts if and when you try an event yourself!