Can Bo
Catalan / Italian Tapas · Ciutat Vella, Barcelona · €€€
Awards: Michelin Selection
Open since 2024
The Delekta Review
Oliver Peña spent years at elBulli, Comerç 24 and Enigma before running his own one-star Teatro Kitchen Bar. Here he's the creative advisor, and the day-to-day kitchen sits with Lorenzo Cavazzoni, a Genoese executive chef who came up through Rome and London. The room opened in October 2024 on the ground floor of the Grand Hotel Central — own street entrance off Via Laietana, facing the Roman wall on Plaça Juli Garreta — and inside seven months collected a Michelin Guide Selection, a Repsol Recomendado listing, and warm reviews from Philippe Regol and Laura Conde. The menu reads Catalan with an Italian undercurrent (tagliatelle al ragú de rabo de toro, plin of ossobuco, cacio e pepe artichokes) over a 150-reference cellar by sommelier Amador Marín. Tapas from four euros; serious sharing plates closer to fifteen.
What works
Two-chef structure makes the menu read coherently — Peña's Catalan-haute pedigree and Cavazzoni's Italian seasoning land in the same room without feeling like fusion. Genuine sourcing (Cerdanya chicken, El Prat artichokes, Ebro Delta mussels, Maresme strawberries, Santa Caterina and Boqueria for the markets) backs the talk. Wine program unusually serious for a tapas room — Amador Marín's 150-plus references, minimum-intervention focus. First-seven-months recognition has been heavy: Michelin Selection, Repsol Recomendado, warm reviews from Regol and Conde. The setting — Sagrada-designed room in the 1911 Casa Cambó, Roman wall through the window — punches above tapas-bar weight class.
Before you go
Peña is creative advisor, not the day-to-day chef — the cooking sits with Cavazzoni — and Peña has split focus since opening (Teatro closed, Mineral newly opened with Cristina Losada). Worth knowing before booking for the Peña badge alone. The room sits inside the Grand Hotel Central; the entrance is genuinely independent, but the hotel-restaurant association will still color expectations for some diners. Repsol's listing tags Coctelería/Vermutería alongside Mediterranean — those are form-fill defaults; no editorial source has yet reviewed the cocktail or vermut program as a draw, and wine is the only beverage that meaningfully carries.
What the critics say
- Can Bo — Time Out Barcelona
- Can Bo Vins i Tapes — Macarfi
- Lorenzo Cavazzoni, the Genoa native who wants to play in the Champions League from Barcelona
- Can Bo: la ensaladilla del chef Michelin Oliver Peña
- Can Bo (Hotel Central, Barcelona)
- Can Bo, mejor que en casa
- Obre Can Bo al Grand Hotel Central
- Can Bo: modernidad, tradición y sabor mediterráneo
- Oliver Peña opens Can Bo at the Grand Hotel Central Barcelona
Visit
- Address
- Via Laietana, 30, Sant Pere, Santa Caterina i la Ribera, 08003 Barcelona, Spain
- Phone
- +34 932 95 79 05
- Website
- canbo.es
- Reservations
- Book a table
Nearby restaurants in Ciutat Vella
- El Chigre 1769 — Catalan-Asturian / Sidrería, €€
- Shunka — Japanese / Sushi, €€€
- Bar El Pollo — Basque/Tapas, €
- Kiosko Universal — Seafood, €€
- Arraval — Catalan, €€
More Tapas in Barcelona
- La Cova Fumada — Traditional Catalan Tapas, Barceloneta, €
- Fino Bar — Wine Bar / Tapas, Gràcia, €€
- Bar Tomás — Tapas & Bravas, Sarrià-Sant Gervasi, €€
- Topik — Japanese-Catalan Fusion Tapas, Eixample, €€€
- Bar Mut — Classic Spanish Tapas & Wine, Eixample, €€€