Spanish bars are desperately searching for ways to save the tradition of tapas
Ricardo Cases for Insider
- The COVID-19 pandemic hit Spain's hospitality sector hard.
- It's now facing another crisis, with one of the country's most famous traditions now under threat.
- Insider spoke to several tapas restaurateurs in Spain about how they're dealing with rising prices.
MADRID, Spain — On summer nights, customers fill Madrid's terraces to the brim, with beers and plates of tapas — small appetizers served with drinks — arriving at tables one after the other.
"Here you order a couple of beers and you've already had dinner, and seeing how expensive everything is, that's quite a big thing," a customer at La Pequeña Graná, one of the bars, said.
Lifelong neighbors, university students, and tourists all flock this bar in the capital's Delicias district, where for 1.70 euros, or around $1.80, you can get a beer accompanied by a free plate of tapas you choose from over 20 options.
Simón, the manager, served his bestseller — a plate of fried cheese with honey — and began to break down each ingredient for Insider: "Cheese and honey have gone up by 15% and 35% respectively; bread and egg, for the batter, by 10% and 60%; and oil, for frying, by 100%. Not to mention the electricity bill."
Two years into the pandemic, the hospitality industry, one of the sectors that COVID-19 restrictions affected the most in Spain, is facing another crisis.
Inflation has hit and brought with it soaring energy and raw-material costs.
According to data from Hostelería de España, which represents the hospitality industry in Spain, the price of cooking oils — excluding olive oil — was up by around 96% in April 2022 compared to April last year, and energy was up 42% over the same period.
These costs are now threatening one of Spain's most famous gastronomic traditions.
Simón said that they're trying everything to be able to keep offering free tapas, from raising the price of other dishes to removing tapas that are too expensive.
"We offer bienmesabe as a dish, but we've had to remove it as a tapas plate because it was too expensive to prepare. Keeping it was a utopia," he said.
At Entre Cáceres y Badajoz, a tapas bar in the Goya neighborhood of Madrid, Esteban Auqui had another technique to reduce costs. "We decided to remove mugs. Instead, we serve glasses, something in between, they carry less beer and so lower the cost. We can't change the tapas because the restaurant would lose its identity," he said.
León, around 200 miles from Madrid, has one of the longest tapas-serving traditions in Spain.
"You even get tapas with your coffee here. Until recently, there was a little war to see who could offer the biggest plate of tapas, but that's over," Paula Álvarez, the manager of the Asociación de Hostelería de León — which represents the hospitality industry in León — said.
Álvarez said each business was trying something different to get through the crisis. "Most have raised the price of drinks, others are changing the tapas and serving something more affordable or smaller, some have lowered the quality, and some are starting to offer different prices depending on whether the drink is with or without a plate of tapas," she said.
But she was adamant that "León would not stop serving tapas, it is one of our great attractions."
Ricardo Cases for Insider
"The tapas in a bar are crucial, they're the litmus test that we have to pass with a customer. If you like it, you order the dish," Félix Presencio, who owns two establishments in León's barrio romántico — Cafe Bar Cantabrín and La Otra Abacería — said.
Presencio told Insider how rising prices and the supply crisis has forced him to stop offering his star dish – ensaladilla ucraniana, or "Ukrainian salad" — which he also served as a plate of tapas.
"I always try to guarantee the best quality for each product I serve," he said.
The oil comes from Córdoba, the piquillo peppers come from El Bierzo, the beef chorizo comes from Astorga, and the anchovies come from Barbate, he said. He wouldn't reveal where he got the mayonnaise, the key ingredient, from.
"I was the only one who bought that mayonnaise in León, but the distributor told me that it's not profitable for him to deliver it to me because of the rise in costs," Presencio said.
"I tried another one, but people told me it wasn't my salad," he said.
He said the same thing has happened with his piquillo peppers, which he used to buy from a group of women who roasted them on stones.
"Now I can't find them anywhere, and I'm searching endlessly so that the dish doesn't disappear," Presencio said.
Ricardo Cases for Insider
Presencio added that he thinks many bars will disappear in the fight to keep tapas alive.
Insider also spoke to restaurateurs in another Spanish region famous for its tapas: Andalusia.
The Taberna Uvedoble in Málaga is an award-winning tapas bar, offering one of the city's classic tapas experiences. But it too has had to remove dishes from its menu.
"Scallops have gone up a lot so we've removed them, as well as everything with duck meat," Willie Orellana, the owner and chef, said.
"We're already taking some losses because we can't just add huge price increases to the menu."
"Businesses want to maintain the quantity and quality of their tapas to keep their customers, but if the prices of raw materials rise and we don't adjust the prices on the menu, it's the hospitality industry that will be the most affected. We have no way to combat inflation but by raising prices," Gregorio Garcia, the president of the Federación Provincial de Empresas de Hostelería y Turismo de Granada, said.
"Beer has just gone back up about 7% and profit margins are already at a minimum," García added.
David Pasadas owns Cervecería Pasadas, located in Íllora, Granada, another city famous for its tapas. According to him, the recent increases in the prices of sugary drinks and beer barely leave any margin to keep offering traditional tapas plates.
"We'll have to raise the prices of drinks if things go on like this. It's currently at two euros and we'll have to start charging 2.50 euros if we want to avoid losses," he said.
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