To Bulli or not to Bulli

After our pilgrimage to San Sebastian to eat at two of the world's top restaurants (Mugaritz and Asador Etxebarri), we've set our sights a little higher this year. In fact, we've set our sights to the top, numero uno, El Bulli. The restaurant is closing in 2012, and I'm leaving Spain this summer to return to business school, so we figured this was the year to eat there. El Bulli has been ranked the number one restaurant in the world for the last four years, and in 2002. The chef, Ferran Adrià, the forefather of the molecular gastronomy movement, is considered a god among chefs. The 3-star Michelin restaurant only serves 8,000 diners a year, and gets over 2 millions reservation requests during the 15 day period that it accepts reservations.

This year, a few of those reservation requests were ours. Between Lee, our friend David and me, we've sent 6 reservation requests. They've started to respond to them slowly. Four have been rejected, and we're waiting to hear on two of them. It's become something of an obsession for us - checking other blogs and twitters to figure out what our chances are and how to increase our odds. We've thought about getting letters of recommendation from Carles Abellan, the chef at our beloved Tapas 24. Maybe we should stalk Ferran's little brother, Albert (also the pastry chef at El Bulli), at his restaurant Inopia. Lee and I are considering driving up to Roses a few times so that they know our face in addition to weekly calls to check for cancellations.

I'm still not giving up hope. Stay tuned for updates.