Disfrutar In Barcelona Just Became The 2024 World's Best Restaurant

One decade ago, Oriol Castro Forns, Eduard Xatruch Cerro, and Mateau Casañas Puignau opened the doors of Disfrutar in Barcelona. Within a year, the restaurant received accolades for its impressive interior design from Restaurant and Bar Awards, and in subsequent years the restaurant and its chefs have earned multiple other esteemed awards as well. Now, the three Michelin-starred restaurant known for its innovative yet playful cuisine has been rated as the world's number one restaurant in 2024 by The World's 50 Best Restaurants.

Disfrutar, which translates to "enjoy" in English, had appeared on the list previously including landing at number 18 in 2018 and taking second place last year. The restaurant offers diners the option of two tasting menus, The Classic and The Festival, each of which consist of approximately 30 courses. The former menu pays homage to the chefs' all-time favorites featuring dishes that incorporate concoctions like spherical pesto and caviar-filled donuts. Meanwhile, The Festival highlights the trio's most recent innovations. For the ultimate experience of enjoying the restaurant's innovations, diners can also choose to book The Living Table experience, with seating for up to six in the restaurant's R&D kitchen.

Landing a reservation at Disfrutar is notoriously challenging and the restaurant's recent award will likely not make it any easier. Plan to book at least a year ahead of time. For another taste of the chefs' cuisine, you can also try their other restaurant Compartir with locations in Barcelona and Cadaqués.

The World's Best 50 Restaurants awards began over two decades ago, initially by a British magazine called "Restaurant." Eventually, the organization separated from the magazine and grew from only a few hundred voters to over a thousand.

The participants in the voting process come from varied backgrounds ranging from chefs and food writers to restaurateurs and critics throughout the 27 designated voting regions. Each of the experts is allowed ten votes, seven of which can be awarded in their own region while three or more can be given to restaurants outside of where they reside. 

Voters also must have dined at the restaurants they choose within the previous year and a half and also can not have any stake in the restaurant. Like many rankings and awards in the industry, the voters remain anonymous and the entire voting process is kept in confidence. And, several years ago, the award-giving organization also acquired The World's 50 Best Bars.

Meanwhile, if you're already familiar with The World's 50 Best awards, you may have noted that last year U.S. eateries were scarce on the list. This year remains the same, with only two U.S.-based restaurants on the list: Atomix in New York City secured the sixth spot and SingleThread in Healdsburg, California was ranked 46th.