He was able to survive the bombings of war, a dictatorship, the Spanish transition, a terrorist attack and even the times of the Internet. Boadas, the historic cocktail bar on the Rambla, affectionately nicknamed by professionals in the sector as The Church, has just turned 90 years old without moving the furniture even a bit. Everything remains intact here: the essence, the cocktails, the service and above all the memories of the countless personalities who have passed through there.
There are those who say that she has managed to remain unbeatable because there is a special energy in her. "Once a mystic told us that he has that golden feeling because the space is triangular. You enter and you are so relaxed that you come back," explains Jerónimo Vaquero, who spent 51 years behind his bar. At 14 he met María Dolores Boadas, the teacher, the queen of Boadas, who had inherited from her father - Miguel Boadas - the know-how of a bar that this Cuban projected almost as the Barcelona branch of his longed-for Floridita.
Vaquero found in the Boadas, and also in Tío Pepe (José Luis Maruenda, María Dolores' husband) not only a team to join, but also a family. This explains why "the mother", as she affectionately called María Dolores in recent years, did not hesitate to leave him in charge of the cocktail bar when she retired from it.
Eager to continue persevering the legacy of Boadas, a year ago Vaquero (who will turn 67 next week) decided to let two of the most renowned bartenders in the country enter the business: Marc Álvarez and Simone Caporale, who, although they lead the vanguard of cocktails with their acclaimed Sips, they ensure that nothing will change at Boadas. "It is a museum, an international reference, a business that is not only part of history, but also of my history," says Álvarez, remembering what this place meant to him 20 years ago, when he was still dedicated to serving caipirinhas and mojitos to the tourists on the Costa Brava.
"As soon as you crossed the door you discovered a magical world," he adds, stating that the second time he entered Boadas, sitting in front of the bar, he found Joan Manuel Serrat. He was not the only personality who frequented this cocktail bar, but Antonio Machín, Xavier Cugat, Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí, Federico García Lorca, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, Greta Garbo, Manuel Vázquez Montalbán and Kevin Costner also did so.
"The last famous person I saw enter Boadas was Antonio Banderas," says Vázquez, remembering how for a few months they even had a borrowed Goya award on their shelves. "In Boadas there was always a good atmosphere, although at noon there were always many more intellectuals. Lawyers, journalists -La Vanguardia in those times was next door- or writers who passed by there. In those times we even served coffee after dinner."
Boadas knew how to become a reference in international cocktails for multiple reasons: that pour or shot that Miguel Boadas imported from Cuba to Europe in years in which information traveled much more slowly than now; or those classic cocktails that at the time were pure avant-garde. Like the Bambú, a drink with dry and fine sherry vermouth in equal parts to which they added a drop of Campari because orange bitter did not yet exist in Spain and resources were much more limited. "Many people wonder why this cocktail is pink at Boadas and not orange. They say they don't understand it, and that's normal, because it is a historical cocktail," defends Álvarez.
To commemorate everything experienced and celebrate what remains to be experienced, this year Boadas will host a series of exclusive events during the months of October to December. They will be open to all mixology lovers, the most faithful parishioners and those curious who want to join the celebration.
As part of the anniversary, next spring the iconic Boadas cocktail bar will be brought to the terrace of the Duquesa de Cardona hotel, where its nine decades of history will be remembered through different drinks.
Work is also underway on a new book for which thousands of photographs are being digitized. Although this will take a little time: "There are so many memories... It takes years to collect everything!" concludes Jerónimo Vázquez.
