The first restaurant on my Valencia foodie bucket list was…closed.
Dusty metal shop shutters down, a notice taped on the front, and my tortilla de patata cravings left satisfied.
And the paella restaurant that had literally thousands of five-star reviews? Served us moldy bread. Twice! And the paella was disappointingly below average.
Even though I plan my foodie trips like an overqualified and underpaid project manager on her fifteenth red bull—scouring the internet for the best eats, diving into Google reviews, and coming up with a plan A, B, and C—things don’t always go as planned.
Yep, it still shocks me every time. “The unexpected” seems to love upending the plans of Type A travelers like me.
But despite the foodie mishaps that plagued my trip to Valencia, I still enjoyed a few truly spectacular eats that I definitely recommend devouring when you visit this beautiful Spanish city.
(And, of course, I’ll tell you exactly which ultra-popular paella restaurant to avoid.)
Horchata: Valencia’s Creamy Summer Drink
Despite living in Spain for over almost 5 years now, I had never been to Valencia until now. I had heard only incredible things about this city: orange-tree lined streets, endless beaches, and incredible paella. And of course, the birthplace of Spain’s famous summer drink: horchata.
So after an insane morning at La Tomatina—a ginormous tomato food in the streets of a small town outside of Valencia—we spent the afternoon at a cafe by our airbnb, sipping on horchata.
Unlike Latin America’s cinnamon-y horchata, which has a rice base, Valencia’s horchata is made from chufa (tiger nuts). This delicious superfood from Africa was brought to Spain during Muslim conquest of the Iberian Peninsula. Today, it’s grown all over the towns surrounding Valencia.
Valencia’s horchata is sweet, creamy, nutty, and has just a hint of cinnamon. It’s served cold and you can order it as a drink or in a slushie form. It’s traditionally served with fartones, sweet breadsticks that are light and airy, perfect for dipping in the horchata.
Where to try horchata in Valencia:
Trying The World’s Best Burger at Hundred Burgers
My hot take: Spain does burgers better than the US. I’ve been saying it for years now, and especially after enjoying so many incredible burgers at The Champion’s Burger foodie event.
And, apparently the world’s top burger connoisseurs agree, because they ranked Hundred Burgers, a burger joint that started in Valencia, Spain, as #1 on their ‘The World’s Best Burgers’ ranking—for two years in a row.
The cool thing about Hundred Burgers is that it all started because two friends began traveling the world in search of the best burger. And after trying over 300 burgers in 22 countries, their taste buds were ready to take the reins and start cooking. Their goal? Make the best burger at the best price.
But did they achieve it? Well, not quite.
I ordered the Satisfaction Burger: a delicious combination of two flavorful, 110-gram patties, American cheese, bacon, and smokey mayo. Here’s what I thought:
✅ The pros:
A LOT of meat—with two patties, this burger is a doozy. It’s 220 grams, which is about two serving sizes of meat, which means every bite is packed with the good stuff.
Good price—The burgers cost between €12-15 each, which is a fine price, especially for how much meat they have.
Awesome fries—Hundred Burgers has upleveled their fries to the max. They’re extra crispy, seasoned fries that are truly fantastic.
Solid burger options—They’ve got the classics, and then they’ve got burgers with spicy Korean gochujang sauce and peanut butter and BBQ sauce. The base of the entire menu is the bacon cheeseburger, which I applaud.
❌ The cons:
The patties could have been juicier. The meat was fine, but the burger ended up tasting mostly like meat. Nothing’s wrong with that, as long as it’s cooked perfectly, which unfortunately it wasn’t.
I need more sauce. The smokey mayo sauce was fantastic, but I need more of it. Especially with two patties. What can I say? I’m a sauce girl.
The bun to burger proportion was off. The bun has a tremendous influence on the burger’s taste—and this one was a little too bready and dry for me.
Hundred Burgers wasn’t the best burger I’ve tried (right now, that top spot belongs to a delicious burger I recently tried in Madrid). But, if you’re at Cabanyal beach and craving a burger, it’s a great option.
👀 Check out the menu here.
💸Price: €15-20 per person.
📍Location: Inside the Mercabañal food zone near Cabanyal beach. (You won’t see the restaurant name from the street, look for a sliding glass door with Mercabañal stickers on it, then go through the indoor seating area to the outdoor area, and up the stairs to the second floor.)
