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WHEN WE called for the interview we caught Alba Pau, driving force of Can Pau restaurant, planting petunias in a garden which she defines as wonderful: “My mother used to tell me that when I was a little girl, when I went out to the garden, I used to leave my bad mood there”, she says laughing. That garden is a soothing balm and also the setting for conversations that start after the midday meal and stretch for hours on end. “After-dinner conversations are never-ending; it was that way in my parents’ time and the tradition carries on.
Alba Pau is 67 years old and is still, in her own words, running full steam ahead: “And I will be doing so as long as I can.My two sons already form part of the business, one in the kitchen and the other in the dining room, which allows me more free time,” she says.
Can Pau is a traditional Ibiza farmhouse, a quasi museum. Little has changed inside since her brothers saw this farm and decided to settle here to, at first, set up an eatery where they would serve fuet, bread with tomato… “The farm belonged to the home de pau, the Justice of the Peace of Santa Gertrudis, and we thought it was a good omen that the word Pau (peace) formed part of both our names”, she says.
Alba was born in Bañolas, Gerona, but has lived in Ibiza from the age of 16. “I always call myself a Bañolas native because I revisit there for a few days each year when the Ibiza season ends and all the celebrities leave. I go there to find my roots and to be myself again”. She inherited the restaurant genes from her mother’s family; her mother and grandmother were both cooks and her mother ran an inn as well. “I can’t tell you how much I love my profession, it’s my whole life. And the good thing is that with my children in the business I have more time to devote to my other passion project: helping children who are victims of domestic violence and those with special needs. I have spent the past 25 years working with them through the Conciencias Foundation,” she says. Just a few days before the interview she had hosted a luncheon for them.
About the dishes, he says that they can’t keep up with the eggs and potatoes: “Once Lucio asked me what the secret was and I told him that there was no secret, that the hens are ours and that when the diner eats them, they have only been laid for a day. And of course, then there is the Ibizan potato…”. In the menu, they appear as the starred eggs from Ibiza and, as the restaurant itself states in its own networks, “you may have tried many but, although it is wrong for us to say so, there are none like ours”.
“Many ask me what the secret is to our success, and I always reply that our suc- cess springs from the fact of never having been trendy and always remaining true to tradition”, in the words of this feisty and tireless woman.
Where is Can Pau? Carrer Sant Miquel, Km 2, 7, 07814 Ibiza
Highlighted photo: Valentina Riccardi