El Conjuro

Antonio Lorenzo at the pass

A scallop lands first, then the sauce pulls the plate into place. Chef Antonio Lorenzo works at El Conjuro in Granada with that kind of bistro grammar: recognizable ingredients, arranged with enough pressure to move them away from habit. His public profile is closely tied to this house rather than spread across a long itinerary of previous kitchens. That matters here, because the restaurant reads as a chef’s station more than a brand exercise. The hand is visible in the choice of dishes, in the way northern Spanish references sit beside Andalusian context, and in the room’s willingness to let a croquette, an artichoke, or a plate of chicken carry more than comfort.

Lorenzo’s published role is plain: chef of El Conjuro. The restaurant does not build a large public mythology around his training or mentors, so the useful reading stays at the bench. He is the person attached to the kitchen’s expression, and the menu gives that expression its measure: oysters, smoked anchovies, truffled croquettes, BBQ octopus with sobrasada, pitu de caleya chicken with mole, pork in beet sauce. The register is not strict regional preservation. It is a cook’s argument with familiar Spanish materials, made in Granada and sent into a dining room that allows both à la carte ordering and a longer tasting sequence.

A bistro method with a tasting spine

The kitchen works in two tempos. One is the à la carte bistro tempo, where a guest can stay with a small run of plates and wine. The other is the tasting menu, listed for 2025, which gives Lorenzo and the team a more deliberate progression. That structure suits a place whose cooking depends on turns of flavor rather than ceremony. An oyster trilogy can open the appetite without becoming precious; smoked anchovies can keep their salinity; artichokes can hold the center of a plate when the kitchen gives them enough char, fat, or lift.

The most telling dishes are the ones that put comfort under strain. Truffled croquettes stay inside the Spanish bar vocabulary, but the perfume changes the pace. BBQ octopus with sobrasada joins smoke, paprika, and marine firmness in a single gesture. An Asturian bird enters a darker, longer sauce language. Pork in beet sauce does something similar with sweetness and earth. None of this requires a rigid fine-dining script. It asks for seasoning, heat control, and a pass that knows when a plate has enough on it.

The room around the plates

El Conjuro’s Granada room sits in the modern bistro lane: polished, informal, and built for food and wine to share the center of the table. The official face of the house gives equal weight to the restaurant menu and the wine list, which tells its own story. This is not a room where the glass trails behind the plate. The wine program is part of the meal’s architecture, especially when the kitchen moves from anchovy to artichoke, from octopus to pitu de caleya, from beet sauce to truffle.

The room’s tone matters because Lorenzo’s cooking needs a little looseness around it. A plate can carry Asturian memory, a bistro form, and a Granada address without being forced into explanation. The counterpoint is the service style: upscale casual rather than hushed. Plates arrive with enough polish for a tasting menu, but the room keeps the food close to appetite. The pass remains the fixed point.

Granada as the frame

El Conjuro is Michelin-listed, with one current award attached to the restaurant, but the kitchen’s more durable signal is its placement: a Granada bistro using Spanish products and a flexible format to make a specific house voice. Lorenzo does not need a long public lineage for the work to be legible. The menu does that plainly, especially when the dish reaches the table at El Conjuro.