Sometimes an idea sounds so right, particularly when it comes to you in a flash and it turns out the same idea is running through your friend’s mind and you both say, “Hey, I have a great idea …”

When that happens, before you know it, you might find yourself eating every item on a restaurant menu and wondering how this happened.

Simply put, some conversations just lead to “Why not?”

Pantà Memphis delivers Catalan flavor, snack-sized and served late

Why not eat all the dishes at places that might have unfamiliar food — and a small enough menu to tackle.

And here we are, giving it a try. It won’t happen everywhere. But it might at places that are newer and you might not know what to order. Places such as Pantà, where the food is Catalan, it’s all small plates and the restaurant has been open almost a year.

I’m not, be warned, here or anywhere, going to drink every cocktail. I’m also unlikely to eat every dessert, unless it’s a very well-edited selection.

At Pantà, where there are three small menus, it was easy enough to eat it all over several visits.

So I ate all the food, with people who know a thing or two about food themselves and we talked it over, but the final list is mine, best to least-favorite, and for good or bad. Rate them yourself and let me know how your list and mine compare.

Late-night menu

I say give me the late-night menu anytime, but they say nah, you can have it after 10 p.m. and we’ll throw you a bone and also give it to you Sunday night. 

There are six items on this menu, all recommended, and everything together costs $60. Three of us split it all, had plenty of food, and enjoyed — more about this coming — the make your own gin and tonic flight, too.

1. Mushroom bikini, $8: This couldn’t be simpler, but you learn something every day and I never knew that mushrooms and tarragon were such a match. It’s a grilled cheese sandwich, made with mozzarella, sherry-roasted mushrooms sweetened with a licorice-tarragon kiss, dressed with a bit of grilled onion and aioli. The crust is cut off the bread and it’s cut in triangular quarters that resemble bikini bottoms, hence the name.

2. Loaded brava fries, $10: I love French fries, and The Second Line, Pantà’s sister restaurant that shares a kitchen, makes some of the best in town. But I’m real picky about loaded fries and dislike more of them than I like — I don’t want cheese sauce making my fries soggy. No worries here. The fries are covered with brava sauce, which seems thinned more to a hot sauce consistency than the thicker sauce on the patatas bravas. It’s also topped with a generous amount of pulled duck, grilled green onions, a rich and runny fried egg and a shower of snipped fresh green onion.

3. Brava burger, $12: Do you remember the monster burger served at Iris’ bar? This is reminiscent of that glorious beast, but it’s smaller and sprightlier. It’s dressed with — get this — olive pickles, and if you don’t know what that is, here you go: Cucumbers pickled in olive brine. I didn’t know either, but what a creative example of waste-not, want-not from Pantà chef Patric Kee. Mozzarella cheese oozes over the top, and you get the grilled onions and brava sauce treatment again. The burger itself is good, hand-formed and tender with a few lacy edges, and it’s on a brioche bun.

Listen to Kelly English talk about his new restaurant, Pantà

4. Secreto Philly, $12: You’ll see the secreto pork on the Catalan menu, where it’s close to the top of my list, and read a little more about it there. Here it’s served sandwich style with grilled onions, green peppers and plenty of that very popular mozzarella. And all that’s good, but it’s the deep flavor of the pork that makes this stand out.

5. Albondiga sub, $10: Meatballs, tomato sauce and burnt lemon aioli on a roll and guess what? No mozzarella! The meatballs are the star here. They’re tender — nothing worse than a tight and tough meatball — and flavored with paprika, onion and maybe a whiff of cinnamon?

6. Catalan hot dog, $8: I love a grilled hot dog, and this one is dressed with garlic aioli and escalivada, a hearty relish of grilled onion, peppers and eggplant. It’s last on the list because something has to be, not because it’s not good. As I said, the late-night menu has got it going on.

Traditional Catalan menu

These are the foods of Barcelona, where Pantà owner Kelly English spent about six months when he was in college and where he was inspired to become a chef. The menu changes now and again, but the main ingredient — the beef, the pork, the shrimp and so on —generally remain the same.

1. Costella de Vedella i Bolets, $15. These are essentially chunks of beef, reminiscent of kabobs, served with mushrooms and red pepper with shishito peppers draped over the top. The peppers are often called Russian Roulette peppers because you never know if you might bite into a fiery one. We didn’t — these were all mild — but here it was really about the beef anyway. It was tender and flavorful, grilled just enough for a hint of smoke. And the portion was generous.

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2. Secreto a la Plantxa, $15. These first two could switch places easily; both are hearty, filling dishes for meat lovers. Secreto is the name of the cut, one of many that over the years have migrated from the butcher’s table to the meat case. It’s trimmed from the outside of the pork shoulder and the flavor is intense, rich like beef. Here it’s thinly sliced like a flank steak, seared with an herb crust, served with crushed olives, chiles, olive oil and Marcona almonds scattered over the top.

3. Cimi Tomba, $15. This is Pantà’s take on a fish and potato stew and it’s apt to change, as I’ve eaten it a couple of different ways. But it’s always been good and right now, it’s a piece of flaky roasted cod served on a creamy sauce of melted potatoes, fish stock and olive oil. Add in grilled onions and a few Brussels sprouts.

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4. Patatas bravas, $8. Order these with any meal, because they are the French fry of this world. Roughly diced cubes of potatoes are crisp and covered with a blanket of brava sauce, a creamy mix of olive oil, paprika, garlic, onion, red pepper, a dash of sherry vinegar and maybe a bit of tomato.

5. Gambas al Ajillo, $14. We all love shrimp in garlic sauce, from scampi in an Italian restaurant to camarones al mojo de ajo in a Mexican restaurant. Here, four big shrimp are nestled around a small mound of olives, swimming in a garlicky, lemony bath. Take note that as with several dishes at Pantà, you’ll want to request bread to go with this one.

6. Tortilla, $11. At Pantà, the potatoes for the tortilla, which is a big round omelet/fritatta, are sliced. I’ve eaten tortillas with diced potatoes, which tend to be eggier and this one leans spud-like. It’s simple and hearty, a pie-slice of potatoes, served, when I had it, with a simple salad alongside.

7. Coca de Recapte amb Samfaina, $11. I love squash and expected to find it grilled on toasted bread. But this is more like a flatbread, with the squash cooked on dough instead and the bread was too soft and lacked flavor. But my friend and I stopped eating at one bite because the garlic, which wasn’t listed on the menu, was overpowering. I say keep the squash, work on the bread, and please, give the garlic another think.

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8. Botifarra amb Escalivada, $14. This one wasn’t for me. The meat is generously seasoned with warm spices and much too heavy with clove for my taste. But it’s a hearty sausage, served now with roasted eggplant, red peppers and olive oil (on top of white beans when I ate it). It’s stayed on the menu since the restaurant opened, so my opinion is a minority one.

Menjar Panta

This is the mashup menu, food inspired by Memphis and Barcelona. At one time there were potato croquettes stuffed with Payne’s barbecue, though not at present. This menu seems to change with more frequency, too.

1. Pulpo amb Llimona Cremat, $14. Done right, octopus is divine, though people will hate on you for eating it after the “My Octopus Teacher” documentary. At Pantà, it’s tender (and often sold out, so beware) and has recently been given a fresh bed of creamy lemon sauce, crushed olives, sizzled hazelnuts and dollops of salsa verde.

2. Rotla de Remolatxa, $9. It’s beets. And here’s how much I love beets and tarragon. It’s supposed to be served on grilled baguette, but our bread was cold, cut right from the loaf and plopped on the plate. But the beets, glossy in their coat of olive oil, served with sweet piquillo peppers, roasted garlic aioli and tender sprigs of tarragon, were so good that it’s my second-favorite thing from this menu. We didn’t really eat the bread, but scooped the beets with forks and ate the small pieces of bread that had sauce on them.

3. Albondigas Catalana, $13. As mentioned above, meatballs are all about the texture. If they’re too tight, they can’t get any flavor inside and that’s no good (same holds true for meatloaf, by the way). Too loose and they fall apart. Here the meatballs are consistent, just right. Served with tomatoes and crushed olives, this is one of those dishes where you’ll want a little bread on the side.

4. Musclos a la Suquet, $13. The mussels were clean and plump, the serving generous (and bread came with the dish), but the flavor needs a boost. It’s good, but not quite there, and truly, it could be as simple as adding a little more salt to the broth of white wine flavored with saffron and tomato. Or maybe throw a little brava sauce in the mix?

5. Ensaladilla Ucraïna, $13. This is potato salad, and who knew it’s ubiquitous all over Spain? (Or maybe just about everywhere — everyone has a family potato salad recipe.) In Spain it’s common for it to contain tuna, but here there are chunks of chopped shrimp in it, along with crushed olives on top. It’s made with a charred green onion aioli, but there’s a sweetness to it that was more appealing to my dining companion than to me. Nothing wrong with it, just not my favorite.

6. Canalon de Anec, $13. This is a popular dish, one diners are digging, and I undoubtedly ate it on an off-night. It’s pulled duck seasoned with harissa, wrapped in a fresh pasta sheet and topped with bechamel. All the elements are there, but the bottom of the pasta was seriously overcooked, as in hard to cut with a knife and fork, and the sauce was very thick. My guess is this lingered in the kitchen before it made it to our table.

And more

There is a snacks section at Pantà, but two of the items change daily so they don’t fit here (one is a vegetable snack and the other a lamb chop). The others — small bowls of olives, Marcona almonds and grilled green onions in romesco sauce — don’t really need an explanation, except perhaps for the sauce. It’s a hearty, delicious and thick sauce made of nuts, red peppers, tomatoes, olive oil and sometimes bread.

We’ll not spend much time on dessert — I didn’t eat all of them — but if there’s fresh ice cream studded with pieces of lemon icebox pie, order it. And don’t be put off by the description of the crème Catalan when you read it contains cinnamon and lemon, which doesn’t sound good; it is. The flourless chocolate cake was served chilled both times I’ve had it, and meh, I’d prefer it at room temperature.

David Quarles IV details design vision of Kelly English’s Pantà

And there are drinks, friends. Spain is all about the gin and tonic, and you should do the flight at least once. You pick three 1-ounce pours from a growing list of gins, which are delivered with your choice of tonic and a nice board of sliced citrus and fresh herbs. Taste the gin first, then have at it. Have a contest, make it fun.

(Sunday nights, by the way, are particularly made for fun, with the late-night menu and a killer soundtrack of mixes and covers put together by Pantà manager Aaron Ivory.)

There are four signature gin and tonics, and my pick is No. 4, Gin Raw Barcelona, served in an oversized stemmed glass with rosemary, bay leaf, an orange slice and Fever Tree Indian Tonic. But they’re all good, and there are plenty of Spanish wines plus a small selection of sherry and vermouth and a full cocktail list if gin and tonic is not your thing.

But you know what they say. When in Barcelona …

Pantà, 2146 Monroe Ave., gets new hours next week when it opens on Mondays. Hours will be Thursday, 5:30-11 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 5:30 p.m.-midnight; Sunday 4-8 p.m.; and Monday 5:30-11 p.m. Call 901-417-7491 or click here for reservations.