Calçotada de Valls Festival 2023: programme and new route

Past edition · archive 2023Historical programme and chronicle for 2023. Locations and amounts should be consulted again for any future edition.

The 2023 edition

Date: 29 Jan 2023
Location: Valls (Tarragona)
Edition: 41st Gran Festa de la Calçotada

The great novelty: an area to sit and share the calçotada

The 2023 route connected the Blat, l'Oli and Pati squares with the Societat Agrícola. There the tasting pack was collected and tables, chairs, bar service and embers were installed for those who wanted to complete the meal with meat or sausage. The change allowed the concentration of spectators to be separated from the areas intended for eating.

The advertised tasting pack cost 12 euros and included a dozen calçots, sauce, cava, bread, bib, orange and water. The presentation also incorporated music and after-dinner proposals. In the programme archive you can see how a festival focused on the morning prolonged its activity around the tasting.

Documentation: Organisation: the Gran Festa de la Calçotada returns with new features

A city full of calçots and shared work

The organisers estimated around 35,000 visitors and approximately 2,300 tasting portions. They considered attendance to have returned to pre-pandemic levels and reported a positive response to the new area. Their report described visitors from several countries, alongside people from Catalonia and the rest of Spain.

The ARA chronicle focused on the work of the volunteers at Plaça de l'Oli and the movement that the festival generated in butcher shops and businesses. That look helps to understand what is behind the photographs: while some follow the contests, others prepare the grills, serve food or attend to those who come to spend the day.

Documentation: Organisation: report of participation and 2023 contests · ARA: L’Adrià Wegrzyn, multicampió dels calçots

The result of the contest and the other protagonists

According to the organisation's report, Adrià Wegrzyn won with 221 calçots and 3,135 grams. He was followed by Ramón Caballero, with 215 and 2,440 grams, and Jordi Oller, with 375 and 2,280 grams. The third place had eaten more units than the first, but a lower weight: it is one of the clearest examples in the archive to understand the importance of weighing.

In the other competitions, Dani Rovira, from Torredembarra, won the first prize for growers and Andrea Cabrera, from Reus, the sauce prize. The festival thus recognised both the skill of the contestants and the agricultural work and the preparation of an accompaniment inseparable from calçotada.

Documentation: Organisation: report of participation and 2023 contests

How to read the 2023 programme

The brochure distributes the morning's activities across several venues: cooking in Plaça de l'Oli, competitions in Plaça del Blat, tasting at the Societat Agrícola and the eating contest in El Pati. It also includes a weekend market, cooking demonstrations, a wine area and activities for exploring the town.

Comparing this map with that of 2025 allows us to follow the evolution of the celebration. The tasting area already appears as its own point in 2023, while the cooking demonstrations still retain their previous location. To study the history of the festival, the locations are as useful information as the names of the winners.

Documentation: Official programme of the Gran Festa de la Calçotada 2023 · Organisation: presentation of the 43rd Gran Festa