Casa Francis is a traditional guachinche at Santa Catalina, near the TF-5 motorway on the north coast. It opens from around November to February and is shut the rest of the year — and if you are here in that window, it is one of the more genuinely local meals available.
The season is the whole story
A guachinche is a wine grower’s own kitchen, and under Canary Islands rules it can only trade for roughly four months a year, or until the wine it made that season is sold. Then it closes.
Casa Francis runs its window over the winter. That makes it one of the few things in this guide that is better in January than in August — worth knowing if you are choosing dates, since the north coast is quieter and cheaper then anyway.
We have written a fuller explanation of guachinches, because the rules explain a lot of otherwise baffling behaviour.
What to expect
Simple, inexpensive, local. Marinated pork, rabbit, papas arrugadas with mojo, cheese, and the house wine in a jug. Long tables, a handwritten board, cash.
Our hosts describe it as very popular with locals and advise going early or late to avoid a wait. That is the reliable signal: a guachinche full of people from the next village is doing it right.
Getting there
It sits near the TF-5, which makes it easy to reach by car and unremarkable to look at. Do not let that put you off — this is a category of place where the setting is never the point.