Lisa C.
Yelp
I had a friend visiting London over the weekend and her request for dinner was Spanish. I was a bit hesitant about bringing tourists to the Brixton area, where most of them would never go, but I gave her some restaurant suggestions and she liked Boqueria so we booked in for dinner on a Saturday evening. After dinner we ended up on Clapham High Street, and I'd recommend coming from that direction if you fancy a much more pleasant walk through a largely residential area. Inside it is very nicely furnished and decorated, and there were several dates going on but it was only about half full.
We were recommended to order 3 tapas each, and we had a group of 5 so we ended up with 13 and that was more than enough food. That was nearly everything that I was interested in on the menu. Everything we had was absolutely delicious, and a lot of them even came in fives (like the prawns and the croquettes), which I'm quite sure was a nice touch by the restaurant! And they arrive in waves, so you are not overwhelmed all at once. The staff was extremely friendly and very attentive.
To start, we got the pan con tomate, which was extremely tasty because of the very generous servings of garlic. The patatas bravas was a huge mound of crispy potato cubes with a big creamy dressing. I feel like sometimes this can be more tomato based, but this was closer to a Thousand Island dressing. The croquettes were extremely large; I feel like sometimes I get croquettes half or a third of this size! The calamari were traditional rings, nothing too fancy but I liked the green aioli sauce that came with it. The padron peppers and octopus were also great - and these are large plates with like 15-20 pieces, so don't think of them as small tapas! The grilled vegetables were recommended and it was a selection of bell peppers, aubergine, etc that was nice to get a balance in the meal (nothing you can't make at home though).
The lamb chops, beef tenderloin, and suckling pig were all recommended and absolutely delicious. I thought the beef tenderloin was pretty interesting; you don't see foie gras much in Spanish cuisine and it was one large tartine that I cut into five pieces. The suckling pig was also a standout; the lemon sorbet pairing is more like something you would see in fine dining, and it definitely impressed. In addition, we got the grilled king prawns, which come with the shell on, and the arroz negro that came with two mussels and one prawn. We must have gotten one of the specials too but it escapes me right now.
In addition to all that, we had 2 bottles of red wine, priced reasonably with a house option under £20 and many options in the £20-30 range. And the bill for our feast came out to about £30 a person. I think this is truly a neighbourhood gem that could charge much more and be completely packed if it was in another location, like literally just a few blocks down the road in Clapham! In the meantime, definitely get yourself here and enjoy the delicious food and the relaxed dining experience. This is infinitely better than queueing for tapas at Brindisa and night and day compared to my recent traumatising experience at Dehesa!