Twitter Summary Review:
Good buzz, slow service. Reasonably priced, but average tapas. Decent wine & cocktails. Veggie & seafood dishes better than the meat.
Full Review:
A few friends were staying with me ahead of a wedding we were all going to yesterday, so we thought we'd have a leisurely stroll down to Camden for a few pints and a bite to eat. It was gone 9.30pm by the time we decided to put food choices to the vote. I nominated burgers at Hache but was outvoted in favour of tapas at Bar Gansa.
As we entered the place was full and really buzzing and we got a table near the front door, which is great for people watching. At 10.00pm on a Saturday though this was mainly an electic mix of drunk teenagers queueing for the off-licence next door!
Before I go any further I should declare that Spanish food is one of my favourites and i've been known to spend a small fortune at Brindisa - so my standards are high when it comes to tapas.
Anyway, back to the meal. We were waiting 20 minutes before anyone asked if we'd like a drink and we decided to order at the same time.
Three of us went for a selection of tapas, one for a seafood paella and one for a sizzling seafood dish.
Forty minutes and a couple of bottles of wine later the first tapas dishes arrived.
I tucked straight into the meatballs and stuffed yellow peppers (not red as it said on the menu). The meatballs were reasonable, but the sauce was fairly bland, however the peppers were pretty good with a generous helping of rice and melted cheese.
Next up was some disappointing and overcooked chorizo in red wine. I'm a bit obsessed with chorizo and love the texture and flavour, but this was fairly chewy and no better than you can get from your local supermarket.
My favourite dish was a bit of a surprise. The 'Tumbert' (a sort of aubergine lasagne) was excellent. It was what good tapas should be all about - simple food, well executed and with plenty of flavour.
Garlic king prawns were ok, though my friend wasn't too keen on pulling their heads off, which is something I find strangely satisfying. The dish I was most looking forward too was the Morcilla with black pudding and chilli pineapple salsa. Sadly, like the previous chorizo, the morcilla disappointed. In fact, i'm pretty sure it wasn't morcilla at all, but bog-standard British black pudding. Most people probably wouldn't have been able to tell the difference, but I could, it was drier and didn't crumble like the best morcilla i've had and the pineapple salsa just didn't work with it.
We had to pester the waiters to get us another bottle of wine whilst we waited for the two main dishes to arrive. For some reason they decided to wait until three of us had finished our tapas before bringing out the paella and platter, which meant it was gone 11.00p.m. by the time it arrived!
Both the paella and platter contained a generous amount of fish. I managed to nab a muscle and some squid when my friends weren't looking and both were good and tasty, which led to my inevitable food jealousy of not choosing the same...
We finished off the wine, got the bill (about £125 for 5, including 3 bottles of wine and the obligatory 12.5% service) and walked back up the hill home with a warm wine glow.
Overall, a good evening and I thought the buzz and vibe of the place compensated for the average food and slow service. My friends enjoyed their meals, so it could be my Spanish food snobbery that has led me to be fairly critical and only rating the food average.
How i'd improve it
- The menu outside looked a bit shabby. The case could do with a clean and it needs to lose the bluetac and things behind it. It was also low down and so hard to read.
- The staff were really friendly, but could have been a bit more attentive. We had to ask for more wine (twice) and also had to wait over an hour from arriving to getting our first dish.
