The food at Balandro was good but really nothing spectacular. I was undecided and the waiter recommended a fish that was referred to in English as Dory fish or John Dory. It is a firm white fish and it was prepared beautifully with some light sauce and spices. Vegetables that accompanied the dish were bright and tasty and there was a little bit couple of clams and shrimp as well. Portion size was not large but there were these cooked potatoes that seem to be infused with butter and some other flavor that were very delicious.
My fellow diners had grilled tuna and a pasta dish with truffles. Both were good, neither were outstanding. The tuna was red in the middle as it should be but this was grilled a little more than the way it is currently served in the US, where it is really just seared on the outside.
We had a special dessert suggested by a friend who vacations here frequently: tocino de cielo. It translates roughly as Heavenly bacon, but has nothing whatever to do with bacon.
We stumbled through the experience with our limited Spanish and Google translate but there was not a lot of English spoken in the restaurant. Service to get coffee at the end was slow it seems to be common in Spain. We think they wanted to serve the coffee after dessert but we wanted it with dessert. Maybe they just forgot!
It is an attractive restaurant but not a lot of tables. There is a long circular bar you can have drinks...
Read moreDining out in Cadiz is quite an adventure, the focus being,which it shouldn't be,on the staff! Generally the food in this town is good if you steer clear of the tourist traps, Beware of menus in English, or visuals of what the dishes look like! So, to the problem, being the attitude of, sorry to say, the Camareras
When you politely request a menu or a drink and the waitress looks to heaven Or glares with open hostility you have to wonder, what's going on here? While the kitchen are on top of it, The delivery leaves a lot to be desired. Apparently there is a crisis currently with the availability of staff for restaurants in Spain and it shows! So I'm thinking, and someone please tell me I'm mistaken, there's a culture going on here among the staff of particular taperias, which is, see how rude you can be and get away with it!
We've had the pleasure of meeting some great people working with professionalism and good cheer at the Caleta and the Mercado area but their number are diminishing,mores the pity! For a country like Spain who depend so much on tourism it may be prudent for the authorities concerned to address this...
Read moreI always visit this restaurant when in Cadiz. Until today, all the dishes have been pretty amazing in their creativity and great taste. However, today I made a mistake, one that I feel compelled to share with management. I ordered a Velez hamburger. I really rarely eat hamburgers, but I thought, well, OK, give it a try! Eveything else on the menu has been so fantastic!
Well, big surprise! The beef was grilled fine. (Actually far too thick for the presentation.) But the rest of it? Yukk! The roll was just a soggy thin mess. The spring onions and mushrooms were no were no where to be found. The lettuce, limp - frankly the wrong choice, and too little of it. The bacon? Was it actually bacon? Just a gristly bit of meat scraps that mostly fell away if you tried to hold and eat it like a normal burger. The sauce? Not sure what was in it, just made the roll turn to a paper thin slab that disintegrated on the plate.
My suggestion is to remove this from your menu or start all over and reinvent it. It harms your good reputation ! I praise this restaurant so much to friends. Now I felt...
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