Flor Y Solera Spanish Tapas Bar — Restaurant in Los Angeles

Chicken croquettes (4 pieces in 1 order): these were too small for a group of 5 to share. The chicken inside was mush and mild in flavor. It would have been nice had a garlic aioli or some other dipping sauce accompanied the dish. 5/10

Marinated salmon w/ sunchoke purée: the word ‘marinated’ isn’t appropriate in the title of this dish as there was no marinade to speak of. Both the fish and sunchoke purée were very bland. This tasted like cat food. 1/10

Fried calamari: the plating on this dish is just sad. No other garnish, no color, just very pale looking squid rings. Also, the term ‘fried’ was misused here as the batter was hardly crispy nor was it seasoned at all!! There was not even a dipping sauce to accompany the dish, and this would have been fine had the batter been SEASONED! Some sea salt would have done the dish wonders! Unless you enjoy a soggy bowl of squid rings, do not bother to drop $12 on this. 0/10

Idiazábal cheese w/ carrot marmalade & walnuts: We actually enjoyed this. The presentation was artfully executed and enticing — and the cheese, which comes from Idiazábal, a town in Northern Spain, was buttery, nutty, and downright tasty. The carrot marmalade, which I’ve not had anywhere else, was creative and fun. The sweetened walnuts were complementary to the dish. Well-balanced. Our only criticism here is more cheese please! 8.5/10

Entrées: Fideus — this pasta dish with shrimp and clams, was the star of the night. This dish hails from Valencia, Spain and is similar to that of a paella, except short, thin pasta is used in lieu of rice. The pasta had a nice ‘bite’ to it and was extraordinary in flavor. The jumbo shrimp was perfectly cooked and the presentation was inviting. Our only gripe here: the clams were too small. Despite the clam size, we rate this dish a 10/10 — we loved it so much, we ordered a second round of it. Do not hesitate to get this!!

Sea Bass with kale: beautifully presented and executed. The fish was perfectly cooked — tender yet had a nice flaky/crispy skin. The kale was boiled to perfection, and the sauces were tasty. 10/10

Desserts: Flores de calabacín: battered zucchini blossoms with rice pudding ice cream — the presentation could use some work. The way the zucchini blossoms were plated reminded me of a cross between soft shell crab and funnel cake. But the dish was delicate, light, and fluffy. The crisp on the blossoms was on point. And the ice cream was delicious. 10/10

Torrija con leche merengada: fried milk-soaked brioche, ‘merengued’ milk ice cream, berries. The plating here needs work. It looked like one piece of French Toast topped with ice cream alongside melted burnt marshmallow with a red ring encircling the whole thing. There was nothing in the presentation that screamed, “EAT ME.”

The brioche was very orange/citrus-forward in flavor. Good but could have used one more brioche to make the dessert feel more complete, stacked on top of the other in a criss-cross form. The burnt marshmallow did not enhance the dish any. And the word “berries” in the title was misleading as there were no berries in berry form. We assumed the red ring was made from berries, and that’s fine, but then don’t entitle something and not deliver. This was a 7/10.

All in all, I’d say FORGO THE TAPAS and dive right into the entrées. From $8-12/plate, the tapas seem overpriced for mostly mediocre food. Very hit or miss. The entrées, however, will give you more bang for your buck. Still pricey, but we don’t mind paying top dollar for good quality, well-executed, FLAVORFUL food.

Service was excellent — not just from our server, but all her colleagues as well. Everyone working the floor was attentive. They cleared our table often and replenished with new plates (not that it was necessary, but nice). Our server was present and pleasant frequently checking in without being too much, nor did she try to upsell us on anything. We had a nice family outing and the vibe of this place is fun and lively. Perfect night out for either a date or a...

This is going to be a slightly scathing second review for a restaurant that just opened (~1 week ago) but I don't see them remaining open without significant changes. We wanted to give the restaurant a try since we got to know Catalan cuisine last year and heard it was run by an engineer turned chef (that was my mistake, the restaurant is part of a restaurant group which made things worse in context). The best way to describe this is a way for rich people to "sample" an interpretation of a foreign cuisine (sample being generous given the portion sizes). The food wasn't authentic in the sense of ingredients, size, and love(?). I'm not going to criticize the staff, they were all very friendly and well enough informed given the proximity to opening (it's a fair assumption that many came from other restaurants in the group to support the opening). But the restaurant was poorly staffed overall; there was an excess of wait staff (there aren't that many tables) and a shortage of chefs (food took so long to come out that we didn't get "mains" until at least an hour and a half in) and there was only one bartender (we only got our drinks after all of the tapas has been served and after we ordered mains - that's an extremely poor experience). The food... The tapas were ok and priced decently but the portion sizes even up being a joke, maybe 1/3 to 1/4 of what you'd expect. This made sharing difficult (come on, the tapas!) and left us very unsatisfied. Spanish tapas are generally premade so it's easy to have variety with quick prep. The mains were disappointing, extremely over salted and disappointingly small (irrespective of price). Rice stuff was nearly incredible, chicken dish was a single thigh, soup was maybe a shot glass worth. I wouldn't say it was bad (aside from the rice dish and crema Catalan) but nothing memorable or worth returning for. Right, the desert. They might need a new Patissier. Of the three desserts we got, I'd only say the churros are worth getting. I've had much better but, eh. The crema Catalan should not have been served. Someone skipped the cooking class on mixing dairy with acids - they were trying to make it a crema Catalan instead of a creme brulee but they curdled the milk with the acid. So instead of a posting consistency it was that of a ricotta/goat cheese. Yeah, we didn't finish that. Overall, cocktails were decent but they need to get the service fixed with those, food was underwhelming in all respects, ambiance was nice, value was extremely poor. We were there over two hours for a meal that shouldn't have exceeded an hour by much. For a chef opening their own restaurant, many things could be excused (not those with the menu though) but for an established restaurant group, well, that's why you've...

We had a lovely experience at Flor y Solera! We were a table of 10 and shared most of our dishes.

A key point, en route to the restaurant we learned that one of our guests is HIGHLY allergic to all seafood. We immediately informed our server and a few minutes later the chef, Monica Angelats, came out personally to discuss alterations to dishes; she showed genuine concern. From that point on, the servers showed great sensitivity by not placing seafood dishes near our friend. He reported that all of his food was delicious and he looks forward to dining at Flor again.

We began our meal with cocktails, wine and sherry, and the selections are excellent and well priced. We then dove right into the tapas and ordered almost all of them. The paz espada frito (fried swordfish) was the table favorite. It is a flavor one does not find elsewhere and we gobbled it down quickly. The croquetas were also fantastic, closely followed by the shrimp cooked in salt and the bread, tomato, and cured sausage.

Next we had the ajoblanco (cold almond soup), which is a must have because it is out of this world. The judión con mojama took us back to Spain the instant we tasted it. The rice dishes were also a hit. We greatly appreciated the absence of paella (one can find mediocre paella everywhere it seems) in favor of authentic rice dishes. The arròs negre was the table favorite, closely followed by the migas camperas.

The items from the del monte (land) section were generously proportioned as were items from the del mar (sea). Every dish exploded with flavor. Although we barely had room, we finished with several yummy desserts including the braç de nata and the crema catalana.

Would we go back? Absolutely! It's great to have an authentic Spanish restaurant in...