Baru Bistro & Tapas — Restaurant in New Orleans

Don't normally give 5 stars, but this was fantastic. Came in on a Thursday an hour or so before they close. Didn't matter. The staff was friendly, smiling, informative, and didn't rush us at all. The decor coming in is minimal, but clean and well cared for. There are a couple of tables on the street side (Magazine St), and an upstairs also. We started with drinks...kind of expensive, but well made. The Margarita was a bit strong, but for $12. bucks, you get your money's worth. The Cuba Libra is VERY tasty. The dark rum has tons of flavor, lime and coke.. satisfying! OK, THE FOOD: WOW! Started with 3 tapas, and each was better than the last! The Guacabello is avocado, mushrooms, Spanish olive oil on spinach chips. Delicious! All the flavors came through and were fresh. The Camarones al ajillo... just a special dish. Four head-on extra large shrimp with sautéed garlic slices, Spanish olive oil, and chili de arbol. Comes with a couple of slices of toasted bread with garlic butter. It also soaks up the liquid from the shrimp. Blown away! Sooooo much flavor! The Chuzos de Entrana are skewers of skirt steak masterfully grilled with chimichurri, and grilled bollo de limpio...which is like a little corn cake. The steak was tender, rare inside, but had grill flavor outside. So good!

For an entree, we had jerk chicken with house smoked tocino (bacon-like pork belly), and braised kale, served on corn and poblano risotto. Great taste, flavor..sweet, spicy a bit, made my tongue dance. The chicken breasts were tender, and just great. I also ordered a side of the corn and poblano risotto, which was tremendous on its own. Our server was a beautiful young lady with a great smile who described dishes, and answered our questions with pleasure. Very nice. I understand this restaurant has been here 10 years. It's our first visit, and won't be our last. My lady and I were very happy,...

I really wanted to rate this higher. Been looking forward to eating here for a while, and finally made it. Everything on the menu sounded interesting. The prices were a little high, but not incredibly so. Beer prices are very reasonably priced, while mixed drinks are a little on the high side, but not unreasonable. The food is what I went for however. Being a tapas style restaurant we stayed with the small plates. We started with the Cuban Sliders and the Ceviche. Mixed blessings here. The sliders were incredibly well done, but the ceviche didn't work. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't too good. The next item we tried was a Portabello dish. This tasted bad, but we weren't finished yet. The next small plate was Colombian arepas. These were disappointing as they used the same pulled pork as the sliders. Cuban and Colombian are different. We finished with Chicharon con yuca. This was extraordinary. So we started with great, ended with great, but the middle was so-so. That said, the staff were very good. Will I go back?...

Menu looked great, wish we could have tried some of it. Made a reservation for 8pm on a Saturday to celebrate my partner’s birthday. When we showed up it was medium busy but most of the inside tables were empty. We sat for about 10 minutes and when the server came over to take our drink order, informed us they were out of a few of the entrees, which was not a problem. She left and maybe another 10 minutes later another server came over to take our order and when I ordered what I wanted she said they were out of that. Then proceeded to tell us they were out of basically everything. When we asked what do you have she said “avocados” and kind of laughed, didn’t offer any kind of apology or future explanation. My partner asked if she was serious and she just kind of shrugged so we got up and left. For charging $40 an entree, I would have expected more from the service and atmosphere. Again, I would have loved to try the food because it sounded great and is close to our house but I don’t think I...