Barrafina

Barrafina is a fairly new Spanish tapas bar in Soho, opened by a pair of brothers called Sam and Eddie Hart, one of which can usually be found behind the counter (the other probably works at the sister restaurant, Fino). It opened sometime in May or June 2007, and is a member of the annoying group of new egalitarian London restaurants - it's one of those where you cannot make reservations at. Still, they've gone some way to taking the edge of that annoyance (adding to the authenticity of the Spanish tapas experience in the process), making it a fairly pleasant place to eat. The Pretty Lady and I enjoyed our meal very much.

Barrafina is on Frith Street, in fine company - it shares the road with Arbutus (Michelin-starred too) and Bar Shu (authentic, good, spicy, blow your head off Sichuan hotpot). It holds its own though. If you're looking for the address here it is:

Barrafina
54 Frith Street
London W1D 4SL
020 7813 8016

The Pretty Lady and I arrived there at about 6 pm on a Saturday evening - early enough, so we thought, to beat the main evening rush and avoid a lengthy wait. No such luck. All the seats at the bar, which is to say all the seats in the house, were full, and there were already about 10 people queueing, behind the bar seats. It worked out alright though - there is a small ledge at about chest height along the queueing area, and one can order a glass of wine, and some raciones to take the edge of one's hunger. Which is exactly what the Pretty Lady and I did.

The sherry list is pretty reasonable - we had a good Manzanilla and a Pedro Ximenez (yes, a dessert wine, but this is tapas!) to wash down some reasonably good sliced chorizo. This killed a good half an hour, and by the time we were finishing up our sherries we had a seat at the bar.

There is a very good list of specials, mostly seafood - we happened to be able to choose from clams, large Mozambican prawns, langoustine, mussels and John Dory, and the Pretty Lady chose the prawns. I plumped for the land-based special, green beans cooked with jamon serrano. We also had a tortilla (classic Spanish omelette), chipirones (deep fried, battered baby squid), and chuletas (lamb chops).

I was particularly impressed by the green beans and jamon - I wouldn't call this classic Spanish, but it's certainly Spanish-inspired, and the combination works very well. The tortilla was not quite perfect, being runny in the middle (I think tortilla needs to be moist but firm), but this was more of a variation on a theme rather than a flaw. The Pretty Lady loved her prawn, which was grilled in front of us. Unfortunately we had the misfortune to get a male, so there was no roe in the head (the people next to us had 4, at least 2 females, and left the heads - what a waste). For puddings, the Pretty Lady had a crema catalana which was done creme brulee style, and I had a dram of Maker's Mark bourbon (not very Spanish, I know).

There were also a number of things we didn't try, but wanted to - pisto on egg, for instance, which sounded interesting (could it be the Spanish version of pesto on duck egg?), tuna tartare, and morcilla. Maybe next time.

Oh, and they serve Belu water! These people certainly know what they are doing. For your choice of beverage, you can enjoy Cruzcampo on tap, plus any number of spirits. They have a bottle of Elijah Craig bourbon, which means that fellow whisky freaks could amuse themselves by musing various combinations of said bourbon and sherry casks...

I digress. Bottom line, Barrafina is great for couples and groups of up to 4 (any more and they turn you away). Turn up early, drink your sherry, eat your pork, wait patiently, and enjoy. Oh, and eat your prawn heads.

Scores:

5 Feb 2008: TFQ = 26, CS = 26, S = 13, AD = 6, VfM = 6. Total = 77 points.

What does this mean?