Jose Andres' Jaleo

To be honest, I was never a Spanish food eater, it never drew my attention and my exposure to Spanish cuisine was very limited; up until my recent vacation in Spain.  After eating 3-4 Spanish meals everyday for a week and a half straight, and happened to have one of the best tapas of my life, I will admit, I pay more attention to Spanish cuisine now.   I didn't fall in love with it like I did with Italian food in Italy (will talk about this in future posts), but going to Spain definitely helps, even though I still can't stand eating so much fried food, and the excessive use of potatoes in their dishes, but the varieties of ingredients and options suit my taste very well.  I like eating small portions of many things rather than one big portion of a single thing - it's the "Greedy Eater Syndrome" aka GES.  There's no cure for it other than keep eating. :)    

This wasn't the first time I have eaten in Jaleo, I have been there a couple of times for the past few years.  But it is the first time I have had Spanish food since I came back from Spain.  The only difference between Spanish food in Spain and Spanish food in US is...the price, it's so much cheaper in Spain, sometimes we even get free tapas with our drinks! The dishes were more simple in Spain, but still very good.  Jaleo is a pretty solid Spanish restaurant, there are some very decent dishes, and of course some mediocre ones, but if you avoid those, it's not a bad place to eat at.  Definitely good for groups, so you can try as many tapas as possible, to help alleviate your GES.

 

Sangria

How can you not order Sangria when you eat in a Spanish restaurant, actually you HAVE to get drinks when eating Spanish food, that's the Spanish way.  Jaleo's Sangria is pretty good.

Fisherman’s soup with mussels, shrimp and cockle clams

This is one of my favorites of the night, probably because I love seafood, especially shell fish.  This is a hot soup, and it's really flavorful, and the seafood is really fresh, we just kept dipping our bread into it.

Sea urchin with diced peppers,tomatoes and cucumbers

Oh...sea urchin, sea urchin!  My first encounter with sea urchin, I didn't really like it.  Until I had it at Sushi Taro, which I would say still till this day, the best sea urchin I have ever eaten, I fell in love.  Even though the ones at Jaleo is not as fresh as Sushi Taro's, but the combination with the diced peppers, tomatoes, and cumbers was very refreshing.   It's a little less overwhelming for people who are not use to the taste.

Patatas bravas

Patatas Bravas, a Spanish signature dish, it's basically fried potatoes with alioli sauce. This is the one dish at Jaleo which is almost identical to the ones you can get in Spain.  This is a good tapas to go with your drink.

Gazpacho

Gazpacho, cold tomatoes soup.  It's cold because it's really hot in Southern Spain in the summer, so drinking cold soup helps cool you down.  I don't really like Jaleo's Gazpacho though, look at it, it's so orange, I think it lacks the tomatoes flavor.

Calamari with alioli

This was ok, you can't really make bad calamari, it's hard to come by the really good ones, but usually you can't go wrong with calamari.

Fried cod fritters

The fried cod fritters were a little too salty, and the cod is kind of minimal, it's so creamy inside, after you eat one, you are kind of done with it already.  The honey alioli sauce was good though.

Squid ink paella with porcini mushrooms

The paella was...kind of disappointing.  I swear, the squid ink pasta in Venice and Seville ruined all my squid ink dishes, I have been looking for one to match them in US, there are still no luck.  Maybe the squids in Europe has better tasting squid ink? Any how, the squid ink wasn't that big of a problem here, the porcini mushrooms is the problem, it's so strong tasting that it covers up the squid ink taste. I am expecting squid ink, and I got mushrooms.  I don't think this was a good combination.  Maybe I am being picky, I do tend to be more picky on the food I really love - squid ink anything is one of them.
   

Grilled hanger steak with piquillo peppers

This is pretty good, I usually like the Spanish meat dishes, I think they can cook their meats really well.   It was juicy, tender, and flavorful.

Chorizo with potato purée

Chroizo, again, the Spanish loves their sausages! This was good, I can put it on a bun and eat it.

Orange flan

This definitely caught me off guard, I was never a real fan of flan,but this is good!  It is not too sweet and the texture is prefect. The Catalan cream you see there on the side is delicious, it has a rich milk taste to it.  Only if I wasn't so full...haha.  Thanks for ordering this, because I typically go after the triple, double chocolate cover chocolate ice cream cake on chocolate brownie with chocolate syrup. You get the idea, but maybe now I will start considering other desserts.

This is why I like eating with different people, because I tend to order the same type of food I like when I go to different restaurants, lamp chops, braised pork belly, seafood dishes, chocolate desserts.  But dinning with other people expose you to food you won't typically order, but sometimes they surprise you.  Like what the Flan did to me this time.

http://www.jaleo.com/