Casa Brindisa

We had lunch at Casa Brindisa in South Kensington shortly after it first opened and enjoyed a small selection of tapas style dishes but we had to be careful in our ordering as we knew we had dinner plans that evening. Happily, on our most recent visit, we didn’t have to exercise such restraint because we visited as part of a large group on the Dine with Dos Hermanos event.

We were greeted with a glass of Manzanilla Pasada sherry, some gordal olives and some salted marcona almonds. After a short run-down of the wines we were going to be drinking, we sat down to begin the important business of eating.

First of all we enjoyed some typically Spanish toast with tomato. I’m not a fan of raw tomatoes but I enjoyed this, it was fresh and zingy with a great hit of garlic. Next up was one of the highlights of the evening, the jamon plate: Teruel DOP, Joselito paleta DOP Guijelo and DOP Dehesa de Extremadura. We shared this plate amongst six of us and it didn’t take long before it was empty.

Another one of my favourite dishes was the smoked and salted anchovies. I love anchovies but hadn’t tasted any as fresh as there before, I could have eaten a whole plate of the smoked ones in particular. They were noticeably anchovy like in taste but not quite as concentrated in flavour and much lighter on the palate.

To follow, we were presented with the best tortilla de patatas I’ve ever tasted. We cook this at home quite a lot but I’m never completely happy with the result, this was packed full of very well cooked potato that had an almost bubble and squeak like texture to it, it didn’t have the noticeable layers of potatoes and onion either which suggests a different cooking method.

The Iberico ham croquetas were a big hit around the table but they didn’t do much for me, I found them slightly soggy in texture with not a lot of flavour. I didn’t try the prawns but they looked big and juicy and well seasoned with garlic, if you can call garlic a seasoning.

I wasn’t blown away by the sea bass but the accompanying morcilla de Burgos was very good, we fought over the remaining crumbs before the plate was cleared away.

The grilled Iberico pork fillet seemed a little dried out to me but was flavoursome and plentiful with a dense, nutty note.

Another start was the grilled octopus which was crying out for some bread to soak up all those lovely juices.

There was also cheese, fruit salad served with olive oil and crema Catalana but, as inevitably happens towards the end of the evening, the picture quality was just too bad to display.  I blame the lack of light 🙂

As well as a goody bag filled with all sorts of interesting food stuffs, Stephen and I also won platinum membership to the Hi-Life dining club.  A pretty good way to round off a great night of good food and company.