jaleo

jose andres, jaleo, sets the standard for spanish restaurants across the country, and is now offering a little something special this summer. jaleo in bethesda and crystal city want you toexperienceand celebrate the culture, cuisine, and grapes of spain with their 11th annual paella festival, monday night flight nights, and tour of spain program. recently, i had the chance to check it all out, and it was quite a delicious experience.

a culinary gem in crystal city. jaleo in crystal city, virginia is a tapas bar featuring traditional spanish dishes. if you’ve never dined at a tapas bar, they encourage each person to order two or three small dishes to share with the entire group, so everyone can enjoy a wide variety of food. of course, if you’re the only person in your party ordering gluten free, your culinaryexperiencewill be somewhat limited.

fortunately, jaleo offers a gluten free menu, but it has a disclaimer for those with gluten allergies. as usual, there’s a risk of cross contamination, and the fryer is shared with other non-gluten free foods. that being said, i safely enjoyed a salad with tuna, potatoes, green beans, tomatoes and hard-boiled eggs, shrimp sautéed with garlic, and flan for dessert! now, i’m off to the gym! after eating a georgetown cupcake earlier today and flan tonight, it’s time to pay the piper. =)

for more gluten free restaurant reviews, check out kareninreallife.com!

bad, very bad. before i talk about ourexperiencein this restaurant i have to say that we love the cuisine jose andres presented to food lovers in his other restaurants like zaytinia and (unfortunately closed) cafe atlantico.
we also had an okexperiencein his oyamel.
but in this jaleo location we had a very disappointing experiences and had it twice (i don't think there will be any more because we've decided that enough is enough)
now to the point:
ambiance - nice
food - promising in menu descriptions but never delivered anything but disappointments in more or less degree depending from the dish. most of the sauteed or roasted dishes are drenched in oil of very bad quality. even in "endives, goat cheese, oranges and almonds" they managed to pour so much oil it was almost inedible. we had an impression that oil is the main component of their dishes. speaking of taste it wasn't present in any dish we've tried except of beet soup (that was ok but definitely wasn't worth $9.50 they charge for it). the dessert ("apple charlotte") was basically dough stuffed with applesauce on the top of which was half melted ice cream. ugh! our impression was we are sitting in an italian restaurant of poor quality southern italian cuisine. their was nothing that reminded us of a wonderful spain tapas with flavorful sauces and refreshing taste of unique and creative small miracles that are happening in your mouth with every bite. that kind of spanish tapas we've experienced in dali restaurant in boston and loooved it.
i think if jose andres tasted the kind of food that his chefs "create" as spanish tapas he would be ashamed for the way his native cuisine is presented here. but he probably haven't been visiting this restaurant for a long time.
service - pretentiously "nice", intimidating with pushing their opinions about dishes when not even being asked, absent and ignorant when needed, not friendly and all together not professional starting from the hostess and finishing with the waiters. as i mentioned we've been there twice and both times with the different staff we experienced the same kind of service.
value - not good for anexperiencewe had (5 dishes + 1 dessert + 1 coffee + 1 tea = $75 all including)
conclusion - not recommended (particularly if you are a foodie)

theexperiencewas much as i expected: swanky and sophisticated, with lots of small plates to share. with good, clean flavors, the food was quite tasty, even if not as gritty as i usually prefer. here’s some of what we tried, starting with apple and fennel salad with manchego cheese, walnuts, and sherry dressing:

great food; strange service. we were a party of four with 6:30 pm reservations on a saturday night of restaurant week. the place was already packed. two of us arrived at 6:29 pm and the host wouldn't seat us until the entire party had arrived. i know that restaurants don't want to have large tables occupied and then have no shows but for a party of four that is unlikely and having to stand in the doorway was not a good start to the evening. had i been seated at a table i would have ordered wine while i waited. instead i had to stand in a crowded area in front of the entry door, blocking the way of other restaurant guests.

the selections on the restaurant week menu were excellent and we had a wide variety of tapas. nothing disappointed and, having lived in spain, i found the food to be authentic with a twist.

however, and this may have been a result of the restaurant week menu, they required that we order everything at once and then they randomly and quickly brought all the tapas to the table. that is absolutely wrong at a tapas restaurant. you should make a selection of your first round of tapas, have an opportunity to leisurely eat them, discuss them, and make your selections for the next round. their service model greatly reduced our enjoyment of ourexperienceand their profit. if we had been able to linger over each round of tapas more wine would have been consumed, thus increasing their profit margin. we were dining with people who had not had tapas before and they found the food presentation to be totally confusing and off-putting, and i certainly couldn't explain it since i'd never experienced anything like it in spain.

i would go again to jaleo, but i would be insistent on having the service my way, the spanish way. this felt like an assembly line, not a dining experience.