Prior to my surgery and radioactive iodine therapy, which requires a month of isolation, my friends and I used to go out for dinner at least once a month. On this particular dinner date, we decided to eat Spanish cuisine at Ipar's Restaurante Y Bar De Tapas.
We've hopped from one restaurant to another in the past months. We vowed never to go back to the same restaurant twice unless we really love the place; hence the restaurant hopping.
Now, let's go back to Ipar's. Ipar's is less than 1km walk from my office and since it was my turn to choose which restaurant we'd try, I chose this one for it's proximity in my office. Kidding aside, I'm a huge fan of spanish cuisine. Ipar's boost of it's authentic and traditional Spanish dishes they offer for dinner.
As usual, Jelo arrived first. When I came in, an overly vibrant interior welcomed me. It was like I was transported to the movie setting of Coco. Furnitures and fixtures looked outdated but not in the bad way. Most of their furnitures were made from hard wood.
I passed by this restaurant a couple of times and noted that only a handful of people visit the place, perhaps with exemption on weekends. But on weekdays, you can be assured of a seat here even without reservations. In our visit, there were only one group other than us. They were about to finish when we ordered so technically, we had the entire place to ourselves until closing time.
We had Spanish Chorizo, Croquetas de Pollo (chicken croquettes), Pescado en Salsa Verde (basque style fillet or fish in parsley sauce, Paella Negra (ink squid paella), Solomillo a lo Pobre (pan-seared beef tenderloin) and Magro de cerdo con tomate (lean pork balls in tomato sauce). I thought we ordered more than what we can finish but with how each dish tasted, I ended up eating a lot! Despite the fact that I'm always on the lookout for my calorie intake. This night was an exemption. If I'm to choose one dish to recomment, it would be the Paella Negra.
