Jaleo
480 7th Street NW, Washington, DC 20004
Web: Jaleo
Phone: 202.628.7949
Rating:    [learn more]
See More Restaurant Reviews For:
Spanish Tapas Washington

"The variety leaves diners with only two questions: how conventional you wish to be on a given night, and whether you have enough cash or credit to continue trying new items."

This, friends, is tapas. Not sampler-sized portions of Italian food, fusion cuisine, or Latin-influenced appetizers - what Western New Yorkers are sold under the tapas name - but rather the real thing: authentically Spanish small plates as served at Washington, D.C.'s Jaleo. As one of five restaurants from José Andrés, a chef credited with popularizing tapas and Spanish cuisine in the United States 16 years ago, Jaleo offers a multi-page menu consisting of numerous tapas choices, the seasoned rice dish paella, and a wine list. This week, our group of four paid Jaleo our second visit in several years, digging deeply into the menu and leaving almost entirely thrilled by the experience.

As Buffalo Chow's editors have visited many tapas restaurants but previously covered only one authentic one - notably, in Ithaca - understanding our 3.5-star rating of Jaleo requires a bit of special context. Whether it's found in the United States or elsewhere in the world, authentic tapas is served in various styles and prices: some are the equivalent of bar food, as cheap and simple as would befit tapas' heritage as a snack to cover and accompany open wine bottles, while others are more deluxe and creative. All are intended to be ordered en masse and shared amongst a group of people rather than individually selected and consumed; the joy is in sharing the experiences of trying both new and familiar things, together.

Jaleo's offerings fall almost exclusively on the deluxe side: though there's no dress code, the open, large and highly wood-focused restaurant recommends smart casual attire, and typically charges roughly $7 or $8 per "small" dish. Portions are in fact small but not tiny, enough for two to share or three to sample, and the servers generally recommend that diners order three dishes each. Practically, that won't be enough to sate most diners at dinner - we ordered more than that and still had room for dessert - so a budget of $50 per person before drinks is appropriate here.

That having been said, the meal one gets at Jaleo for $50 will be an order of magnitude more creative and beautiful than the typical three- or four-course $50 dinner one can find elsewhere. It was also served something close to perfectly: unlike the wonderfully formal, nearly smothering attention of a Fogo de Chao, the staff at Jaleo manages to walk the line between casual friendliness and deferential servitude: as they explain, they are there to let you enjoy your night out, and are obviously trying their best to facilitate that with prompt delivery of items and appropriate attentiveness. The only flaw in its otherwise ideal presentation was that our items were delivered not to the specific people who chose them, but rather to a collective place on the table for manual distribution - a modest challenge given the scope of what we ultimately selected.

Ordered first but second to arrive was a two-part dish: the Jamon Iberico Fermin (normally $14) and Jamon Serrano Fermin (normally $10), deluxe and expensive sliced hams, the former known for its soft, buttery body and the latter for its saltier, coarser body - the result of an 18-month salt curing process. Served in slices on the same plate with seven comparatively neutral-tasting crackers on top for a combined price of $16, the two types of ham were wonderful examples of how even ultra-thin pieces of this meat can differ substantially in flavor, power, and texture given the type of pig, the process, and the cut. For the price, which is heightened by the former ham's Black Iberian Pig heritage, we were pleased rather than blown away by this dish.

From the Sopas (soups) section of the menu, we selected a special: the Sopa Flight ($8) was a gazpacho sampler, a selection of four colorful chilled Spanish soups traditionally made with a tomato base. Not here: served in four shot glasses, an orange one was tomato, a white one was almond, a green one was mint, and a red one was watermelon. All of the flavors were interesting, save perhaps for the creamy almond version which had too little of its supposed flavoring for any of us to detect; the presentation was creative and fun.

The Tapas Clasicas (classical tapas) menu held one of our long-time favorites, the "very, very famous" Gambas al Ajillo ($8.50), a plate of five shrimp that had been sauteed in garlic and guindilla pepper. Though Jaleo's version was by no means the sharpest version of this dish we've ever had - the long, dried pepper was obvious on the plate but not in the shrimp - it's hard to go wrong with properly cooked garlic shrimp, and this version was easy to munch with abandon. By comparison, the Tapas Modernas (modern tapas) menu contains items such as the Manzanas Con Hinojo Y Queso Manchego ($7, not pictured), a salad of sliced apples and fennel mixed with a sherry dressing, walnuts, and Manchego cheese; this salad's light, fresh taste, contrasting textures, and interestingly stick-cut apples thrilled those of us at the table who tried it. Another modern tapa, the Mejillones en Escabeche ($6), was a dish made to look like it was fresh from a Spanish fish tin, packed with cooler than room temperature mussels that had been marinated in paprika olive oil and vinegar with diced tomatoes - a pleasant, thoroughly delicious little snack. Best of all was the Chistorra Envuelta en Patata Frita ($7), thin and soft tubes of slightly sweet, slightly spiced chorizo wrapped in light, crispy homemade potato chips and served on toothpicks; the flavors, size, and textures came together to create the type of hors d' oeuvres anyone would wish to be served at the fanciest of weddings.

Many of our other picks came from the Pescados, Mariscos y Carnes section of the menu, which offers a diverse selection of fish, shellfish, and meats. Most conventional of the bunch were fried calamari - Calamares a la Romana ($7) - which were exactly like the dish you'd find at most Italian restaurants, fried brightly golden in a light batter, and a large bowl of steamed Prince Edward Island mussels listed as Mejillones al Vapor ($8), very lightly flavored with only a hint of bay leaf. Both were good, not special. More adventurous were two scallop dishes, the Zamburinas al Albarino ($10) - three tiny seared scallops with sofrito, Serrano ham and Albarino wine - shown in our first image, beautifully arranged into shells filled with crispy goodness, and two larger, more savory seared scallops with pistachios, raspberries, and red beet dressing called Vieiras Con Remolacha Y Pistachios ($8). Though the scallops in each dish tasted basically like properly cooked scallops of their respective sizes, their garnishes - salty in the first case, sweet and nutty in the latter - made them unique; we wound up ordering two of the second dish because the first one's recipient loved the scallops too much to share them. Another item, the Costillas de Buey Guisadas en Vino Tinto ($11), were red wine-braised beef short ribs with delicious pureed potatoes. Appearing like a miniature caramelized brown log in puddles of wine and mashed potatoes, this was low-grade beef made mighty with sauce and proper cooking, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside.

Two other picks from this part of the menu were true highlights. Heavy with fresh orange slices and ribbon-like pieces of sashimi-like salt cod, the Ensalada De Bacalao Con Naranjas Y Aceitunas Negras ($7.50) was another light sherry dressing salad, this time with scant field greens and black olive pieces on top. It was delicate, as strong in salt as the "salt cod" name would suggest, and utterly fresh - for the price, a Japanese restaurant couldn't have done it better or more beautifully, balancing the orange, green, white and black colors. Similarly, a plate with three oversized rare seared pieces of yellowtail kingfish called Atun Blanco Con Pipirrana Y Vinagre de Pedro Ximinez ($11.50) was gorgeous in its simplicity: the pink fish meat was dotted with a light orange Pedro Ximinez vinegar dressing and scant diced peppers and tomatoes, leaving the fresh filets to speak for themselves.

Drinks and desserts were also memorably good. An outstanding white wine sangria was made with Spanish Cava sparkling wine, vanilla Liquor 43, brandy, fresh strawberries, peach and mint, its fruit elements floating and lightly bubbling in the glasses and carafes we continued to order. From a seven-item Postres dessert menu, we chose four $7.50 desserts - a cream and orange-topped Flan, a Basque cake with semolina cream, a rice pudding with lemon marmalade, and a chocolate and hazelnut mousse torte. Each of the desserts was lighter than we'd expected, and very different from the expectations one would have from these descriptions: the heavy-sounding torte (shown) was light brown, soft, and topped with nuts, more cake than mousse and more attractive than delicious. The rice pudding, by contrast, was made with quite a bit of Espuma milk, and was almost like wading through a cereal bowl filled with large chunks of whipped cream, honey-like marmalade, and rice grains waiting to be found. It and the other two items were winners.

Though a 3.5-star rating - "excellent," and equivalent to the best places we've dined at in Western New York - is entirely appropriate for the meals we've enjoyed at Jaleo, there is truly nothing like this place in or near Buffalo. Between its classical and modern takes on tapas, its more deluxe seafood and meat dishes, and its impressively original drinks and desserts, Jaleo offers the sort of enlightened Spanish dining experience that our area truly needs. From item to item, there is nothing merely "okay" at this restaurant, as every dish is guaranteed to be either great or good, and the menu's variety leaves diners with only two questions: how conventional you wish to be on a given night with your selections, and whether you have enough cash or credit to continue trying new items. At a place like Jaleo, it is tempting to dive deep into the menu, and explore the depths; there are always treasures to be found here.