Buttered Scones for Tea?
Now rebranded with revised menu.
Pay
€€€
Per Person
Shared starter, 1 main, 1 dessert, 1 Canadian beer, 1 Mahou. €30. Bookings at weekends essential.
Two 2-hour sittings, lunch and evening.
Location
Website
In Short
Hopes? Please don't be all modern and superficial.
Reality? An impressive touch of British Colmubia hospitality.
First Impressions? That waiter's wearing my shirt!
A USP? It's Canadian!
The food in three words? It's got authenticity.
Can they get the staff? Three chaps beavering away.
Service with a smile? Exemplary on all levels.
Friend friendly? Just about enough V-options for those who choose them.
Rating for dating? Decor certainly suitable, you'd suppose.
Tip? Medium.
Change one thing? Tabasco sauce in the tray.
Going back? Yes. No question.
Compare & Contrast
Auteur cuisine at Trikki | New Orleans.
Decent burgers at Steakburger.
In Pictures
On Google Images
In Depth
There's a terrific taste of Canada near Glorieta Bilbao.
There's much to praise here, and we'll start with a detail that says a lot. They have beautiful curvy jugs. If you're after water, they'll pull down one of these swanlike things. Stylish and distinctive.
Canada's national dish sits pretty well in wintry Spain. Was this a top taste? Is this poutine, on the ritz? Well, we're going to make a song and dance about it. This was tasty, rich stuff and genuinely close to what we'd had years back in Montreal. Pickiness? I'd have melted the cheese a smidge more, but...name another dish in Madrid which proudly, confidently, says it's got gravy in it. Very good indeed!
The Ontario's welldone wagyu worked well, but the al punto/rare version in the Montanesa/Highland was superb. A great burger this, with, startlingly, redfruit compote contrasting well with the cheese and beef. Impressive stuff. Nitpick? The Montenesa was billed with redfruit and rhubarb. Admit it, non-V eaters, you'd want to know if rhubarb could possibly work in a burger, wouldn't you? Sadly, despite almost Holmesian efforts, I couldn't detect that distinctive pink stalk flavour. It didn't do the dish any harm as I still thought it was excellent, but I did miss finding out.
Editorial note. Sticks of rhubarb should not be confused with flamingos. The first are pink stalks, the latter pink storks.
The accompaniments were real successes, too. A mini bucket of handcut chips came deliciously seasoned - a touch of oregano with the salt and pepper. How often can you praise the effort put into chips? Try them with squeezy mayo. Good work, there.
And on to desserts. An impressive list of possible pies, and as it turned out rhubarb hadn't finished tempting us. But our rhubarb pie dream became a rhubarb pipe dream. It was still in the oven, announced the server. Would the apple one, with biscuit ice-cream, suffice?
Editorial note. The famous poem the Rubaiyat should not be confused with a persian dessert created by its author. The latter is the Rhubarb Tart of Omar Kayyam.
So was the pie the apple of our eyes? Core blimey, it was! Crumble mix, soft short pastry, the right touch of cinammon, excellent apple chunks, a smidge of chilled custard and amazing ice-cream. It certainly earned its crust as our Dish of the Day and goes on the h:m recommended list. You want to try it. Biscuit ice-cream? Crumbs, I mean. It takes the, well, I think you know.
A Madrid classic is tarta de abuela. A chocolate & soggy biscuit concoction that defies that admittedly disturbing description and can be absolutely unforgettable. El C's tarta de mamá tastes like the pastry chef's granny taught him it. Terrific, authentic Madrid food.
You can tell we are impressed by El C. Someone has sat down with a sheet of A3 paper, drawn a flow chart and thought this all out - from those water jugs to choosing steak knives as sharp as their business sense. Anyone running anywhere that serves anyone anything edible could take a maple leaf from the El C book. More?
Don't be shy of Spain. Brilliantly, El C notes its location. Mahou is the draft beer of choice, served properly caña cold. There's Canadian Moosehead too, which is also cold enough. You should try it for contrast. That Tarta de Mamá is on offer at other group restaurants, and as it's simply superb, they stuck it on the menu here. It works!
Care for customers. We'd lost one of our group. Knowing this, they rearranged tables to give a bigger group a bit more space than we'd need. And we didn't merely get asked what we wanted, we got asked, politely, followed by a recap - complete with old-style la damas and el señors - from the server to check he'd got it all right. Fresh drinks came in almost instantly. I had to check on a coffee, but they remembered it was due as soon as I started to mention it. And all this between three different waiters. Class, confidence and communication.
We confess, we'd approached warily. We've seen and been in places ornately done up like El C. Too often, more effort seems to go into decor than dinner. Often, hard-won victories - getting the food right - are dragged down a step or six by misjudged - or simply missing - details. But El C is giving us headaches looking for things to grump about.
There should be more V dishes. A couple more table sauces would be a bonus. Today's phantom rhubarb was a shame. But even the fact that pie wasn't ready was actually OK as, apparently, the chef bakes rhubarb pies on site.
But tables are comfy and pleasingly roomy, given the space available. The decor's wood-heavy with maple leaf flags scattered about. There are cuddly mooses(? Mooce? Meece?) jauntily perched around. The panelling's lightly painted which makes for a bright atmosphere with the sun on it, but turns cosy in shadow, A clever bit of design when you also do a breakfast menu.
A Spanish take on the Canadian way of eating, it's impressively successful and pleasingly close to being faithful.
We're impressed.
Dish of the Day: Apple pie with biscuit ice cream.
Now rebranded with revised menu.
Pay
€€€
Per Person
Shared starter, 1 main, 1 dessert, 1 Canadian beer, 1 Mahou. €30. Bookings at weekends essential.
Two 2-hour sittings, lunch and evening.
Website
Access One step, two doors to negotiate
In Short
Hopes? Please don't be all modern and superficial.
Reality? An impressive touch of British Colmubia hospitality.
First Impressions? That waiter's wearing my shirt!
A USP? It's Canadian!
The food in three words? It's got authenticity.
Can they get the staff? Three chaps beavering away.
Service with a smile? Exemplary on all levels.
Friend friendly? Just about enough V-options for those who choose them.
Rating for dating? Decor certainly suitable, you'd suppose.
Tip? Medium.
Change one thing? Tabasco sauce in the tray.
Going back? Yes. No question.
Compare & Contrast
Auteur cuisine at Trikki | New Orleans.
Decent burgers at Steakburger.
In Pictures
On Google Images
In Depth
There's a terrific taste of Canada near Glorieta Bilbao.
There's much to praise here, and we'll start with a detail that says a lot. They have beautiful curvy jugs. If you're after water, they'll pull down one of these swanlike things. Stylish and distinctive.
Canada's national dish sits pretty well in wintry Spain. Was this a top taste? Is this poutine, on the ritz? Well, we're going to make a song and dance about it. This was tasty, rich stuff and genuinely close to what we'd had years back in Montreal. Pickiness? I'd have melted the cheese a smidge more, but...name another dish in Madrid which proudly, confidently, says it's got gravy in it. Very good indeed!
We went to burgers for main courses and were well pleased. Ontario came with cheese and bacon - outstanding back bacon like nothing I'd seen in a Madrid burger - in Madrid, full stop - before. This might have been handcut and tasted terrific.There was a wine mayo on hand too, although overenthusiastic mustard and ketchupping meant we lost it in the mix.
Editorial note. Sticks of rhubarb should not be confused with flamingos. The first are pink stalks, the latter pink storks.
The accompaniments were real successes, too. A mini bucket of handcut chips came deliciously seasoned - a touch of oregano with the salt and pepper. How often can you praise the effort put into chips? Try them with squeezy mayo. Good work, there.
And on to desserts. An impressive list of possible pies, and as it turned out rhubarb hadn't finished tempting us. But our rhubarb pie dream became a rhubarb pipe dream. It was still in the oven, announced the server. Would the apple one, with biscuit ice-cream, suffice?
Editorial note. The famous poem the Rubaiyat should not be confused with a persian dessert created by its author. The latter is the Rhubarb Tart of Omar Kayyam.
So was the pie the apple of our eyes? Core blimey, it was! Crumble mix, soft short pastry, the right touch of cinammon, excellent apple chunks, a smidge of chilled custard and amazing ice-cream. It certainly earned its crust as our Dish of the Day and goes on the h:m recommended list. You want to try it. Biscuit ice-cream? Crumbs, I mean. It takes the, well, I think you know.
A Madrid classic is tarta de abuela. A chocolate & soggy biscuit concoction that defies that admittedly disturbing description and can be absolutely unforgettable. El C's tarta de mamá tastes like the pastry chef's granny taught him it. Terrific, authentic Madrid food.
You can tell we are impressed by El C. Someone has sat down with a sheet of A3 paper, drawn a flow chart and thought this all out - from those water jugs to choosing steak knives as sharp as their business sense. Anyone running anywhere that serves anyone anything edible could take a maple leaf from the El C book. More?
Don't be shy of Spain. Brilliantly, El C notes its location. Mahou is the draft beer of choice, served properly caña cold. There's Canadian Moosehead too, which is also cold enough. You should try it for contrast. That Tarta de Mamá is on offer at other group restaurants, and as it's simply superb, they stuck it on the menu here. It works!
Care for customers. We'd lost one of our group. Knowing this, they rearranged tables to give a bigger group a bit more space than we'd need. And we didn't merely get asked what we wanted, we got asked, politely, followed by a recap - complete with old-style la damas and el señors - from the server to check he'd got it all right. Fresh drinks came in almost instantly. I had to check on a coffee, but they remembered it was due as soon as I started to mention it. And all this between three different waiters. Class, confidence and communication.
We confess, we'd approached warily. We've seen and been in places ornately done up like El C. Too often, more effort seems to go into decor than dinner. Often, hard-won victories - getting the food right - are dragged down a step or six by misjudged - or simply missing - details. But El C is giving us headaches looking for things to grump about.
There should be more V dishes. A couple more table sauces would be a bonus. Today's phantom rhubarb was a shame. But even the fact that pie wasn't ready was actually OK as, apparently, the chef bakes rhubarb pies on site.
But tables are comfy and pleasingly roomy, given the space available. The decor's wood-heavy with maple leaf flags scattered about. There are cuddly mooses(? Mooce? Meece?) jauntily perched around. The panelling's lightly painted which makes for a bright atmosphere with the sun on it, but turns cosy in shadow, A clever bit of design when you also do a breakfast menu.
A Spanish take on the Canadian way of eating, it's impressively successful and pleasingly close to being faithful.
We're impressed.
Dish of the Day: Apple pie with biscuit ice cream.