After going halfway across London to eat at Gordon ramsay's pub the narrow, being told our booking had been lost and after a long and frustrating argument being turned away, my friend Jo and I were pretty fed up, So back to the station we go and down the line a few stops to Crossharbour and to a tapeas place I read about in the Metro El Faro.
When we arrived it wasn`t too busy, but the very polite restaurant supervisor informed us they were fully booked, very sorry.
Tired and hungry by this point I briefly told her of our Narrow debacle.
"Would you mind eating in the bar" "not at all" I replied. She showed us to a table with high stools and a waiter came and gave us menus and took a drinks order. He was so friendly and efficient, a big contrast to the staff of The Narrow.
The menu was split into the classic starter, main course and pudding fashion, but you could also just order a selection of the reasonably priced starters as a tapas selection. That's what we chose to do.
We were just about to order when the waiter came over and said " a booking hasn`t showed, if you don`t mind waiting another 10 minutes to be on the safe side you can move to the restaurant" eyes on the comfy looking tables we readily agreed.
We ended up at a lovely little table and placed our order. Meatballs in tomato and vegetable sauce, ham and cheese croquettes, squid, pork belly, chorizo, hot breads and garlic mayo....mmmmmm the first thing to arrive was the bread and mayo, our comment was "if the rest is as good as the bread it will be great" The bread was in several diff types, hot and delicious. The mayo was soooo creamy and garlicky, a perfect specimen. We soon hoovered all that up, dipping it alternately in the mayo and the olive oil and balsamic vinegar.
I did note that the oil was a good strong peppery extra virgin variety and the balsamic a high quality thick sticky one. I like a restaurant that thinks about the little things, after all, its those that make it.
Next to arrive was the chorizo, a big fat sausage, all oily and paprika filled, delicious.
The rest all arrived together. The strips of squid were crispy coated but tender as melted butter, they could have done with a sprinkle more salt, but that's a minor gripe.
The meatballs were great, nice and meaty and the sauce rich and tomatoey, again a touch more salt could have helped the flavour but we still polished them off no trouble.
Croquettes were to die for. Crisp and golden outside and fluffy creaming and very cheesy in the centre, flecked with bits of ham that had a real good flavour, we ooooooh'd and ahhhhhhh'd our way through them.
The crowning glory was the cubes of suckling pork belly. Perfect. Crunchy and sticky glazed but so tender they melted in the mouth. I think they were so damn good it seemed indecent to eat them in a public place. A porky treat I wanted to be alone with.
What also received a big thumbs up was the fact that each dish was served in even numbers on the plate, this made it very easy to share. I always find it annoying when its obvious that you are going to share a dish but they give you 5, 7 or 9 pieces.
The rose wine I had was good, scented with strawberries and utterly drinkable. The wine list was all Spanish, extensive and catered for all tastes and pockets.
I finished off with a sticky chocolate brownie with ice cream and Jo had a fruit cheesecake. Hers was tangy and had a lovely crisp base. Mine was everything a brownie should be. Crunchy outside and sticky middle. Very good.
Coffee rounded the evening off and we were very happy. Great food, competent friendly staff and not over priced. £30 each with tip, not bad.
The Bill: £30 per head
