Emilio's Tapas

We went to dinner at Emilio's Tapas in Hillside.  We had been here to eat before, but not since we started this blog.  (It also has been recently featured on Chicago's Best.)  Nick's parents were in town and they recently went on a trip to Spain so we thought we would share in the tapas with them so they could reminisce about their trip.  We tried some new dishes and also had some of the same dishes we have formerly experienced (at Meson Sabika or Cafe Iberico).

Here's a list of the dishes we've had before; obviously we love them otherwise we wouldn't keep ordering them:

Garlic Potato Salad

Patatas con Alioli - garlic potato salad, Natalie's favorite

Pan con tomate, jamon y queso - bread with Serrano ham, Manchego cheese & tomatoes, drizzled with olive oil - lately we have really been into Serrano ham and Manchego cheese

Bread with Serrano ham, Manchego cheese and tomatoes

Sauteed Escargot on Toast points

Caracoles Emilio - sauteed escargot served on croutons.  Nick doesn't like escargot so he won 't eat these, but Natalie loves them (and Nick's dad really loved them)

Bacon wrapped dates

Datiles con Tocino - dates wrapped with bacon, served with a red pepper butter sauce, Nick's favorite

Queso de Cabra al Horno - goat cheese baked in tomato sauce; good because we love goat cheese

Baked Goat Cheese

New tapas we experienced this time:

Crab Claws

Special - crab claws, good but nothing spectacular. The claws themselves were a bit small and came served on a bed of salad.  The salad was good but we didn't order the dish for the salad.

Asparagus with shrimp




Special - asparagus with shrimp, some of us liked this, some didn't. But it was a nice contrast in flavors compared to the heavy starches of the other tapas.

Chicken stuffed with Chorizo and mushrooms

Special - chicken stuffed with chorizo and mushrooms.  We all really liked this dish.  But since it was a special it won't always be on the menu.

Stuffed Mushrooms

Champinones Rellenos - mushroom caps stuffed with spinach, onions, and mozzarella.  This sounded good from the description but it was just ok.  We wouldn't order it again.

Also before any of the other tapas came out they brough a complimentary Amuse Bouche - a toast point with spinach and cheese.  We each got a bite.  It tasted pretty good and was unexpected.

Amuse Bouche

We were pretty full after ordering all of these tapas so we certainly weren't planning on getting any dessert. But then something unusual happened to Nick.  At the table next to us the waiter or busboy was gather their dessert plates.  Apparently he slipped and one of the plates with ice cream on it went flying.  We saw that this happened behind Nick's back, but couldn't see anything else.  Then Nick stood up and turned around and he had a lot of ice cream on the back of his sweater. We did our best to clean up what we could and fortunately he had another shirt on underneath so he just took the sweater off and they washed it up. Then they apologized profusely and brought out 2 free desserts. Fortunately it wasn't an expensive sweater that could only be laundered in expensive ways.

It's a bit hard to see, but there is a mural on the wall of Emilio and
off to the right ist he actual Emilio near another table

So they brought out a Caramel Flan and a Tiramisu.  We didn't get pictures due to all of the hubbub  The flan was great.  We really don't love Tiramisu so we would have preferred something else.  Later we looked online at their dessert menu and Tiramisu isn't even one of the regular dessert items (isn't it Italian?) All in all we crammed in more food than originally planned.

Final thoughts on Emilio's Tapas:
Food - The key seems to be to definitely stick with our favorites and then maybe try a couple new items. It's hard not to order our favorites. It's really nice to try out lots of little things though.  This is definitely Natalie's preferred way of eating - she always enjoys appetizers more than entrees at most restaurants.
Service - Pretty good.  The whole ice cream incident was a bit bizarre.  But part of the reason that happened was because all of the tables are really close to each other.  Another few inches and this wouldn't have happened at all.

Interior with lots of items from Spain

Atmosphere - we were there on a Saturday night and it was very busy.  Good thing we made reservations.  We have been there before at other times and it isn't as busy. It was fun to go with other people.  But once you get over a certain size group you have to order more than one of every dish if everyone wants to try it.

Cafe Iberico

We went out to eat at Cafe Iberico, a Spanish tapas restaurant in River North. It had been several months since eating at the last tapas restaurant so Nick was ready to go to another one. Natalie had been here many years ago but it was Nick's first time.

Patatas Alioli-Garlic Potato Salad

We ordered the following tapas:
Ensalada Mixta - Spanish style mixed salad with asparagus, beets, hearts of palm, endive, avocado and vinaigrette dressing. A nice combination of ingredients for a salad. We should try some of these items in a salad at home.

Ensalada Mixta

Patatas Alioli (under cold tapas) - red potatoes with garlic mayonnaise.  This is Natalie's staple dish at all tapas restaurants. They really all taste about the same - Nick thought this one was a little more mild (not so garlicy) and creamier than others.  It was definitely a larger portion than at other tapas restaurants.

Bacon wrapped dates with goat cheese and rice with raisins on the side. This is Nick's favorite tapas restaurant item. This was a special item for that night.  It was nice to have the cheese with dates - not all tapas restaurants do this.  Also most places just serve the dates and not anything else like the rice dish that accompanied the dates.  Overall, having the combo of the sweet dates and the salty bacon makes this dish great.

Bacon wrapped dates

Queso de Cabra

Jamon Iberico

Jamon Iberico (under cold tapas) - Spanish style cured ham with Manchego cheese and tomato bread (better description is toast points with a bruschetta style tomato sauce).  All of these items went together nicely.  The description of tomato bread was quite deceiving and ended up being the much better reality of bread with tomatoes on top like a bruschetta. We piled the ham and the Manchego cheese on top of the bread and it all tasted great.

Queso de Cabra (under hot tapas) - baked goat cheese with fresh tomato basil sauce and pesto toast. We love goat cheese and this was no exception. This is another dish that is offered at most other tapas restaurants. The combination of the cheese and the tomato sauce and the toast melded into one fluid flavor.

Croquetas de Pollo

Croquetas de Pollo (under hot tapas) - chicken and ham puffs served with alioli sauce.  These were surprisingly tasty.  The description on the menu was quite sparse so Nick went out on a limb in ordering this one.  They looked like hush puppies but inside they were even better with a warm combo of chicken, ham and cheese.

Final thoughts on Cafe Iberico:
Food - good tapas but Nick appreciates the tapas places near our house better
Service - very good, all of the dishes came out very quickly
Atmosphere - vibrant scene for a weekday evening, gets hopping on the weekends.  In the front part of the restaurant they have a tapas bar concept of ordering small individual tapas.

Interior

Interior

Pa

Cafe Ba Ba Reeba

Dining Area where we were sitting with giant mirror

For our third and final meal of Restaurant Week, we went to Cafe Ba Ba Reeba, a Spanish tapas restaurant in Lincoln Park.  It is located at 2024 N Halsted in Chicago.  Natalie had been there before but Nick had not.

The restaurant week menu offered a 4 course meal including 1 pintxo (bite sized tapas from Northern Spain), 2 regular sized tapas, Paella (Spanish rice dish) and dessert.

Pintxos

For our Pintxos we chose a chorizo wrapped date and cheese and a short rib stuffed piquillo pepper. We usually have had bacon wrapped dates so it was a new twist to have chorizo instead. We enjoyed the combo of the date and the cheese - sweet and salty. The short rib was good but would have been better with a little cheese as well.

Charcuterie Plate

Since we have eaten at a lot of tapas restaurants in the past we wanted to try some different tapas than we normally get at other places.  The first tapa we ate was a Charcuterie plate with Serrano ham, salchichon, chorizo and manchego cheese. Serrano is thinly sliced dry Spanish ham similar to the Italian proscuitto; salchicon and chorizo are sausages and manchego is a cheese from the La Mancha region of Spain.  Natalie likes Serrano ham better than proscuitto because it is a little less salty.  The manchego cheese was served atop a toast point with a tomato bruschetta like topping.  This will be the new way to do bruschetta in our household.

Salmon with celery root puree and kale chips

Our second tapa was a piece of cooked salmon with celery root puree and kale chips. The salmon was good not great.  The highlight was the celery root puree which had the consistency of mashed potatoes with a punch of flavor.  We were surprised at the kale chips; they had a crunch texture but a lot flakier than a potato chip.

Our third tapa was beef tenderloin topped with blue cheese and served with potato chips.  We got this dish because we had enjoyed a beef and blue cheese dish at Meson Sabika in Naperville.  We didn't enjoy this version as much as at Meson Sabika, but it still tasted good.

Beef & blue cheese

Our fourth tapa was spiced lamb kebabs with lemon, mint and tomato.  It obviously had a Middle Eastern flavor to it - a nod to the Moorish flavors of Southern Spain. The lamb was cooked well and not dried out but what made it really good was the sauce.  It wasn't spicy in terms of heat but it had a lot of interesting spices that highlighted the mint and the tomato.

Lamb Kebabs

Chicken & Pork Paella

Seafood Paella

For our third course we had Paella which is a Valencian rice dish with meat and vegetables. We chose 2 different paellas - one with chicken, pork, green beans and artichokes and the other with shrimp, scallops, mussels, green beans and hot peppers. We enjoyed the seafood one better because it had a more dynamic flavor profile.  We don't often order paella at tapas restaurants because it is more fun to try more of the smaller tapas.  It was nice to be able to have paella, in fact it was only the second time Nick has ever eaten paella, but in the future we will probably stick to the tapas.

For dessert we had a butterscotch custard cream and a caramel dulce de leche tres leches cake. Neither one was that large but they were a nice final sweet note to end the evening. The texture of the cake was smooth and didn't drown in the milk, but we were hoping for a bit more of the caramel taste.      The custard cream was served in a large shot glass; but even though it was small it didn't disappoint.

Butterscotch custard cream

Tres Leches Cake

Final thoughts on Cafe Ba Ba Reeba:
Food - good food but there are more convenient tapas restaurants located in the suburbs for us.  It took us quite a while to find parking in this neighborhood.  All of the side streets are resident permit parking at night and there is limited paid parking on the main streets.  We did finally completely luck out and found a spot that was both close and free. But this is an exception to the rule which is why we would rather stay closer to home for this type of food. We felt this restaurant didn't try as hard to give a really good value for Restaurant Week.  With the items we ordered we probably only saved a few dollars in comparison to the better bargain deals at Table 52 and Joe's Stone Crab for us for Restaurant week.  If we had been eating off the regular menu we probably wouldn't have gotten dessert and may have even left paying less money.
Service - the service was generally good, but they didn't explain the dishes as much as at other tapas restaurants we have been to.  Also our food wasn't as spaced out as we would have hoped for a multi-course meal.  One of the tapas came before the pintxos and then the paella came out before we were done with all of the tapas.

Dining Area where we sat

Atmosphere - this restaurant is very large and has several different rooms. We actually sat in what would be the outdoor area during the summer, but fortunately it is very well heated and just like any other room during the winter. There were a lot of groups, like at most tapas restaurants, so there was a very energetic vibe to the restaurant. The tables in our room were spaced very close together, however, so we felt crowded and it looked very difficult for the servers to maneuver.

Meson Sabika

After a short hiatus for the Christmas holiday and lots of homemade food and goodies we have started venturing out again. We went to dinner at Meson Sabika located at 1025 Aurora Ave in Naperville.  Meson Sabika is a Spanish restaurant specializing in tapas - small plates of food which together form a full meal.  Natalie has been to this restaurant many times during her life including a celebratory dinner after her high school graduation. This was Nick's second visit to the restaurant.



Garlic Potato Salad

We went to dinner with Natalie's parents and two friends to celebrate Natalie's parent's wedding anniversary.  With six of us eating we ordered a number of tapas (the restaurant's rule of thumb is to order about 3-4 tapas per person and we fell within that ratio). We attempted to eat all of the tapas in a family style fashion.  It was a little cumbersome attempting this when we didn't know exactly how the portion sizes would work out.  For some of tapas we have enjoyed on previous visits we knew to order 2 portions for everybody to get a sufficient taste.  Our recommendation is if you are with a larger group consult your waiter for exact portion sizes to see if the dish is easy to split several ways.

Meson Sabika splits its tapas menu into cold and hot varieties. Amongst all of us we ordered 7 different cold tapas and 9 hot tapas.  We will list all of what was ordered below and then comment on our favorites.

Cold:


Beef Tenderloin with blue cheese, dates & mushrooms

Samon Curado - smoked salmon with toast points

Patatas con Alioli - garlic potato salad

Tostada con Piquillo - toast points with peppers stuffed with shrimp, scallops and salmon

Pisto Manchego - Sauteed vegetables with asparagus

Rollito de Buey - beef tenderloin wrapped around blue cheese, dates and mushroom

Gambas Marinadas - shrimp with a trio of sauces

Tostada con Centollo - toast points with avocado and king crab meat

Hot:
Quisquilla al Horno (daily special) - baked prawns with tomato sauce over pasta
Costillas de Cordero (daily special) - grilled lamb chops with asparagus and mashed potatoes
Empanada de Buey - beef empanada


Scallops and couscous

Pipirrana de Buey - skirt steak with blue cheese sauce

Gambas al Ajillo - Grilled tiger shrimp with garlic lemon butter

Cazuela de Pollo - chicken casserole with peppers, asparagus and a pimento cream sauce

Vieras al Albarino - grilled sea scallops served over couscous

Crepe Rellena - crepe of goat cheese, spinach, pine nuts and apples

Datiles con Tocino - roasted dates wrapped in bacon



Grilled shrimp in garlic lemon butter

Our favorite cold tapas were the beef tenderloin and the garlic potato salad.  We both enjoyed the beef tenderloin because it had well balanced flavors of both blue cheese and dates - sweet and tangy at the same time.  Natalie's perennial favorite is the garlic potato salad.  It makes regular potato salad seem bland because of the punch/zing of garlic flavor. Do not order this dish if you don't like garlic. We ate small samples of the other cold tapas and enjoyed them all.



Grilled lamb chops

Our favorite hot tapas were the tiger shrimp in the garlic lemon butter and the grilled lamb chop special.  The shrimp melted in our mouths and the garlic lemon butter enhanced the shrimp without overpowering it. The lamb chops were cooked perfectly, tender but not chewy.  They were accompanied by great mashed potatoes. Other honorable mentions were the bacon wrapped dates and the smoky flavor of the grilled scallops.

Somehow we all had enough room to each order a dessert. We (Nick and Natalie) ordered a chocolate, caramel and hazelnut tart and a sauteed banana with caramel and ice cream. In Nick's opinion the tart had a little too much bitter sweet chocolate and not enough caramel.  He preferred the banana because it had a great caramel sauce. Natalie's opinion was the reverse and she preferred the chocolate tart. The dessert menu is much more extensive now than in the past - there are now 11 desserts to choose from.

After our meal our group talked for a few minutes with the restaurant manager.  We asked him what are the most ordered tapas.  He responded that the top three ordered are the garlic potato salad, the bacon wrapped dates and oven baked goat cheese with garlic bread (Queso de Cabra).  We ordered 2 of these on this visit and have ordered the goat cheese in the past.  Then the manager mentioned his favorites are the scallop dish (that we ordered), a grilled lamb medallion dish (Cordero al Pastor), and the Crema de Chocolate (Creme Brulee) dessert - which Natalie's mom ordered and loved.

Also we should mention that besides tapas you can get soups, salads or paellas.  On the many visits Natalie's family has made to this restaurant they have only ordered the paella once - not because it is poor quality, but rather it takes a long time to cook and it is much more filling than any of the tapas.  We prefer to eat more of the small plate tapas to get a variety of flavors.

Final thoughts on Meson Sabika:
Food: always great, incorporates our favorite part of most meals - the appetizer.  With tapas, you get to try a lot more of the menu, without getting too full
Service - good service in terms on continuous filling of water glasses and bringing clean plates to the table. At one point in eating the hot tapas there were too many dishes that came out of the kitchen at the same time. If you are able to space out the ordering more that will be helpful when the food arrives

Chocolate Tart

Sauteed banana with caramel

Ambiance - fun atmosphere, we were there on a Friday night when live Spanish guitar music was playing in the background and later a flamenco dancer entertained the dinner guests.  Meson Sabika is located in a historic home so since some of the rooms are on the smaller side, there is not much space between tables.  This is a popular restaurant so reservations are recommended.