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What's going on, Albuquerque?
!Tapas!
My sweetie and I checked out the brand new Cosmo Tapas, in east Nob Hill tonight. They're in the old Martini Grill space at Central and Sierra. They've only been open since Monday, but you wouldn't know it based on the food, drinks, atmosphere or service. It's a pretty smooth operation and absolutely enjoyable.
To start, we chose a couple of drinks from their mixed drink menu. My sweetie had a Huaso, which is essentially a pisco sour. Pisco is like a grape brandy, which is the national beverage of both Chile and Peru. It was so good, I had one myself for our second round. I started off with a Caesar, which was limoncello, campari, soda and some maraschino cherry. It was sweet and refreshing. There are only a handful of mixed drinks on the menu, but all sound worth a try. The wine list is extensive and the beers on tap include a Marble red (Marble brewery is a fav in our household) and a Santa Fe Porter.
Food! We spent a long time perusing the menu, which is divided into sections for appetizers, seafood, meat, and vegetables. The great thing about tapas is that you order one or two and then repeat until full. We had the mixed olives, which turned out to be an enormous serving of tasty varieties, some pitted, but some not, so beware if you have sensitive teeth. We also tried the traditional plate of Serrano ham and manchego, or spanish cheese. I spent the first couple weeks of June in Spain and I became inordinately fond of jamon iberico while there, so I was disappointed not to see it at Cosmo. (I did a little research when I got home and found out that these two types of cured ham come from different pigs and the Jamon Iberico is a lot pricier.) However, the Serrano was quite tasty, especially paired with the manchego. I do hope that sometime we see a special which includes iberico (hint, hint, if anyone from Cosmo is out there).
My sweetie also tried a Chilean empanada, which is a savory baked version filled with beef, beans, and a couple other tasty ingredients. He declared it delicious. We also tried the lanza de carne with chimichurri, which is a skirt steak served with a green sauce from Argentina, made with parsley and other veg and seasonings. That was good too. Though they have an enticing dessert menu, we finished our meal with a tapa of medjool dates stuffed with goat cheese and wrapped in bacon. The combination of flavors was amazing, as the sweet dates played a nice counterpart to the pungent cheese and salty bacon. It was really rich and I think we'll start with that one next time. For me, however, the best tapa of the evening was the tortilla, a spanish dish of potato and egg, served here with a really garlic-y aioli. It was absolutely delicious, and I loved it in particular because it tasted exactly like the tortilla which was a favorite of mine while traveling in Spain.
As we finished our meal, the owner came by to introduce himself. He's Guillermo Loubriel and he runs the place with his wife Cecilia Kido, who is apparently the genius behind the menu. They've created a lovely space, bright and colorful and welcoming. The service was great, particularly as our waitress seemed to know a lot about the different tapas.
Sometimes you go to a new restaurant and you think "hey, nothing we tried was bad." We walked out of Cosmo saying to each other "everything we tried was good and some of it was really great." I admit to making a mental list of the things we didn't eat this time around that we're definitely ordering next time. It's wonderful to anticipate a new restaurant's opening and then have such an overwhelmingly positive experience on our first visit. I'd love to see this place survive and thrive, so si quiere ir de tapas or if you're interested in trying them for the first time, please check out this restaurant. The address is 4200 Central and their phone is 232-0535. (They have a web address at cosmotapas.com, but their site doesn't seem to be up yet.) Good luck Cosmo! We'll be back.
To start, we chose a couple of drinks from their mixed drink menu. My sweetie had a Huaso, which is essentially a pisco sour. Pisco is like a grape brandy, which is the national beverage of both Chile and Peru. It was so good, I had one myself for our second round. I started off with a Caesar, which was limoncello, campari, soda and some maraschino cherry. It was sweet and refreshing. There are only a handful of mixed drinks on the menu, but all sound worth a try. The wine list is extensive and the beers on tap include a Marble red (Marble brewery is a fav in our household) and a Santa Fe Porter.
Food! We spent a long time perusing the menu, which is divided into sections for appetizers, seafood, meat, and vegetables. The great thing about tapas is that you order one or two and then repeat until full. We had the mixed olives, which turned out to be an enormous serving of tasty varieties, some pitted, but some not, so beware if you have sensitive teeth. We also tried the traditional plate of Serrano ham and manchego, or spanish cheese. I spent the first couple weeks of June in Spain and I became inordinately fond of jamon iberico while there, so I was disappointed not to see it at Cosmo. (I did a little research when I got home and found out that these two types of cured ham come from different pigs and the Jamon Iberico is a lot pricier.) However, the Serrano was quite tasty, especially paired with the manchego. I do hope that sometime we see a special which includes iberico (hint, hint, if anyone from Cosmo is out there).
My sweetie also tried a Chilean empanada, which is a savory baked version filled with beef, beans, and a couple other tasty ingredients. He declared it delicious. We also tried the lanza de carne with chimichurri, which is a skirt steak served with a green sauce from Argentina, made with parsley and other veg and seasonings. That was good too. Though they have an enticing dessert menu, we finished our meal with a tapa of medjool dates stuffed with goat cheese and wrapped in bacon. The combination of flavors was amazing, as the sweet dates played a nice counterpart to the pungent cheese and salty bacon. It was really rich and I think we'll start with that one next time. For me, however, the best tapa of the evening was the tortilla, a spanish dish of potato and egg, served here with a really garlic-y aioli. It was absolutely delicious, and I loved it in particular because it tasted exactly like the tortilla which was a favorite of mine while traveling in Spain.
As we finished our meal, the owner came by to introduce himself. He's Guillermo Loubriel and he runs the place with his wife Cecilia Kido, who is apparently the genius behind the menu. They've created a lovely space, bright and colorful and welcoming. The service was great, particularly as our waitress seemed to know a lot about the different tapas.
Sometimes you go to a new restaurant and you think "hey, nothing we tried was bad." We walked out of Cosmo saying to each other "everything we tried was good and some of it was really great." I admit to making a mental list of the things we didn't eat this time around that we're definitely ordering next time. It's wonderful to anticipate a new restaurant's opening and then have such an overwhelmingly positive experience on our first visit. I'd love to see this place survive and thrive, so si quiere ir de tapas or if you're interested in trying them for the first time, please check out this restaurant. The address is 4200 Central and their phone is 232-0535. (They have a web address at cosmotapas.com, but their site doesn't seem to be up yet.) Good luck Cosmo! We'll be back.
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Comment by slamwagon on July 17, 2009 at 9:01am -
I'll never have to visit Spain again at this rate! Maybe that's not a good thing. Oh well, I'll save money.
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Comment by Lana on July 17, 2009 at 10:53am -
Thanks for this review! We've been curious.
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Comment by Barelas Babe on July 17, 2009 at 12:06pm -
What a mouthwatering review - I can't wait to check this place out!
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Comment by Spring Griffin on July 17, 2009 at 3:51pm -
Thank you for posting this, Hettie. I'm bad about trying new places sometimes but I will definitely give this place a go after hearing your glowing review.
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Comment by Jay on July 17, 2009 at 4:28pm -
I appreciate hearing about your experience at this new restaurant in my 'hood. I am glad Cosmos opened up in that space and look forward to trying their tapas.
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Comment by Stephanie on July 17, 2009 at 8:32pm -
I'm excited that the date/bacon dish has come to town. I don't like dates...but I could eat a whole plate of those things. I'm guessing it's the bacon...
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Comment by JMG on July 17, 2009 at 9:29pm -
This sounds great. I hope they see this review and put it up on their wall. We'll try it out soon.
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Comment by hettie on July 17, 2009 at 10:12pm -
this is a goofily enthusiastic review, I know, but we were just thrilled with our experience. I hope others have as enjoyable a time. :)
stephanie, I feel the exact same way about dates, but these things were delicious. it really is the bacon. bacon makes everything good.
rodney, I've never been to el farol. where's it located? I'm fairly new to the tapas game, but now I know where we're eating next time we're in santa fe. thanks for the tip!
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Comment by JMG on July 17, 2009 at 10:41pm
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And does El Farol have good paella?
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Comment by FactWino on July 18, 2009 at 6:01pm -
Based on this review, we tried Cosmo on Friday night and Hettie's goofily enthusiastic review is pretty on the money. We had a special artichoke heart stuffed with goat cheese and garnished with orange zest that was out of this world, best thing of the night for the wife and I both. Next in terms of quality was our desert, which was based on a South American fruit called lucuna. It was made into a mousse that was sort of pumpkiney/a little coffee-ey on top of a hard merengue, with berries and whipped cream and a marinated strawberry as a garnish, fantastic. Wife and I were reversed on our rankings of chicken satay and gambero(shrimp), so they were both 3rd and 4th. The other tapas we tried were also good, but not as outstanding as these. A little dissapointing was the Cosmo Papas, some thick fried potato chips, russet, sweet and purple, served with regular old ketchup(catsup). We were expecting maybe some kind of aioli or house-made ketchup or something fancy for the money. It was not enough to turn us off the meal by any means, but it stood out
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