Spanish in San Francisco

Last week my best friend since I was two came to visit San Francisco for the first time. This of course puts the pressure on me to pick the perfect restuarant, which is hard to do in a city filled with amazing food. I opted for Zarzuela, a Spanish tapas restaurant on Hyde, toeing the line between Russian and Nob Hill. This ending up being the perfect choice. The neighborhood is cute, the restaurant is cozy and warm, the food was authentic and amazing and the service was charming.

The restaurant is so warm and inviting. There's a front room, so it looks like a smaller establishment but there's more seating in the back. We got a nice corner table and promptly ordered a bottle of cava (when in "Spain). They bring the cava out to your table with a bucket of ice so it stays perfectly chilled the entire time. From our waiter, I learned that cava served at the perfect temperature will only have bubble near the top of the glass. Now to the food, oh the glorious food. I spent a week in Madrid a couple years ago and this is the best Spanish-style tapas I've had since. We got so many small plates and each seemed better than the next. We sampled the mejillones al zazfran, which are mussles sauteed in white wine, garlic, tomatoes, onions and saffron. We got a side of one of my favorite traditional tapas dishes, patatas bravas, which is basically chopped, fried potatoes with spicy tomato dip (ala french fries Spanish style). When at a Spanish restaurant, you have to get paella, which is Spanish style rice with a medley of seafood, chicken and vegetables, flavored with saffron. Another dish that was one of my favorites in Madrid is the chicken and ham croquettes. These delicious fried rolls and filled with meat and cheese, a combination that rarely goes wrong. We also got the braised quail (because clearly we had not ordered enough already), which was juicy and well cooked, but didn't have many memorable flavors.

The service was really what made the evening memorable. Our server was actually Spanish and very charming. He was knowledgeable about all of the food and wine. He was always there to fill out glasses when they got low and lead a toast. At one point in the evening, he knew man dining at the restaurant and burst out singing this beautiful song from Spain. My friend actually speaks fluent Spanish, so they got to chit chat for a bit in his native tongue. The prices are pretty good too, the bill only gets high because you want to try everything on the menu! I will definitely eat here again and recommend this place to any tapas lovers.