Boqueria

So basically this place was so good I'm hesitant to even utilize humor in this post in fear of making light of how outstandingly delicious everything I consumed was. The interior of the modestly sized, long, narrow restaurant impresses upon you the notion that you've just stumbled into the cozy basement of a fat, jolly Spanish man who cures ham on the hooks hanging from his ceiling. It's slightly modernized, but not enough to infringe upon the overwhelming cheeriness that made my heart purr like a small kitten on Ambien.

We inquired what the Autumn Sangria was but declined to get it after basically being described a melted down yankee candle. So we copped a traditional red, instead - which wound up being not so much red as some seductive, regal shade of violet.

This is spinach covered in roasted garlic, oil, pine nuts, chick peas and yellow raisins. Enough garlic to send your Italian grandmother cowering beneath the dining room table.

If you bring something to me in a worn, metal skillet, you can't see, but I'm actually caressing my groin underneath the table. Especially if it's filled with these shrimp - with a hunk of crusty bread impaled on the handle? I almost poured the whole thing down my shirt.

Peep these croquettas. (TM pending on that phrase). They were filled with ground beef and potato and cheese and covered with whatever all that delicious looking shit is on top. The menu said "salsa brava", which from my youth as a maize farmer in the hills of northern Spain I know to translate to "brave sauce".

Here's Cookie drinking the Sangria. You can't see but her pockets are stuffed with shrimp for the ride home.

This is honestly one of the most delicious meals I've had in a while - enough so that I'd go back to try the rest of the menu. Here is a link if you wanna see what's good:

http://www.boquerianyc.com/index.html