Gmbklm's review of Tapas Brindisa

A very busy little tapas bar / restaurant at the edge of Borough market. Décor is as you would expect for a tapas bar ! We’ve eaten here 4-5 times in the last 12 months, most recently end Jan 2010. Our main reason for not eating here more frequently is that unless you turn up at an odd time of day, it can be a long wait.

The staff are generally pleasant and professional, and seem to cope reasonably well with the high customer turnover, although it can sometimes be difficult to get attention.

Brindisa carries quite a limited menu which doesn’t change much, so its fine for the occasional visit. As a result, we normally end up choosing the same dishes – Olives, chartuterie, cheese, salad, Spanish omelette, etc. They don’t serve white bait, meat balls, kidneys and some other Tapas standards. I think the food is good, but not great, with their particular strength being the charcuterie. The highlight of our last visit was the superb large Gordal olives, but at effectively 40p each they should be quite good ! One of their better mixed meat platters was very good, but was £24. The mixed cheese platter of 4 cheeses to share was quite good, but at £15.50 it did not represent great value compared to a good restaurant.

They carry a reasonably good wine choice. We normally end up paying £30- £35 inc service.

Brindisa is very atmospheric, but as another reviewer intimated, it is not cheap and not necessarily good value for what you get – a bit like my experiences in Spain itself, you need to pay a lot to get decent quality. I think the pricing means you come away with a Tapas bar experience but a restaurant level bill – A basic Tapas style evening meal normally costs us circa £30 pp, inc service, but exc all drinks.