the fat kid at heart: tango

Wednesday evening I had a publisher dinner at tango. Tango is located on the corner of pike and boren on capital hill. I’ve always wondered about it because I used to live a few blocks away but never went. I heard some decent reviews about their paella so I was excited to try it out.

let me just preface by saying i am never going back there again.

I should’ve known how the food was going to be judging by how not busy the restaurant was when we got there given how close to downtown it is!

We ordered a lot of tapas and while they tasted alright (some laughable), they were just overly priced. we started with these ‘cheap dates’ which were dates wrapped with bacon atop eggplant. They were $2.50 each and not good. the combo is usually good but not there. Then we had some green beans which tasted asian…I can’t put my finger on the sauce they used, but I know I’ve tasted it one of my mom’s dishes. We had a shrimp ceviche which was a huge letdown. It was tortilla chips topped with onions and avocado and some shrimp….right. we had some beef skewers which were alright, and then ordered a steak dish for us to share. That was probably the best dish because the meat was very tender.

Then came the $48 paella. We got a meat one (to my surprise because I’ve only ever known seafood paella) and then a seafood one to share. The meat paella was not good. it taste like they used a LOT of beef broth and then that was it. It was tough to distinguish the different types of meat that they used cause everything looked the same and tasted like broth. The seafood paella was ok. The seafood wasn't overcooked and the rice had a tomato taste. But by the time the paella came about, we were already so stuffed from the mediocre tapas.

I’m glad I got to try it because I’ve been curious about it, but I’d say save your money and go to tilth instead :)

potato croquettes--they were ok