Nerja
Pata Negra 57

Pata Negra 57

Almirante Ferrandiz, 57, 29780, Nerja, Spain

Tapas • Español • Internacional • Contemporáneo


"When planning this holiday, and nominated restaurants for lunch or dinner, we were not aware of this restaurant. We only came-upon it when we walked past in the early-afternoon of our visit here. We immediately called in and made a reservation for that evening, and we were pleased that we did. On our arrival in the evening we were shown to our table and the menu was presented. We were given the wine list and immediately ordered water. A pleasant complementary aperitif arrived. We studied the wine list and chose and ordered our wine: the Attis ‘Lias Finas’ 2022 Albariño. The waiter, who was quite distant and aloof, brought and poured the wine. It was complex, but very elegant with toast notes, and peach and lemon aromas. On the palate it was intense with fresh fruit; particularly mango. Worryingly the waiter then took the wine bottle away to (presumably) his station, and placed it in a wine bucket of ice. Although the wine was always in view I was somewhat uncomfortable by the lack of control over the wine; i.e. to feel that we would need to summon the waiter to pour more wine. I let it go and we sipped the wine whilst studying the menu. Starters were listed as either hot or cold, we both chose the same hot starter: ‘Scallops in a white wine sauce, Caviar essence and Salmon Roe’. This was a serving of three reasonably large, beautifully-cooked scallops in a thin cream sauce floated on a black liquidized caviar elixir. It was absolutely divine, a great way to start. Mains were listed by meat or fish and again we chose the same plate: ‘Fillet Mignon with Port and Mushroom Sauce’, which was served with the expected absolutely minimum serving of vegetables, but plenty of new potatoes. The steak being the most tender part of tenderloin was wonderful and cooked to ‘medium’ perfection. The sauce was dark, rich and creamy, just delicious. Every scrap of food on the plate could be, and was, eaten and enjoyed. Despite my reservations concerning the control of our wine the waiter superbly orchestrated the recharging of our glasses. Desserts were taken: my Partner had the superb ‘Fondant Chocolate’ with ice cream; intense chocolate sauce and fresh raspberries (don’t get excited by the latter plural – there were only two). The fondant was otherwise perfect and very, very rich it was too. I chose the ‘Tarta de Manzana’ (apple tart): two small samosa-shaped filo pastries containing apple in a sweet reduction, decorated with a small boule of cinnamon ice cream and an intense raspberry reduction. It was all very, very good and wholly novelle in presentation and portion size. Unsurprisingly it was the most expensive dinner of our holiday. I would say overall that this restaurant was a bit cold and sterile in style, the waiter compounded this feeling. I expect that the other parties were noisier than the waiter would have cared them to be. It was that sort of establishment."

Rocky's

Rocky's

Calle Vía Real, 29780 Nerja, Spain

Pizza • Brunch • Británico • Sin Gluten


"Only tried it because I heard it was under new ownership (used to be **** it now has new owners, and it 's still ****). In fairness, the fried brie starter I had was lovely and my father really liked his cod whatever they weres. But, I ordered a Caeser salad— I 'm not a salady person, but love me a Caeser. What turned up was a mixed chopped salad with that nasty red bitter lettuce thing included, onion, tomato, the world 's smallest ever soft crutons and a dressing that looked and tasted like it was left over from a 1970s Beefeater Prawn cocktail. Oh, and fresh coriander sprinkled all over it. WTF?!!!! I love coriander, but all over a pretend Caeser salad? No bueno. One bite. Gross. Politely said to the server that it tasted a bit off . She told me to hold on. I held on. Enter Mr Angry Chef. He proceeded to mansplain that it WAS a Caeser salad, because it has Caeser dressing on it (highly debatable, but whatever Angry Chef dude). I told him, no, a Caeser salad is romaine lettuce, crutons, shaved parmesan and a dressing made from garlic, dijon, red wine vinegar, lemon juice, Worcester sauce and anchovies (sometimes egg). Mr Angry Chef looks at me..... angrily. I 'll make you one with romaine lettuce then, he snarls. I decline. What do you want then? He growls. I tell him nothing. [I 've worked in enough kitchens to know better than to eat anything prepared by an angry chef.... worth remembering BTW peeps). In their defence, they didn 't try and charge for it. But no apology — at all —and Mr Angry Chef dude 's attitude seriously stinks, even for a chef. Oh, and my mum 's meatballs seriously sucked too, but she didn 't say anything because she was embarrassed and the server took away her full plate without even asking if things were OK or if there was a problem (huge red flag). So there you go. Personally, the biggest issue for me is having a nasty angry man right up in my grill just because I pointed out the Caeser salad ain 't a Caeser salad, and that it tastes off. Maybe they don 't care about customer service because they mainly cater to tourists who only go there once. Or maybe their customers love **** to mediocre food and nasty surly chefs. Who knows? Who cares? I don 't, I 'm off to Colombia in six days. But yeah, if you do go to Rocky 's then step away from the meatballs and give the Caeser salad, a really wide berth... go for the fried brie and the cod whatever they weres. Oh and pray that you don 't bump into that chef dude in a dark alley."