El Bistró de Fuencarral
Although our long and merited Easter vacation in faraway land was nice, the lack of hamburgers - we subsisted exclusively on simple local food - made us hungry for one of our favourite culinary items.
Hermz had been to El Bistro once “sans moi” (I am trying to not to take it personally of course) and suggested it might be a good spot, so we decided to gave it a try.
It’s a typical tiny Spanish bistro, the type you can find in any street of Madrid or any other Spanish city, with the exception that this one has hamburgers. In fact, it has four, which is three more than I was expecting. The atmosphere is also that of a typical relaxed Spanish bar. You come in, take a seat (no standing around until they show you to a table), take the plastic menu and then for the waiter/bartender/bouncer all-in-one guy to grace you with his presence. This one was a forty something year-old dude chewing gum who gave me a wink while I was taking pictures of the bar and took our order within 12 seconds. The speed is what one would expect - the place was almost completely empty - although a few other places could learn from this. I had a feeling that I’d gained some weight, so I gave up on the bubbly ugly (coke) and ordered sparkling mineral water; Hermzz went with his typical coke, even though he is reaching the age where he should watch his belly (Ed: Belly? Surely you meant fantastic six pack). It all came in bottles with glasses filled with ice and a slice of lemon, like it’s meant to be. Everything at this stage hinted at a great meal, all the good checkboxes had been checked.
This time we swerved from our usual ways and ordered an aperitif in the form of pimientos de padrón. Vegetables, even fried, are always a good starter. The pimientos were passable, I’ve had better, but since we’re focusing on hamburgers let’s not get distracted. There is nothing better than having it easy while selecting your hamburger. Since this is a bar and hamburgers are not exactly the specialty, there were just 4 simple types, no fancy shit this time. I went for hamburguesa completa with cheese, bacon, tomatoes and lettuce and Hermz for americana, that had the same ingredients plus an egg.
We were waiting quite a bit for a bar that is not exactly overcrowded, Hermzz’s idea of ordering a starter proved to be a good one. The hamburguers weren’t the eighth wonder of the world. The buns were a bit dry and mine even cold. The meat was slightly too well done for being able to describe it as juicy and the cheese must have melted before I was concieved. The only exceptionally good thing were the fries, if the weird shapes and odd cuts are anything to go by they must have been home made. Dripping with grease, but hey, if you like it light, go to Subway!
It might be I am getting soft because spring is coming and I get woken up by those stupid birds every morning at ridiculous a.m., but I didn’t leave the place in rage. Nor was I in the mood to burn the place down. It was a decent hamburger at a decent price (€6.50 each) and the service was good. If you are shopping in Fuencarral and you feel like a bite bigger that tapas, I’d still go there.
Pretty standard spanish bar decoration.
You can also get this fantastic t-shirt if you become a member of the defenders of all that is good and sacred on the internet: the EFF and donate $65+.
Yes, she did get a haircut shortly after. No need to worry.
