Brunch at Café Espanol

The matinee performance of The City Club at the Minetta Lane Theatre that we attended last Saturday (see our post below) wasn’t scheduled to begin until 3PM which left us plenty of time for brunch in Greenwich Village before the show.  We opted to try Café Espanol, located just a couple of blocks away on the corner of Bleecker and Sullivan Streets, and we’re really glad we did.

Café Espanol offers a complete lunch special for only $11.95 per person on weekdays and $13.95 on weekends.  The deal includes a glass of beer, wine or sangria; any of three different soups or a house salad; and a choice of nearly two dozen different main courses ranging from chicken to pork chops to seafood.  Coffee or tea and bread with olive oil are also included and, for an extra buck, you can also get your choice of flan or vanilla ice cream for dessert.

Both Sue and I started with large glasses of very good Sangria.  Sue then had the House Salad while I had a large bowl of Caldo Callego, a delicious potato, spinach and chorizo soup.  (The other two soups on the menu were gazpacho and black bean but those will have to await my next visit.)  For our main courses, both Sue and I chose paellas but her choice, Paella Marinera, consisted of all seafood, including shrimp, mussels, clams, scallops and calamari, while mine, Paella Valenciana, lacked the calamari but included a large piece of chicken and lots of sausage to boot.  We were both more than satisfied with our selections.

We shared one flan dessert (also good) and coffee.  Service and ambience were excellent.  It was a great value.  We thoroughly enjoyed our meals and definitely plan to return.