Tapas Gitana Chicago

It's really 3.5 stars. Same as the overall score.

Pros: Tapas were well made. Most were delicious though none were terrible. Enough food to split between my girlfriend. They constantly refilled the bread bowl and the service was great. Atmosphere was ok.

Cons: One of the tapas came out lukewarm. The chocolate dessert could of been better. I wasn't really feeling the desserts section or the decor that much. Much rather stick to the tapas.

For the pay and everything else, my critique is 3.5 stars.

I used to frequent this establishment when it was Arco, and I had heard that several staff members (including the cooks) had remained when the ownership changed hands. My last visit had literally been 4 or more years ago, and indeed I did recognize at least a couple people still working from the old days. Unfortunately that is really all I recognized.

The food is generally ok, but many of the old dishes that I loved are gone or have been retooled with not the greatest success. The prices are still fairly reasonable, but the portion sizes also seem to have decreased. We had 5 dishes (shrimp with chili flakes, potatoes allioli, lamb, empanadas, and bacon-wrapped dates), and all were decent but only the lamb and empanadas stood out as really being prepared nicely with bold flavors.

In addition there were some facilities problems during our visit. Mind you this was a cold, cold, cold Saturday night in January, but there were major temperature fluctuations in the back of the restaurant even though we were well away from the front door. Also there was a constant leak dripping water from the ceiling onto a rag near our table. A couple of times my arm got splashed with water from a source I would not like to think about. The visible microwaves in the kitchen (noted in several other reviews) are also a constant source of distraction when thinking of how your food is being prepared.

In summary this place is only OK, but there are MUCH better tapas places throughout the city I'd visit before this place. I'd give this place 2..5 stars, but I rounded up out of nostalgia.

I miss the old days...

This place is good. But not great. It's a small, trendy restaurant up north and I was happy with the ambiance when I walked in. The service was good. Their sangria was stronger than usual, which I liked, and was pretty tasty for white sangria, and I really liked that they gave me a lot of fruit pieces in my glass. We ordered one of the hot tapas shrimp dishes, the patatas bravas, and the beef and pork empanadas. I'm not sure if I didn't love this place because I've had better tapas, or if it was because the food just wasn't really that awesome. Not sure if I'd rush back here, but I would return, however, next time I think I'd try some different dishes, and the patatas bravas again, that was pretty good.