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Rita Rouge

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MichaelJM
MichaelJM
First Reviewer
3 out of 5
Avg. Member Rating
1
Review
4
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Editor Pick

Rita Rouge

  • March 18, 2008
  • Rated 3 of 5 by MichaelJM from Nottingham, England
Rita Rouge

The Rita Rouge Restaurant was recommended to us by the receptionist at the hotel and he obligingly had telephoned them to secure a firm booking for us. It was a decent walk from the hotel and along the packed boulevard of La Rambla. We meandered around a network of alleyways, pausing to admire the samrt graffiti work of local artists, before reaching the road that Rita Rouge is on. The restaurant is actually in the heart of La Rambla but still feels far enough off the main tourist route to have retained its local appeal and an attitude that suggests that they are not pandering for the tourist market.

The décor is a bit of a throw back to an earlier decade and the reproduction stylised from the fifties and sixties. Indeed I have clear memories of the portraits of posed women being sold in large department stores in the mid sixties. They were churned out for a mass market and I often wondered who could possibly want the monstrous things hanging in their house. As an aside my son informed me that originals from that era are now highly desirable. Shame I never bought any at the time!

We passed a small bar area on a “link corridor” from the entrance to the restaurant’s reception area and despite our earlier booking it seemed that they had not reserved us a table and we were offered seats either inside or outside. However, as the outside terrace really resembled a car park with parasols we opted for the more exuberant interior dining. The table was assembled for us this meant drawing up an additional chair and adjoining table and placing the eating irons on the table. The chairs were both comfortable and heavy being constructed of stainless steel and a thick rubberised chair fabric. Unusual? Yes, but very practical for a restaurant.

We’d booked our table for 9-30pm and it was relatively empty when we arrived and we wondered why we’d decided to book. But the Spanish eat particularly late and by 10-30pm the place was filling up and by 11-30pm it was full to bursting.

The restaurant, despite it’s oriental appearance offers an eclectic choice of food with a wide choice of meat and fish. It’s not too great for vegetarians but if you eat fish then Rita Rouge will be OK for you. After a struggle through the menu I decided I was going for the Fajitas – you know sometimes, spicy food just become a necessity!

The pace of life here isn’t fast so if you’re wanting quick service, don’t visit Rita Rouge, but we were happy to enjoy our cocktails before the meal. The six meals all arrived together – not always the case in Spanish restaurants – and we sat back to enjoy a first class meal with a couple of decent bottles of red Rioja. The ever-attentive waiter kept popping back to check that “everything was in order” a feature which became amusing and later a little annoying. Indeed when we’d finished our main course and wanted to order a dessert he was nowhere to be seen – a reality that repeated itself when we were wanting to get the bill. I guess by that stage in the evening the restaurant had filled up and his attention had been pulled away from us to the mass of Spanish diners that had invaded the restaurant.

Overall, despite the erratic service and the fact that the reserved table was not ready for us, we did enjoy our dining experience at Rita Rouge. It offers good quality food in a dining space with decor normally associated with Chinese restaurants. The pace was not hurried and there was certainly no pressure to move on. So sit back, relax and enjoy is the maxim for this restaurant.

From journal La Ramblas and Spanish Food

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