Dehesa Tapas Bar-restaurant: my bad reaction to bar stools, good but expensive food, but not enough

Dehesa
Evening started badly. Bar stools.

What I think of Bar Stools
Horrid. Nowhere to put your handbag except on the dirty floor out of reach. Trying to fit into a tiny stool wearing a winter coat. Nowhere to put your coat. These stools do have a back.

Unfortunately we were coming from another event and had to go to the extra expense of a taxi to arrive on time. We were dropped in Regent Street and ran through following satnav on a phone. On time!

Even so, our relatives had arrived first. They were already settled into the straight wall banquette seats, whilst we had the awkward bar high stools opposite. I beamed enthusiasm. I did not want to disrupt our event by making them move.

Ranting Against Bar Stools
I did my pole-vaulting impression, perched with the uncertain air of a parrot shifting about on bar, about to speak words everybody waited for. I tried to look agile and nonchalant.

Being on a bar stool put me in a bad mood for the whole meal. Are you sitting comfortably? No. I feel like I am in an airport lounge, or eating a snack of pot noodles on a trapeze. Bar stools must be designed for drinkers at bars, so they move on quickly to make way for others, and fall off as soon as they have had the second drink; approved by people who want the most uncomfortable chairs in order to get a quick turnover of diners who don't linger.

Did I say any of this? No. (It's our secret!)

Bar stools have only one use. Sitting up high to play electric organs on x shape supports.

Food Size and Dividing
Small portions. We were dividing between four. We ordered two portions of the starter. Asparagus with a smidgen of goat's cheese on the end, in a shallow sea of honey. Up comes a plate containing two. Everything was like that. I thought you got tapas for sharing. Everything had to be cut diagonally.

Sharing Plates
Plates not easily divided are an absolute disaster in groups, especially if you have any kind of hierarchy. I mean a work situation such as boss and employee so that one has to constantly defer to the other. In a family, older brother and his wife and younger brother and his wife. Or any situation where one is trying to please another.

Fish and meat
Most of the dishes for starters contained shellfish, to which I am allergic.
I had a lovely fish with tiny morsels of something delicious. We had two meat dishes. They also had lovely sauces and morsels of mushroom or fruit. With four of us sharing every plate it was quite hard to get your share. The meat was dark and shiny and looked raw. I thought it looked undercooked and was stringy and got in your teeth. Everybody else loved it.

Potato
We ordered (potato) chips. Very Spanish style, brushed with red pepper powdered or chili powder, which added visual appeal and flavour. Served with two small pots of dips.

Desserts
We told them we were sharing but the deserts were not shaped for sharing and not served for sharing. We had to play yo-yo with the plates. Could they have served us half portion each, or two plates as well as two spoons. I can tell you that I have been to five star restaurants which do so. Do they think it's bad form to share a dessert?

Shared Desserts
If you are running a tapas bar, which is designed for 'sharing' I think a table for four should be served all dishes for sharing. Otherwise the diners end up not sharing.

Whoever gets to eat the bigger portion or keep the whole dish feels guilty and the others feel resentful. However much you try to smile and be obliging, you are constantly on the alert to grab the first half, the last half, not be the first to dip in, and so on.

I don't want to go back. I must remember to tell them I'm a blind one legged cripple (not true, just joking) and will walk out with my group if I am given a bar stool. The more I think about it, the more cross I get. I did not enjoy the meal at all.

Completely put me in a bad mood. The family asked if I wanted to go onto a film with them but I said no and we went home. Two of us felt that despite having starters, two meat courses, two fish courses, two shared desserts, one coffee and three drinks, glasses of tap water all round, we were still hungry. A hungry diner is not a happy diner.

To cap it all the bill includes a supposedly optional donation to charity, already printed on the bill so you would have to make an embarrassing fuss to delete it.

I would have been a lot happier on a chair nearer the ground with my feet on the ground. The semi-circular seating near the door. That's what I want next time.

You can sit outdoors on the corner of the block looking up the pedestrian alleys leading in two directions. The main pedestrian alley leading to it is lit by seasonal lights and flanked by other amusing restaurants, shops and pubs. You are a short walk from Regent Street and Oxford Circus station. London right now is thronged with crowds of jolly people.

I managed to scoot down the steep staircase to the toilets. I thought, no good for wheelchairs or people with knocking knees and awkward ankles. Nor drunks misplacing their footing.

Dehesa, 25 Ganton Street, London WIF 9BP
+44 (0)20 7494 4170
info@dehesa.co.uk
saltyardgroup.co.uk

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.