Casa Asturiana
77 Liverpool St
Sydney CBD
Casa Asturiana is in an area that used to have quite a flourishing Spanish food range - in fact it was often referred to as the Spanish Quarter. There aren't as many places there now but this place has quietly continued on and on and on. We visit Spain regularly - it's one of our favourite places. The food of course it a major drawcard there so we have plenty to compare the local Spanish offerings. We saw croquetas de pollo - chicken croquettes - on the menu. While we usually have cod or cheese croquettes when doing all things Spanish - these turned out to be great. They were certainly longer than normal but the golden crumbed coating revealed a very tasty filling.
Next was a staple - jamon serrano. This wafer thin cured ham was pretty to look at and disappeared fast as it was so popular at our table. In Spain we live on this stuff and you can buy so many variations it's sometimes hard to choose.
You can't have tapas without at least some seafood - well we can't! The gambas a la plancha - or grilled prawns - were delicious. They were a good size and lightly cooked to stay juicy and tender. The calamares fritos - or fried calamari - had a golden crunchy coating over tender calamari rings. These were indulgently good.
Spanish meatballs almost always come in a tasty sauce and these were now exception. The albondigas a la Asturiana were good sized meaty treats in a nice rich tomato sauce. This was perfect with the meatballs and just as good for dipping our bread rolls in to.
Chorizo - fried spicy Spanish sausage - is another must have dish for tapas. We will almost always have it and we were glad we ordered it this time. The sausage had a nice spicy kick to it and great flavours.
Ok - so it's probably good to not have meat or seafood for every dish. Probably. If you do need to stray to something vegetarian then the patatas bravas is probably the most popular one to have. This dish was chunky fried potato pieces slathered in a spicy tomato aioli. The sauce is the king of this dish and even though there was plenty we ate it all. Add a dish of garlic mushrooms and you're getting a great mix.
There's of course a good range of drinks available too. While we stayed with Spanish beer on this occasion we did flirt with the idea of some sangria which we love.
Casa Asturiana was a great experience. The food was fresh, arrived fast and had big flavours. You can sit outside but there's also plenty of space inside too where we dined. We left full and satisfied.