Madrid

An Afterwork drink at the Claremont Hotel on a Friday night led to an early dinner.
Our Party of 3 walked over to Madrid which looked pretty full. Once in, we aplogised for not having a booking but were told we could have the booth seat until its next booking at 7:30. We seated at 6:00.
The staff were fast and friendly taking out order straight away… we ordered the Madrid plate, which had Arancini, Olives, Mushroom, Chorizo, Squid, 2 dips and fresh crispy bread… Taste explosion it was amazing and paired very well with my Elefante Tempranillo Shiraz (I am so in love with this wine). Still a bit peckish we ordered two more tapas to share… the Prawns and the prawn taco.
They came out very fast and were incredibly tasty the prawns were cooked perfectly with a lovelyy hint of chilli… and the tacos… just WOW!!!
We opted for dessert at Koko Black so we were out of the door by 7pm.
We did not feel rushed at all and had amazing quick service and wonderful food!!!
I would say the price of the Madrid Plate was reasonalble at $ 28, but the Tacos, although awesome, $ 18 was pushing it. THe prawns also amazing was $ 16.
A bit Pricey… but it is Claremont so I was half expecting it :)

I would agree with the previous posts about the service being painfully slow. I had to ask multiple times for more water (which I would think would be an automatic refill). We tried the tapas platter and the Zucchini Fritters with tzatziki sauce. I wasn’t too impressed with the general tapas but loved the Zucchini Fritters. The bathroom was across the street in the alley which kind of freaked me out but maybe it’s just that I’m new to Australia. I probably wouldn’t go back here.

In short: fake bar, full of fake people and fake food.
I swayed between three and a two-​star rating at first, but «jovial» and «intimate» quickly translated to «overcrowded» and «sardine can». The bar is TINY, which makes it impossible to move around and requires serious patience when ordering a drink (even if you are seated for dinner).
Food. Well, it’s tapas by method but not entirely by substance. Read: small, overpriced plates of pseudo-​Spanish eats. The food was tasty but it cannot compare to Andaluz or Cantina 663. Madrid have expanded their definition of Spanish tapas to include any Mediterranean country where the people have dark hair and tongue-​rolling accents.
Service was forgetful and the lighting too dim but it was really the off-​site, brothel-​den toilet that put the icing on the cake.
Sitting alfresco, the best part about Madrid was how pretty the Claremont Quarter looked at night.
Madrid are opportunists before they are culturists. I doubt they’ve ever been to the real Madrid, nor would they care to see it.

I’m surprised by the bad reviews, I had a great experience at Madrid. It was a Sunday after noon, the place was quite busy and we walked in and were immediately greeted by the staff, sat down at a cute table near the back and straight away we had someone bring us menus and ordered drinks.
After about five minutes tops we had our drinks and ordered our food as a band began to play cool tunes, the atmosphere was joyous, there was a great breeze we got our food very swiftly and it was delicious! I ordered the toasted veg out wrap with pumpkin, grilled capsicum, hummus and lettuce with fries and my boyfriend ordered the crostini with grilled chicken, prosciutto, rocket and brie both were delectable, the staff friendly and I will definitely be back but next time for dinner.

Umm, a bit pricey for what you get. And the service? Very slow. As a fairly patient person, I am happy to wait if I know the food will be worth it. And it wasn’t really.
Firstly, the waitress said there was going to be a wait for a table. And while we were plotting whether to stay or bounce, the waitress came over and said our table was ready. So we went and sat down, it took forever to take our drinks and for them to arrive, and the same for the food. Sigh! We had some arancini, bad fries, and my friend had some sausage. Seriously not enough food for the money we paid. Meh…