SPEAKEASY

By Nora Cobb
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There we were, in a classy, upscale restaurant where reservations are essential, water is sipped out of a shot glass and college students bill tapas to their parents’ credit cards and my friend, Felipe, had the audacity to lean over the waitress, and steal leftover tenderloin kebobs from the neighboring table’s abandoned plates.

I guess I can’t blame Felipe—he was just trying to get the most for his buck. At $10 a plate, Speakeasy’s filet minion kebobs over mashed potatoes were the second most expensive tapa on the menu, after the $12 sesame tuna. In my opinion, the three toothpicks covered in charred kebobs was the snack, and the mound of moist mashed potatoes was the meal. If I had just wanted a snack I would have stuck with the spinach dip ($5.75). What could be more satisfying than a thick butter-cream soup in a bowl you can eat (it’s made of bread)? If you don’t want to share, go for the white pizza ($7) covered in red peppers and garlic, artichoke hearts, basil and ricotta. Be sure to leave your expectations at the door, though—a frozen Healthy Choice pizza tastes the same and is a lot cheaper.

If you’re on a budget, duck confit salad ($8.50) is a good substitute for the duck breast entrée ($16), which might as well be on the tapas menu. The salad, however, is just that—plenty of baby arugula, carrots and apricot stilton, but not enough duck. The meat’s tender subtleness melts in your mouth, but sadly, the duck is just a tasty topping hidden in a field of green. I would have rather paid double to savor the rare fowl instead of spending $8.50 on lettuce.

No matter which tapa you choose, the fried asparagus ($7.50) pairs well with anything. Presented in a tee pee like structure, these golden sticks meet your mouth with the same excitement as fried shrimp, but then remind you that they are a mushy green and delicious in their own right, as delicious as a veggie could be. As for the roasted red pepper sauce that sets these sticks on fire, it’s so zesty that half way through our meal my friend Brian exclaimed, “I could bathe in this dip.”

Speakeasy maybe hidden, but students flock to its East Broad Street location before a night downtown to share tapas and sip classy cocktails like the mango mojito ($6.50) or the grainy Georgia peach martini (5 ounce for $5 and 10 ounce for $8), which should have been named the Florida orange martini instead—it had a tangy citrus punch, not a sweet fuzzy fizz. At least with the Georgia peach you know you are sipping a cocktail and not a box juice—with sugar overpowering the taste of tequila, the berry martini was Juicy Juice in a martini glass.

For the winos, Speakeasy offers 25 white and 43 red wines from all over the world. Sold by the bottle ($20-$40) or by the glass ($6-$7), wine is an excellent complement to any tapa. In fact, the word tapa, which literally means lid or cover, comes from the dish’s traditional Spanish use as a top to protect wine from pesky fruit flies.

There certainly wasn’t a fruit fly in sight, though—it wouldn’t have found space. Seated at an oval table on high barstools, the only thing my party of six wasn’t touching was the floor. The restaurant tries to maximize surface area and becomes quite crowded at about 8 p.m. As for the low lighting, it’s Speakeasy’s attempt to create an intimate atmosphere. Trying to get to the substandard bathroom was a little too intimate for me, though. I felt like I was in a mosh pit or at a nightclub, like The Loft, with everyone rubbing up against me.

Two hours, six tapas, three martinis and one dessert later, the six of us stood in line waiting to pay and then struggled through the mob of college girls wearing shirts as dresses down the never ending flight of stairs.

Sure, Speakeasy maybe upscale (which is code for overpriced), but go with a group of at least six, exchange tapas and share a bottle of wine. End the evening with fallen chocolate cake ($5.50) and you won’t mind that you didn’t get a table with a view of North Campus. The tiny cupcake surrounded by an army of sliced grapes and strawberries has a warm chocolate lava center that can make any day of the week feel like your birthday.