Sotavento
 

Sotavento boasts an enviable position in Corralejo overlooking the harbour and has a large number of tables both inside and out. It is the sister restaurant of Tio Bernabe but offers a very different menu. When I am asked in the bar for a fish restaurant I would normally mention this one and a couple of others in the absence of one that deals predominantly in fish and seafood as their fish dishes are extremely good. The menu has recently been updated and offers a host of dishes including meats, fish, specialities of the house and paellas. The kitchen also boasts Willy the pasta chef and his pasta dishes are now combined in the new menu whereas before you were given a separate pasta menu. When I know that Willy is working I have invariably chosen a pasta dish as he can cook it just like Mamma made! I will mention that on perusing the new menu I noticed that the translation of “gratinado” (meaning “au gratin”) has managed to become “grated”. For example, King Prawn Kebab with Grated Mussels and Grated King Prawns with Garlic Mousse – I am sure you would be able to interpret them correctly.

This week I visited the restaurant for a girlie lunch with “soon to be resident Sally”. We sat outside in the sunshine watching the boats. Our first of two bottles of Viña Sol was rapidly ordered while we chose our dishes. I have eaten here so many times that I can´t imagine there´s much on the menu that I havn´t sampled or, at least, seen other people eating. When my friend Debi comes over, she readily reminds me that we always end up eating here for her first lunch. Sally hadn´t been here before so she studied the menu avidly. We chose between us for a starter the Fried Goat´s Cheese with Raspberry Sauce which was served as eight fried slices of cheese with the rich sauce in the centre – a very substantial starter if you ordered it just for yourself. Sally chose the Chicken Breast with Roquefort Sauce and I ordered the Spaghetti Scoglio from the speciality dishes which is essentially spaghetti with lots of fresh shellfish in a tomato sauce – scrum scrum!

I do remember a while ago (when I used to vaguely care about my ever fluctuating weight) that the Sotavento Salad was one of my favourite “house salads” around – with a little bit of just about everything on the plate. The paellas are also extremely good – I normally had the paella with both meat and fish but they seem to have removed that from the menu – but am sure they could cater to individual needs. They now have mixed meat, vegetarian or fish and seafood alternatives. They have other speciality pastas such as Tagliatelle al Gabiano (with olives, smoked salmon, mussels and cream), Tagliatelle San Daniele (green pepper, ham, broccoli and cream), Papardelle agli scampi (with garlic and prawns) and, one of my favourites (only because it sounds so nice to order in Italian), is the Spaghetti Aglio Olio Peperoncino (with garlic, olive oil, and chilli pepper). They also do Ravioli and Gnocchi dishes.

I borrowed a copy of their menu from one the waiters that I know to write this review and on returning it later last night ended up dining their again to energise myself before setting off to the quiz. We ordered a very excellent garlic bread and the Sole Waleska (which is another staple favourite of mine) – sole fillets wrapped around prawns with a white wine and cream sauce and piped mashed potato – good comfort food. We also ordered the Sirloin with Mushroom Sauce which came, as requested, medium rare and was an excellent cut of meat. This was served with (yes, you guessed it) – chips as well as a whole oven roasted tomato and pepper. Both dishes were extremely good. We were offered the usual chupitos but declined (as I still had my wine).

I have always received excellent service from the waiters here and even on a visit when there were nine of us the waiter managed to take all our orders for starters and main courses without writing them down. We challenged him to bring out not just the correct dishes but he also managed to remember who was having what. I was impressed to say the least. That particular evening we watched a Guardia Civil helicopter going to and from Lobos Island to collect stranded holidaymakers as the weather was so bad the boats had stopped sailing for the evening. All very dramatic stuff.