Spanish Vacation: Viridiana

Restaurante Viridiana was named after a 1961 Luis Buñuel film. The film was banned in Spain for a number of years. It was only released there in 1977. The Vatican felt the movie bashed Catholicism. The walls of the restaurant are lined with stills from Buñuel films. The restaurant has a very welcoming and casual atmosphere.

The famed chef and part-owner is Abraham García and he creates modern Spanish cuisine. He has an excellent reputation and Viridiana is considered one of the top restaurants in Madrid.

A multi-course dinner was planned for us and it was an excellent beginning to our gourmet adventures.

We started with a Cava apertif, a nice and refreshing Spanish sparkling wine.

Our first course was then a traditional Andalusian gazpacho with crunchy bread. I was expecting a vegetable laden soup, like other gazpachos I had before. But this was more like a creamy tomato soup without any veggies. There were small pieces of crunchy bread in the soup. It was tasty and a good start.

We then had a bottle of 2006 Blanco Nieva from the Rueda D.O. This white wine is made from the Verdejo grape. It was a crisp wine with excellent balance between minerality and citrus flavors. It had a lot of character and went well with our next couple of courses.

Our second courses was Duck pate, slightly smoked in maple wood, on vanilla bread with chutney of roses. The pate was silky smooth, tasty and was an intriguing pairing with the vanilla taste of the bread. The bread was like a pound cake. This was accompanied by a glass of Chateau de Villefranche Sauternes.

The next course came out in a small black pan and consisted of two farm fresh eggs, fried, next to mushroom mousse and truffles. I chose to mix all of the ingredients together to create an interesting sauce. I generally do not care for mushrooms but did finish this entire course. It was a mild mushroom flavor that went well with the egg and truffles.

Our fourth courses was mild rice with king prawns and mushrooms. Once again, despite my not liking mushrooms, I ate all of this dish too.

We now had another bottle of wine, a red, the 2002 Valenciso Rioja Reserva. This wine is 100% Tempranillo. The winery makes only a single wine, a Reserva. This was an excellent Rioja, a more subtle, Bordeaux-like wine. It had good fruit flavors balanced with spice. It was not overpowering though. It was more subtle and very enjoyable.

The wine went well with our main course, Iberian pork sirloin grilled with ham and torta del casar (a cheese) with figs, red wine and mustard. This was superb! The pork was meaty, moist, tender and very flavorful. One of the best pieces of pork I have ever had. It melted in my mouth. Just a perfect dish.

Yet the meal was not over. We ended with a trio of desserts that included: Classic Greek yoghourt ice-cream flavored with Pedro Ximinez; Ewe milk curd latxa, slightly smoked with acacia honey, bramble bush berries and other wild berries; and White chocolate cake with passion fruit mousse. These were accompanied by a Carpe Diem dessert wine. All three of the desserts were delicious and very different. A great melange of flavors and textures.

Service was excellent. They treated us very well and were attentive to our needs.

I was well sated at the end of the evening. An excellent dinner with great wines. This is a restaurant I would highly recommend to anyone visiting Madrid.