Hehehe... It's not that I wasn't sharing, Bill from NYC, it's that I was sleeping!
The lunch WAS GREAT and we arrived right at 2pm - the place was already about half full but they could push together two tables for the 5 of us, awaiting a 6th. By 2:30pm, the place was ABSOLUTELY full until about 4pm. By the time we left, what, 5pm (?), the place was ABSOLUTELY EMPTY and we were the last ones to leave.
They offer THREE lunch
Menús at La Puebla. Menú 1 is 9.80€ and there are about 12 choices for your first course and 12 choices for your second course. They have a Menú 2, which is 11.30€, and they had about the same number of choices. Then they had a LARGE Menú which was 22€ and had "higher class" food choices.
I the Menú 2. From the long list of choices for first course I chose the
Arroz a la Cubana[/b], which was a small tower of rice near the edge of a large plate, a large fried egg, a large pool of ketchup covering half of the plate, and a slice of banana. Wow. It was good!
For the second course I chose the [i]cordero con patatas (lamb with potatoes). It was good too, but not as much meat as I'd hoped.
For dessert I chose (one of) their house specialty, the
pudin casero (a homemade, firm custard).
Other people had the
cochinillo which they said was good, paella, and wow, steve robinson's first course of
Revuelto de Ajetes y morcilla (a mix of fried morcilla and a kind of green bean) looked ESPECIALLY good. Mmmmm.. I'll get that next time for a first course.
In attendance were members steve robinson, JA and his wife from New York City, neilstrauss, Mercedes, and ME! One person cancelled at the last minute. Too bad. He missed some good food and lively political conversation and debate among "same side" protagonists.
As for the "drama" mentioned above by steve robinson, it's really his story (which took place long after the lunch) - I was mainly a bystander, so if/when he wants to share it either here or at a bar after a few drinks is up to him.
I only took one photo during the lunch which you'll see below. Starting at the bottom left and moving clockwise you'll find:
steve robinson (member), Mercedes (member), Judy, and JA (member). I'm not pictured because I'm taking the photo and neilstrauss came a bit later - you've all seen him in photos of previous MadridMan get togethers.
¡Until next time! Saludos, MadridMan