“Purveyors of cheap delicious eats and more” – Review of La Nueva Espana
BY CLAIRE McCURDY
A review of La Nueva Espana
La Nueva Espana
“Spanish”- Rotisserie Chicken, with Dominican Sides
606 W 207th Street
Inwood
(212) 567-0500 – restaurantlanuevaespana.com
Interior of La Nueva Espana - from restaurantlanuevaespana.com
Dining in Inwood can be a great cross-cultural experience. It’s not just the food, it’s the ambience. The Dominican warmth of a place like La Nueva Espana is apparent from the moment one steps in the door. On a recent evening several waitresses immediately came forward to invite us, a group of five, to find our seats. A speedy executive decision was taken and my brother, sister in law, nephew and friend and I were quickly ushered upstairs to a spot which could accommodate us all, to an expansive room with a picture window, which gave our waitress a little quiet space to give us the grand tour of the menu. Seeing me brandishing my Spanish dictionary, she smiled and waved it away. Her excellent English abolished the need for me to attempt to bumble my way through the order in Spanish. She gave us a clear and friendly explanation of every dish we enquired about, all of which proved to be wonderful.
My brother and his family, from suburban Connecticut, very much wanted another visit to this New York City restaurant they had first tried over two years ago. They were eager to try its several new versions of chicken, which they remembered fondly. So we ordered the pollo al ajillo (chicken in garlic sauce); the pollo al limon (lemon chicken), pechuga de pollo con camarones (chicken with shrimp), and a sampling of the sides: red beans and rice, tostones (fried green plantains) and maduros (fried sweet plaintains). A near silence reigned for some time while we savored our meals. My pollo al limon was pungent, crisp, just slightly oily, and exactly what I had hoped. And the tostones, which were huge, were crisp, slightly sweet, not at all oily, and crackling—almost like potato chips, and a great offset to the densely sauce drenched main dishes.
And there was no need for me to joke with my college age nephew, urging him to try the pulpo (octopus) or the mofongo (plantains and pork cracklings). With the help of our waitress he got exactly what he wanted, chicharron de pollo, breaded fried chicken. And he loved it—“Great! Much better than KFC!” (He was right on the money here.—we tried it too, moist chicken and rich crumbling crackling batter. Could there be greater praise than this?)
Appropriately, La Nueva Espana’s fame is more than strictly local. A heartfelt plug by WNYC’s Brian Lehrer: “Best cheap eat in the city!” has done La Nueva Espana no harm at all. “Best delicious cheap eat” is more like it. For price, taste, volume and friendliness La Nueva Espana easily beats out many places with a comparable menu which pride themselves on being chic.
Finally, in our family dinner recap conversation, we commented that not only was the food great (memories of that shrimp linger) but my sister-in law emphasized that La Nueva Espana is both remarkably family friendly and inexpensive. Good deals abound. During a previous visit we, a group of four, lunched very well on a set of wickedly good tapas—shrimp, chicken, or beef, with a liberal helping of cilantro— for just 12.00. Giant bowls of garlic bread, crunchy with big pieces of garlic, gratis, appear on the table as you sit down, filling in the corners until you are served. This evening ‘s special deal, a “bucket of beer,” 5 beers of one’s choice for $12.00, encouraged us to try the Dominican national beer El Presidente, a light lager with a bite, and it disappeared with speed.. All meal portions were extremely generous – in fact, so substantial that each of us discovered that s/he had another meal’s worth of food to take home. For this group of five it was an amazing bargain, and a lovely evening out in the neighborhood to boot. Thanking our kindly hostesses and cooks we spilled out into the bitterly cold streets, each toting our large take-out bag, much warmer than when we arrived, and vowing to return.
