The earliest draft of this post began, “yumyumyumyumyum.” Perhaps that’s all the review we need.

For our second night of dining out with the the Lady’s family (see here and here for night one), we stopped by Mercat a la Planxa, the many-times recommended Spanish tapas restaurant in Chicago’s South Loop. Our heat stoked brains dreamed of gentle Sangria (upper 90’s and a cloudless sky earlier that day had welcomed us on the tour of downtown), but the restaurant provided much more than just tasty wine.

The bright and open dining floor (source)

The main dining area of Mercat is on the second floor and is bright and colorful, though its most striking feature is how very open it is. There are tall ceilings, a partly-exposed kitchen and a multi-tiered floor with tables of different shapes and sizes. The food menu is expansive with mostly tapas-style dishes, though there are some larger entree-sized options as well. The wine menu was also deep with many Spanish wines by the bottle and a fair number also available by the glass.

We settled in with refreshments. A few tried some deep red wines, but the drink of the evening remained that tapas staple, sangria. Mercat offers a few varieties of the traditional red wine type, but we stuck to the lighter and more refreshing white varieties this evening. One version with pears, grapes and rosemary was stellar while another with rhubarb was a bit forgettable.

As we sipped, our meal began with bruschetta-like Spanish toast to which we added pimientos de padrón, a serving of flash fried padrón peppers with salbitxada. The toast was tasty, but our pimientos were a bit bland, both in the too simple peppers and the boring sauce.

Next came our first batch of tapas plates. The mixto was a particular standout featuring Serrano ham and chorizo croquettes; these incredibly flavorful little bites were gone way too soon. An order of calamari with olives and fennel surprised us — cornmeal breading! — and the verdosa ensalada — baby greens, asparagus, avocado, confit cherry tomatoes and shaved mahon cheese — was a strikingly simple, but delicious green salad.

No good Spanish meal would be complete without paella, however Mercat offers an unusual version sans seafood. This giant platter came with grilled chicken, chorizo and olives and was topped with toast and a saffron aioli. Like all good paella, there was a slight, deeply flavored char in the middle of the rice and the whole giant pan disappeared before we even thought to snap of picture of it.

The paella of someone who did think to take a picture (source)

With just a moment to catch our breath, another wave of dishes came our way. A delicate lamb ragout covered butternut squash dumplings with beech mushrooms and black truffle in the pelotas de calabaza y cordero, and pungent horseradish topped the costillas de ternera, a hearty beef shortrib flatbread. We took in more chorizo via a simple sausage and potato dish and delighted in the perfectly cooked llenties i cigrons, a bowl of lentils, garbanzo beans, roasted tomatoes and feta cheese.

Somehow after all that food, we found the room for dessert and a shared glass of port. A nicely presented thick chocolate cream with hazelnuts and a buttercream ice cream finished the meal off well.

“Another? Well, if you insist.” (source)

As much as we loved the food, we did have some quibbles with the service. Tapas dining involves a lot of plates coming and going and, with so much sharing, spills and dropped bits pile up. Surprisingly, there didn’t seem to be anyone tasked with wiping tables or even just keeping the meal orderly. There just seemed to be an overall lack of “mise en place” to the whole operation (if we can be a bit liberal with the phrase). Our waiter also seemed to often be disorganized, forgetting one drink order and then getting it wrong after we reminded him.

These nit-picks are slight, though. Mercat provided an absolutely delicious meal in a great setting. The many good gossips we had heard were all true and we’ll be passing the recommendations on!