The 16 best Spanish restaurants in America

We’re not saying you should visit only one José Andrés restaurant in your lifetime. But if you do, make it the one that actually offers a once-in-a-lifetime, capital-E—or rather É—experience. Tucked within Jaleo, the living legend’s splashy fixture at the Cosmopolitan, é is an eight-seat chef’s counter for which reservations must be made three months in advance and confirmed by a golden ticket in the mail. Throughout the 20-plus-course, interactive prix fixe tasting, you’ll see things you’ve never seen before—shape-shifting, gravity-defying, carnivalesque things involving bags and boxes and vases. You’ll taste things you’ll never taste again: a sphere of sparkling sangria that liquefies in your mouth, say, or a caviar-filled cup made of flash-frozen almonds, or an “empanada” of foie gras and corn nuts in a cotton-candy shell. It may damage your wallet, but unless you’ve had years of practice serving wine with sea cucumber or jellied egg yolks, we suggest you take the beverage-pairing plunge as well.

Highlighting stints with none other than José Andrés and Ferran Adrià, Cúrate chef-partner Katie Button’s résumé may be deadly serious, but her family-run destination in Asheville is as warm and charming as her name is cute. Button recommends that the guests who belly up to the long tiled bar overlooking the kitchen put themselves in their servers’ hands when it comes to dish selection: “It’s a lot of fun and you end up trying and enjoying things you might never typically order.” Perhaps you’ll be treated to the chilled almond-garlic soup called ajoblanco and béchamel-smothered canelones de carne mixta; or perhaps meltingly translucent slices of smoked lardo on toast and stunning rossejat negrowith squid ink-tinted fideos. You’ll certainly want some wine; the bottle prices are reasonable enough to throw in a copita of fine Sherry too. And if you’re really lucky, you’ll get to cap it all off with the eye-popping, off-menu pièce de résistance that is pañuelo de chocolate.

When smoke.oil.salt landed in back in 2014, Los Angeles breathed a sigh of relief: Finally, good tapas in the city! Split into two rooms with brick walls and dark furniture, smoke.oil.salt feels warm without being cramped: on one side, a chef’s counter circles around the stove; on the other side, a large communal table and a smaller wine bar gives the sense that it is all about community here. And tapas is all about community: share a bite here, a bite there, and the meal soon becomes a patchwork of (hopefully) great bites and company. A cucumber gazpacho is grand in the summer, all smooth texture and a dollop of light cream; and the pa amb tomaca, a Catalan tomato toast with house-made red and white sausage, stands out among the starters. The parade of hits keeps coming at the heavier end of the menu (a squid ink pasta with mussels and shrimp that’s fabulously fishy; quail atop a bowl of black lentils and chickpeas) all the way through to dessert (yes, they have the requisite Catalan custard). Los Angeles has one word for this flavorful new(ish)comer: gracias.

Offal-loving partner Mario Batali and protégée Andy Nusser (Babbo, Po) broke new ground at Gramercy Park’s Casa Mono by serving dishes that less-adventurous tapas restaurants seem to shy away from: think pig ears with chilaquiles and excellent fried sweetbreads in an almond-flour batter. For non-organ lovers, there's a juicy skirt steak atop romesco sauce and the iconic fried duck egg. A section of the menu is called “Whole organic animals”—the restaurant buys its various beasts whole, then spreads their bits across the always innovative menu. The open kitchen lends a fun and fiery atmosphere to the dining room, which is adorned with mosaic tile floors and lined with wine bottles. And speaking of those bottles, Casa Mono continues to house one of the most impressive collections of Spanish wines you’ll find in the Northeast. Sherry lovers, be warned: You may never want to leave.

Inspired by the flavors of Barcelona, Contigo is one of San Francisco’s premiere Spanish and Catalan restaurants, dishing out rustic cuisine in an eco-friendly setting since 2009. Contigo’s walls are made from salvaged 100-year-old redwoods—eco-friendly and, frankly, gorgeous—while the water glasses are recycled glass bottles. And the food? A curated selection of Spanish hams is a big draw, as is the daily Catalan flatbreads. Most of the dishes range from medium to large in size, and expertly marry California locavore freshness with powerful Iberian flavors—local Dungeness crab roasted in Contigo’s wood oven with black pepper, paprika, garlic and butter; Monterey squid with chorizo, artichokes and aioli on a bed of rice. The duo behind Contigo—chef Brett Emerson and wife Elan—recently opened Barceloneto in Santa Cruz.

For a taste of Spain in Oakland, Duende is the name that rolls off of most Bay area residents’ tongues. The neighborhood restaurant in Oakland’s Uptown district boasts a spacious interior, one wall lined with bottles of wine while the other sports a brightly colored, geometric design. But you’ll likely be paying more attention to the food than the ambience. A hearty tapas menu includes classic items like crispy patatas bravas, pressed melons with air-cured beef and padrones fritatas, while larger dishes feature paella, fideua and skirt steak. Pair your meal with one of Duende’s cocktails or Spanish wines, including 15 sherries by the glass.