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| - The Applebee's of tapas bars. The Chili's of wine bars. The food is almost on par with Alchemy or Mickey's Tavern, but the pricing is 2x-2.5x. Atmosphere: televisions, noise on par with Weary Traveler, and fat, old men pawing 20-something women. Service: seated immediately, waited 25 minutes to get water and put in first drink order; waitress kept on trying to steer the meal in very odd directions ("order an extra one to take home").
Off the specials menu we ordered a lovely chorizo white bean soup that was the high point of the meal; it would have been even better if the tomato base had the taste you'd expect at the peak of tomato season and the black pepper had been reduced to allow other flavors to shine a bit more. Next we had pleasant stuffed peppers, which had very nice presentation and not much to remember in terms of mouth feel or taste. The Thai flatbread pizza was the blandest item of the evening; coleslaw should not be more engaging than the accompanying jalapenos.
Our Spanish red was quite nice. A place billing itself as a wine bar should have more than one Spanish red, especially when its manager was hired from the former La Paella. The wine menu is not available on paper or on your cell phone. They provide one iPad per table for marking wine selection. This works great for the restaurant, but is cumbersome for patrons (the larger your group, the more unmanageable it becomes).
If you want wine, go to Barriques. If you want tapas, Madison's pickings are slim. If you want better food at half the price, Madison's offerings abound.
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