Bar Comida

By EWAN McDONALD for Viva

Spanish cooking is about to be the Next Big Thing. Saw that claim again the other day and wondered, why is Spanish food always "about to be" and never "is"?

Provencal, Tuscan, Neapolitan, Turkish, Moroccan, Lebanese, Basque, Sicilian, Greek and just about every other indigenous cuisine that dips its toe into the Mediterranean has been taken to our hearts, or rather our stomachs (except, funnily enough, Libyan and Albanian).

Perhaps most of us are not up with the intricacies of Spanish food - pincho moruno? escalivada? cocido Madrileno? - or wine (do you call a vintage red a Rioja of ages?) and there are few Spanish restaurants here. Perhaps the joy of Spanish cooking is that you have it in Spain.

Claire and Sally Hindmarsh and Zeki Kizilata, of Bar Comida on the Mission Bay Riviera, have Mediterranean tastes. Claire's original Caravanserai cafe in Queen St, next to sister Sally and her husband Eliot McLean's Merchant Mezze Bar, and Claire and Zeki's Safran in Newmarket, have all drawn their inspiration from cuisines bordering that seaside.

Four years old, Bar Comida has been crafted to resemble a bar/cafe that's graced a Madrid neighbourhood for several thousand futbol matches at the Bernabeau.

So it is fitting that tapas are a speciality: those entree-sized plates - served between drinks - such as a bowl of nuts or marinated olives, tomato chunks and feta, grilled tomato bread; mini-meals such as a Spanish tortilla (frittata, not the Mexican flatbread), paprika chicken morsels with rice and creamy walnut sauce, meatballs and migas (fried bread) in a tomato sherry salsa.

For mains, the menu ranges from full servings of those dishes to Turkish-influenced spiced lamb skewers on hummus with tahini sauce and harissa; panfried tarakihi on linguini pasta with garlic (Italian-influenced); an aioli-bourride of fish, mussels and prawns poached in a fennel, wine and tomato bouillon, which hails from around Marseilles way; Portuguese chicken algarve; and back home for a scotch fillet draped with roasted red pepper. There are pizzas and pide, the Turkish sesame flatbread.

Be hungry: this place might take its name from Picasso's Blue Period masterpiece, La Comida Frugal (the frugal meal), but the plates are well filled.

Those who still read an Auckland magazine may know there has been an outbreak of ethno-
cuisine correctness along this strip, along the lines of "my restaurant's more Italian than your restaurant", and it is true that some of the eateries owe little more than a flag on the pavement or naming rights on their dishes to authentic regional cooking.

Bar Comida does not pretend to be loyal to one cuisine - it's inspired by the relaxed hospitality and simple, flavourful food of the Mediterranean and Middle East - and it has given a New Zealand twist to some traditional dishes, such as pilaf.

Our recommendation: sit outside, watch the comings and goings on the Croisette - oops, Tamaki Drive - sipping one of the Spanish or Portuguese reds and nibbling at tapas. You just might feel you're by the Med rather than the Waitemata in winter.

Open: Weekdays 9am-late, Weekends 8am-late

Food: Tapas, pizza, Med meals

Owners: Claire Hindmarsh, Sally Hindmarsh, Zeki Kizilata

Chef: Ismael Ismael

Smoking: No

Wine: Try their Spanish/ Portuguese reds and sherries

Noise: We ate outside

Cost (mains for two): $45-$ 50

Vegetarian: Frittata, salad, pizza options

Bottom line: Real Madrid? Not quite. Auckland's Riviera boasts a United Nations of restaurants (well, it will when the Belgian beer cafe opens). Some are true to their flags; this has dishes from around the Mediterranean adapted to Kiwi tastes. Stick to tapas, wine and coffee, and you might be in Europe.

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