Los Roques Restaurant, Los Abrigos, Tenerife

I’ve reviewed Los Roques here before, but I keep going back there. I feel it deserves another mention as there have been some changes since I first reviewed it, and major changes to the menu since December.

Ambiance: This restaurant wins hands down; it’s on the harbour front in Los Abrigos looking over the coast towards Costa Del Silencio and you get a view from pretty much the entire restaurant. They’ve got a lovely terrace which now has heaters on it (though these don’t help if it’s windy). There are two dining rooms, one smoking and one non-smoking, both small and intimate, with lovely polisehd wood everywhere. Nicely lit and nice music – most of the time (not keen on some of the jazz!).

Service: Pablo is brilliant, we have been served by him both at Bencomo and here. Paolo the Italian waiter has gone, which is no great loss as despite being friendly he was a bit dizzy. Peter is the owner and is also friendly, will always chat if he has the time (as will Pablo) which we love. Both seem to know just how much attention to give. I always feel like nothing is ever too much bother for either of them.

Wine: Their wine list has always been pricey, but they now have more local wines on and they start at 12€. Hubby used to have a couple of beers and I’d have a couple of glasses, but now we have a bottle of wine and spend the same or less than before. This time we had a local fruity white from Guimar, not very dry, but nice regardless.

Food: The food has changed a lot recently. The menu used to be quite expensive using only local ingredients, but I’d hazard a guess that this has gone out of the window thanks to the crisis. The menu now has more things on it than before with simpler dishes like prawn cocktail, caesar salad, chicken liver pate for starters and rib of beef, three cheese ravioli and salmon with rice and asparagus for mains. The more complex dishes are still there, and these have come down in price as well. I usually have soup here so I can fit in a dessert, but instead had the prawn cocktail followed by the cod with wasabi gnocci – both were excellent quality and the gnocci was amazing, with a slight heat from the wasabi. Greedy hubby had a chicken ceasar (you can have it with or without chicken) to start and the rib of beef to follow – which was enough in my book to feed 2 people, yet he ate the whole lot. I had his side salad though. We skipped dessert (a first for my husband) having eaten so much. They bring bread and a little pre-starter thingy: worth noting, bread here used to be free, but they charged us 90 cents per person this time. It seems the crisis is hitting everywhere. However, they make the bread themselves, it’s delicious, and it comes with some lovely spreads, so is much better value than the typical fluffy stuff you get with mojo in most places.

Overall: I have mixed feelings about the new menu. I can see why they’ve done it as it’s brought them more customers when times are hard but I feel like they’ve sold out by not doing “only local produce”. However, this means that my husband is much happier with the menu and means that we’ll go more often, which is a good thing. Not only can he have a great big steak but we spend about 20-30€ less there than we used to. The food is still the same high quality regardless. Paying for bread was a bit of a suprise, but I can understand it, and the little pre-starter is a nice touch and still free as are the cookies that came with the coffee – scrumptious!

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