Sometimes you miss what’s right under your nose. Sometimes a place opens up like TonTon in Madrid, just a few steps from your home (Trafalgar, not Chamberí), and you walk past. Actually that didn’t happen. Lie. The truth is that soon after they started the engines we tried to go… but the usual: some Madrid residents persist in living on the edge and aim to secure a table the moment hunger strikes.
The thing is: after three consecutive (and failed) attempts to arrive and kiss the saint, we deemed it unlikely (though not impossible) and relegated it to the “we’ll go” list, that ever-growing one because in Madrid you either book ten years in advance or you don’t dine.
In the end, of course, we pulled it off. And we went to TonTon.
And we were fascinated by the interior design of Estudio DIIR, which is also in the neighborhood and has turned this 320m2 space into a two-area venue with an industrial atmosphere — a little Japanese, a little Nordic, and also very Madrid — helped along by an original two-pitched roof that is pure fantasy.
And we dined on sourdough bread from Alma –the best bakery in the neighborhood, the one with the queues that wind around– with butter, a superb croquette that day, a raw fish crudo that they acevichan with blackberry and kumquat, a swordfish fillet with Massaman curry, duck carnitas on toasts, and, to finish, an impeccable cut of beef with roasted green pepper.
To end, it wasn’t what we planned. We wrapped up with a chocolate mousse, crystallized chocolate and olive oil and another dessert we only remember lapping up with gusto, but it doesn’t matter which one it was. The menu here changes every season, also depending on what the chef, Nico García-Mingo, comes up with, so don’t pay attention to what you’re told you must try. You go, let yourself be carried along and if you leave wanting more that means you’ll come back. Nico, by the way, previously spent time in the kitchens of Carousel (London) and Meroma (Mexico City) and has succeeded the former chef, Alice Reydet.
