El Flamboyan

An unassuming place that feels like someone’s home

I must have walked by this place hundreds of times. It never occurred to me to go inside. Not for any reason, that’s just how it was. Until tonight. My friend Tara and I were meeting for dinner and thought, “we should try that little Spanish place.”

From the outside Flamboyan (1000 Willow Ave, Hoboken) is an unassuming, quaint looking restaurant. I’d always thought it would have the decor of thick wood, exposed brick, low light and candles on white tablecloths. The walls would be adorned with bright paintings and traditional music playing. When we opened the door, were pleasantly surprised by its inner-city, fast-food feel.

This is a simple place with about a half dozen tables that would be right at home in any food court or burger joint. Sure you have the exposed brick and there were candles atop the large center table which had a white tablecloth (under a large glass covering). The music was a radio playing in the background and a bright marquee above the counter listed out the daily specials. No fancy set up here.

Tara looked at me and said, “Oh I’m very excited about this.” The smell of the food cooking hit me and I replied, “I’m like four times hungrier now than I was a second ago.” Neither of us even cared about the screaming baby. We were so euphoric that we actually thought it was cute. The place only recently started to open on Sundays, so no specials were listed. We asked what they’d recommend.

This is when I knew I’d love this place, even before tasting the food. The waiter said, “Right now we have the beef stew and chicken with shrimp prepared, but we can make you anything you want.” Now that’s service. Of course to keep things simple, we ordered the beef and chicken dishes.

The beef stew was amazing. The meat melted under the fork–no need for a knife at all. The chicken and shrimp was tasty too. The portions seemed small at first but then we factored in the rice, beans and a little cucumber and pepper salad. We walked out too full to proceed with our misguided intentions of desert.

We’ll definitely going back to this place. It seriously felt as if we had wandered into a family’s basement during a Sunday dinner. And we felt welcome, warm and well fed. All for about $20.00.