Ole! to Theater and Tapas

Jaleo
480 7th St. NW

With the Capital Fringe Festival on in full swing, a bunch of us headed to the theater district for a play and dinner soiree. After catching the one-woman show “Butter” (a musical satire on Food Network and Paula Deen, in particular), we settled on Jaleo to satiate our appetites.
Jaleo has been around long before Cafe Atlantico and Zaytinya came on the block. They are apparently part of the same creative team so it's hard to go wrong on the menu here. They have a nice wine selection but everyone loves a pitcher of sangria.
After a small wait, we got our table and and rattled off our tapas order in quick succession: Pollo al ajillo con salsa verde (Grilled chicken with green sauce); Costillitas de cordero con salsa de romero y allioli (Grilled lamb chops with rosemary sauce and allioli); Patatas bravas (Fried potatoes with spicy tomato sauce and alioli); Tortilla de patatas al momento (Classical Spanish potato & onion omelet); Calamares a la Romana (Fried squid with allioli); Pimientos del piquillo relleno de queso y setas (Sweet peppers stuffed with goat cheese and mushrooms); Cazón en adobo al estilo de Cádiz (Marinated fried shark like people do in Cádiz). Also a stuffed garlic mushroom in breaded balls, whose name escapes me now. But all the dishes, without doubt, were ummm-mazingly delish. Every time I come here, I try to have something new and this time it was the shark tapas which came out a surprising winner (kudos to whoever ordered).
The atmosphere is great and the downtown location makes it perfect for not only the theater crowd, but office-goers and tourists alike. Reservations are recommended for lunch and limited to dinner between 5-6:30 p.m. for pre-theater patrons. The service isn’t bad and although yours truly wasn’t carrying a valid ID, I sneaked generous sips of the sangria without being glared at. A glass-breaking incident was also handled by management with minimal fuss. Yup, the sangrias were doing a Flamenco in some of our heads.

Cost: Average. Depends on the order.