La Taberna Tapas on Halsted

I absolutely love this place and have been coming for drinks and tapas since they opened. I always get very good service and I LOVE their food. Sangria is pretty great too.

Really good food, great atmosphere, love the décor. I’ve been a couple times now & everything I’ve tried was delicious. Seriously everything. You could close your eyes & point & have a fantastic meal. Can’t wait to go back!

Great food and service. Love the sangria selection. Last, don’t pass up dessert, they are amazingly tasy.

The food was definitely good but perhaps it was a wrong choice as we wanted to focus on drinking more than eating.
I had asked for sangria catalana. However when I ordered the same drink later it taste and looked different. I asked them and they told me that they ran out of Italian wine and used Spanish wine without letting me know. I really would not have mind if they would have asked me beforehand. I was not very happy with the service.
However, the band was amazing. I was soo soo thankful to them as I was in mood for dancing and they played all the songs I requested happily.

Horrible service. Just plain horrible. 3 appetizers and a sangria pitcher turned out to be $ 80. I was shocked with the bartenders attitude. It wasn’t welcoming at all.
The main shock was today when i checked my cc statement, the bartender self tipped himself with $ 10. I just plainly couldn’t believe it. Make sure you write the tip clearly without any possibility that the tip can be corrected, because i guess they are doing it.

Hosted a party here the other night and the whole experience was terrible. To make a long story short, the general manager who I set up the party with was unresponsive at best. I left a voicemail saying I was going to take my business elsewhere, and that was when I finally received a call back. I wanted to host the party here because the atmosphere had looked nice, it was close to UIC, and I had dinner their previously which was a good experience.
Upon arrival, the party was told that no one had booked a party there, and the area was not set up. When the management realized there was a mistake, there were no apologies given. The staff was rude, and we essentially bussed our own tables since no one was coming over to check on the area. It would have been one thing if the restaurant was busy, but other than one other couple in the restaurant, we were the only patrons there. Additionally, we had ordered the drink package to be included. I was told that the package was for two drinks per person. This was regulated by handing out carnival tickets to the guests to redeem at the bar. This was extremely tacky. There was no server to take drink orders, and as stated earlier, no one to bus the tables. We paid twenty percent gratuity for waiting on ourselves. Hindsight is a beautiful thing, and I really wish I had taken my business elsewhere. If you are looking for a place where you have to beg to give them your business, and would like to be disrespected, then this is the restaurant for you. If you want to be treated with respect and have a pleasant dining experience, then definitely go elsewhere. It’s a shame because I used to love the food and experience at this restaurant. But after essentially being the only people in the restaurant and treated terribly, I would never go back nor recommend anyone else to dine here.

Horrible service… had to wave down their employees for service and they looked unhappy to be bothered. Food was bland also and cold. Never again!!!

The food was great! I loved the meat and the bread. The vegetables in the vegetarian paella were chosen well.

Very disappointed.. . Menu very limited and the manager came over to our table to argue about use ordering more fruit for our Sangria that was over flowing with ice.

Delicious sangria flights. Good tapas and an overall good atmosphere. The service was lacking a bit when I was there so I took off one star for that. But I’ll definitely be back.

The food is outstanding at this place! The bacon wrapped dates and paella are among my favorites! Only negative is the live music they had on Friday night when we went. The music was way too loud-​our table couldn’t speak to one another. And the guy just didn’t play good music. Otherwise, a great spot!

Delicious food and great atmosphere!
My boyfriend and I went there to try out the restaurant.
We had Gambas al Ajillo, mini hamburguesas, croquetas de pollo, calamares con lechon, and queso fundido.
Keep in mind that these are small dishes.
We shared everything and we were not disappointed at all!
I highly recommend this place (:

First time here the service was great, the food was delicious. I fell in love with the lime in the coconut margarita.

This is definitely a go to spot in the UIC area. The service is usually quick and the food is delicious. I haven’t had anything I didn’t like from their menu, and it’s a huge menu!
Tip: this place is BYOB, but there is a corking fee of $ 25.

Came here on a Friday evening after work. The restaurant is very spacious and dimly lit. When I first walked in, it appeared there was a Holiday party just starting in one side of the restaurant. Not soon after, they were already breaking glasses, haha! The other side, where my bestie and I sat, was still kinda empty as the dinner crowd slowly came in.
Service was spot on. Our server greeted us right away and was very friendly. We got the pitcher of their classic Sangria to start off with.
It was just ok. A little watered down for my taste, but it wasn’t bad.
For food we had ordered the olives, gambas al ajillo, patatas bravas, and the charcuteria. Everything was good. I love olives, so they were delicious to me. A few of them were spicy and had a kick to them. The gambas al ajillo was very flavorful and the charcuteria was pretty decent as well. The patatas bravas were really filling. A little too mushy for me, but they were good.
Overall, the food was good, definitely not the best, nor anything memorable but everything was flavorful. Service was excellent. I feel like they checked in on us just enough times. The prices weren’t too bad. I would say average for tapas.
Not sure if they do this every night, but there was a live guitar player which was cool. It added a nice touch to the ambiance.
While I wouldn’t make a special trip out here, it’s a nice option if you’re in the area.

A little on the pricy side for tapas but they are very tasty. The ambience is dim and at times there is a guitarist playing. We had a
certificate and they waiter had no issues with the certificate.
I had the flight of sangria, highly recommend it.

Came here for an event… LOVE THE FOOD and great service. THE BAR is terrible service.
Super rude, charging people different prices, definitely sensitive about something that the kitchen does not care about.
I’ve come here before on a regular day and we were just talking about coming back until we visited the bar. They really killed any desire we had to come back with their poor service and rude attitudes.
The bartenders should be told that they also count when it comes to service

The food was good but the service was okay. It took them a while once we set to come get our order. Also, they never came to refill our drinks/​water. We had to wait 15 mins before we got someone’s attention to get our waiter to fill our drinks… This is with just us being in the restaurant and maybe couple other customers in the outdoor area.
Must Try: Potato Bravas (Really good spicy creamy sauce!)
Good: Vegetarian Paella and the chocolate dessert
Average: Bread/​Bruscetta with tomato basil sauce and cheese (pretty typical)

This place is definitely a great addition to the neighborhood as there aren’t many tapas place in this neighborhood. I have been here 2 times and the food has been decent both times.
Dishes we thought were great:
Chicken croquette
Dates con Tocino
Patatas Bravas
Gambas al Ajillo
Beef Empanadas
Ceviche de Lima

First and foremost what’s with all the spelling errors on their menus? They should grab a student off the street to proofread their menus before handing them to people… What a shame.
It took a good 15 minutes for us to get acknowledged by a waiter/​waitress. When she came finally, we order a pitcher of sangria… Come on, I know all businesses are cutting costs but that sangria was sewage water… It was sooooooo watered down and disgusting. We told the waitress and she went back in and «made» a fresh pitcher… She literally added a little red wine to the pitcher. It was bad…
It took a while before she came back to take our food order, it was not busy for being a Friday.
The food is ok… I remember the food being better before.
My biggest disappointment was the goat cheese. The sauce was orange and it looked gross and it was hard to try to find the miserable piece of goat cheese in that orangy colored sauce… Disgusting.
I can go on and on but I guess we get the picture. Save your money and go to iberico.
The ceviche was good.

omg so delicious. we went on tuesday when they had their 7 tapas for $ 40 special. my and victor had the sangria ala taberna which were good. we choose queso de cabra, datiles con tocino, albondigas, punta de res, quesos, pulpa ala plancha and for desert we had chocolate suffle which was so yummmy. the waitress was so helpful because we had no idea what to order. i definitely recommend going. my favorite tapa? datiles con tocino it was a perfect combination of sweetness with the savoryness of the bacon to offset the sweetness of the date.