Mundaka
Seventh Avenue and San Carlos Street, Carmel
(831) 624-7400, www.mundakacarmel.com
This year Carmel’s popular Spanish tapas restaurant celebrates its fifth anniversary, and five years as a readers’ favorite. The upcycled decor, live music, impressive wine list and steady expansions – owner Gabriel Georis has taken over two adjacent leases to open the Mundaka Cafe, serving daytime Ritual coffee, artisanal tea and light fare; and a bar, High Tide – are impressive on their own. But it’s the food, dished small, that gets our pulses racing. Chef Brandon Miller constantly mixes up the menu with charcuterie (think high-class meats like hand-sliced, acorn-fed ham); seafood (dreaming of shrimp bisque with scallop ceviche); traditionals (can’t go without the papas bravas, served with an addictive aioli); farm foods (the lamb sliders give a new meaning to hamburguesa); and nibbles (mmm, fried garbanzos with white-truffle salt). Most of them clock-in under $15, too.