The best Spanish restaurants in Los Angeles

Best for: paella, cured meats

Drive through Harbor City's warehouse district, turn down a dead-end side street and join the line at this tiny storefront—you’ve reached your paella destination. On weekdays, L.A.’s best Spanish deli hawks baguettes packed with jamón, cheese, or tuna in tomato sauce, but on Saturday mornings, Angelenos trek from far and wide to chow down on authentic bomba rice dotted with mussels, pork loin, jumbo shrimp and other goods. Order ahead to secure the elevated varieties, such as squid ink or all chicken, and don’t forget to grab jars of imported olives, slices of Ibérico ham and thick wedges of Manchego cheese before you leave.

Best for: Bikinis, empanadas, sherry

L.A.’s Spanish dining scene is fairly lackluster, but this Santa Monica tapas bar serves a decent (enough) selection of traditional bar bites from Asturias, Catalonia, the Basque region and Galicia, where chef-owner Sandra Cordero spent her childhood summers. Pronounced “chuntos” (which means “together” in the Galician dialect), the restaurant offers hallmarks like patatas bravas and croquetas de jamon alongside harder-to-find items like bikinis (tiny grilled cheese sandwiches), Spanish-style empanadas (served in slices, unlike the ones in Latin America) and plenty of seafood. Not every dish will impress Spanish food snobs, but Westsiders are already flocking to the lofted dining room for calimocho (red wine and Coca-Cola) and a well-appointed list of Spanish wines, sherries and vermouths.

Best for: tortilla española, fideua

Spaniards take full advantage of their coastline, so it should come as no surprise that one of the best Spanish restaurants in L.A. is just a block from ours. Gabi James adds a bit of Redondo Beach into the mix, with beach-themed gin-and-tonics, the South Bay Caesar salad and other playful offerings. Of course it nails the traditional dishes, too: Come here for the best tortilla española in town, stacked inches high with thin slices of potato and sweet pops of caramelized onion—perfect for a post-beach snack, if you ask us. The seafood fideua, made with thin pieces of spaghetti, in lieu of arborio rice, is excellent as well.

Best for: pan con tomate, boquerones

Classic dishes from Valencia and Catalonia fuse with chef Teresa Montaño’s urban, global approach for an old-world–meets–new-world spin on Spanish cuisine. From the kitchen of her cozy shotgun restaurant, Japanese dashi sneaks into the paella, while even the pan con tomate sprinkles in a little something extra: tomato essence, in addition to the traditional tomato spread and raw garlic. Gin-and-tonic goblets brimming with herbs and botanicals await, as do vermouths, sherries, small-producer natural wines and other tipples from beverage director Gavin Koehn—all the better to snag during “Siesta Hour,” from 4:30 to 6:30pm, along with tapas like jamon croqueta.

The scent of seafood, garlic and saffron hits you the second you enter this Beverly Grove mainstay, which feels more like a friend’s hacienda than a restaurant. Colorful ceramic plates line the walls, the lighting is low and warm, and the tapas come out sizzling in delectable pools of garlic and olive oil. As the name suggests, the paella is the focus, but we're smitten with the lengthy list of tapas: flavorful shrimp, grilled squid, simmered meatballs and more. By far the city’s most authentic in congeniality and ambience, La Paella is a restaurant where we would be more than happy to enjoy a long lunch, take a siesta and then return for dinner the same day.

Best for: Spanish brunch, traditional paella, 

When a motorbike enthusiast and a Spanish-Dutch chef love each other very much, you get Gasolina Café—in case you were wondering how all of those vintage helmets and Spanish Grand Prix posters wound up alongside an all-day menu of pan con Manchego and tortilla española. But there’s an even bigger draw than the retro biker decor: Spanish daytime fare with an approachable, diner-like twist. Forget a side of bacon with your eggs; instead, you want the griddle-fried serrano ham a la plancha. Craving French toast? Opt for the weekend-only torrija, dusted in cinnamon and sugar. The home-fry-like patatas bravas make the trip worth your while, as do the monthly paella evenings, where chef-owner Sandra Corderos (who also runs Santa Monica's Xuntos) serves seafood, meat and veggie versions of the famous Spanish rice skillet dish.

For homesick Spaniards, this is the dive to go to. A hole-in-the-wall spot in a strip mall, Spain Restaurant offers no-frills cuisine and $4 filled-to-the-brim glasses of sangria, to imbibe as you watch the multiple screens sporting fútbol. The real star is the lengthy list of tapas, some rarely found in Americanized Spanish restaurants—like the sliced chorizo sautéed in a rosemary-laced red wine sauce. Craving a taste to-go? There’s also a small deli at the front selling imported meats and tinned fish.

Best for: tapas by the beach

Located on Santa Monica's pedestrian-friendly Main Street, Manchego specializes in Californian-influenced tapas and Spanish wines by the glass and bottle. Come weekend brunch time, this cozy spot also offers bottomless sangria and mimosas, as well as a reasonably priced daily happy hour from 5 to 6:30pm that includes vegetarian-friendly croquetas and a killer goat cheese and fig tostado.

Best for: live entertainment

A Spanish tavern and flamenco club since the early 1960s—and a cabaret long before that—Silver Lake’s subterranean hideout is a long-time favorite for dinner and a show. These days, the on-site theatrics skew more toward burlesque, stand-up comedy and live music. From 6 to 10pm, however, you'll also find a menu that includes chorizo croquetas, albondigas (meatballs) and a seafood paella for two. (And if you're here for tradition, don’t worry: You can still catch flamenco dancing earlier on Saturday nights, before Funky Sole revelers take over the venue.)

Best for: tableside porrón

Three decades after first opening in a tiny town outside Barcelona, Telefèric has landed in L.A. by way of a neutral-toned dining room in Brentwood, with a specialty market next door soon to follow. Similar to its two Bay Area outposts in Los Gatos and Palo Alto, this upscale-casual chain caters to the older, monied local clientele with predictable, fairly humdrum takes on seafood paella, patatas bravas and other Spanish staples. Despite its claim to authenticity, the fare here is unfortunately less than impressive. But it just barely lands on this list because of excellent cocktails and the availability of porrón service, which makes Telefèric stand out in terms of some boozy tableside fun.