Rio – Jazz & Tapas Evening Review!

November 18, 2015 by Rich - Foodie Reviewer

Rio – Jazz & Tapas Evening

I visited Rio a few months back; you may recall my review. Lou and I enjoyed a very memorable lunch. I was incredibly impressed by their ham egg and chips! Oh boy, it was awesome! Just sitting here, on a less than clement Sunday morning writing this review is bringing back a foodie memory which has stuck with me ever since! I’m now craving some of their wonderful ham! I described this as the benchmark to which all future ham egg and chips would be judged. Rest assured Rio, I have yet to find anywhere else who has beaten this simple classic. Some may have come close, but you guys ticked all the boxes. Homemade chips, duck eggs fried to perfection (yep duck eggs!) and that ham! Just wonderful home cooked ham as it should be. Hand carved and smokey, it was some of the best I had eaten in a long time. A simple dish maybe, but simplicity done well is hard to beat. Jeez I’m getting hungry!

Anyway, I don’t find myself back at Rio to tuck in to this now legendary ham, nope not this time! I had been tempted back for their new Jazz and Tapas evening; an event these guys are hosting every Thursday. Tapas, I just love this way of eating. Sharing small plates around the table, everybody gets to try so many different dishes and flavours. What's even better, no food envy! Don’t ya just hate food envy, there's nothing worse! You look around the table at your fellow diners food and wish you'd ordered something similar; we’ve all been there haven’t we? No danger of that here, just an array of treats for everyone to dive in to. Let's not forget though, it's not just about the food tonight, but jazz too. Both Lou and I do love a bit of live music. Everything from a rock band in a spit and sawdust back street boozer, to last night of the proms, it all has its own unique charm.

If you never been to Rio before, it's right in the thick of it, on Leigh Broadway, and it's a pretty cool, fresh and modern venue. We arrived by 7.30pm, the place was already pretty packed, and the Jazz duo were playing some chilled out Jazz….nice! We both started with a pint of Peroni. There's more lager than you can shake a stick at here, but panic ye not craft ale fans, I am told craft ale will be available very very soon! Rio had certainly raised the bar pretty high after my epic ham egg and chips experience. But, looking at the tapas menu I was in no doubt this was gonna be good. No less than twelve different dishes to choose from! Fish, meat and veggie dishes it all looked pretty good. As always, I was hungry, the menu advertised 4 dishes for the price of three, so we ordered 8! Yep, 8 dishes between two of us, sounds a lot but hey this is Tapas!

Now, I am not going to waffle on in too much depth about each dish, I'd be here all day, and I have got other things to do. So, I will keep it short and to the point, quite simply each dish was very good! If you are sitting comfortably, I will run down the 8 dishes we ordered. So, here goes! Black pudding with bacon lardons, sausage with garlic onions and peppers, chorizo & halloumi skewers, deep fried squid with garlic mayo, tempura cod with tartar sauce, king prawns with garlic chilli & coriander, hummus with pitta, and finally, avocado & mozzarella on sour dough toast. Ok, That does sound like a lot of food, and I guess it was; on reflection, I did get a bit carried away, but I just want to try everything! All the dishes were good, but if I had to pick a winner, it would be a close call between the prawns, or the chorizo and halloumi skewers. I do hold any dish with chorizo in high regard; I just love the stuff, but the prawns where very good and just got a nose in front. Not over cooked at all, just juicy plump prawns with chilli and coriander. Sounds simple, but as I always say, simple is often best. I must also commend Rio on one other dish. Black pudding! I love black pudding, and I do think some restaurants can get a little nervous including this on their menu. After all, we all know what it’s made from, which isn’t too appealing, but it tastes so good. So well done guys, the black pudding with crispy bacon was a great addition to the Tapas selection. Lou and I went for a bottle Rioja, a classic Spanish red, alongside our not so classic Spanish tapas! Don’t take that as a criticism, no no, quite the opposite. We all know the definition of Tapas; just small tasting plates of food, and that’s exactly what we got. Ok, there wasn’t a patatas bravas or a tortilla in sight, but who cares, we were presented 8 plates of tasty modern tapas, good work chef! We sat back, nibbled at the different dishes, sipped our wine and enjoyed the laid back jazz, in this very busy bar. I know Thursday is the new Friday and all that, but no kidding, every table was packed; it was standing room only by 9pm, with diners and drinkers thoroughly enjoying this quite unique evening in Leigh. So, what did we pay? £80. Beers to start, more food than we could finish, wine and some great entertainment thrown in, so not bad value.

Well guys, Rio pulled it out the bag again! My last visit was all about the ham! This time, tasty tapas combined with uber cool, relaxed jazz, in a busy venue with a real buzz about the place. A totally different experience to my first, but that’s what a good restaurant is all about, thinking up new ways to drag you back. Not that I really needed dragging back, as the temptation of live music and tapas was too much for me. But I still need to get back for another taster of that glorious ham!

To book a table at Rio please call 01702 715533.