Rezagarse

Nice ceviche, I’d love for it to have more lime (as opposed to vinegar)
I loved my salad (arugula, goat cheese, walnuts), and my husbands fried puntaillitas (fried baby squid) was awesome.
Nice alternative to some of the other places on this street

After going last night, I updated my review. It had to be done.
I, like others that have reviewed Rezagarse want to support my local businesses. It’s a tough industry in general, but DT Decatur in particular is highly competitive. Iberian Pig located around the corner specializes in Spanish-​themed fare as well, and is a popular city-​wide favourite and for good reason.
Rezagarse has some positive attributes, there is however work to be done to hit it out of the park.
The white-​tiled floors that they inherited from Carpe Diem can work for, or against them. They are going to have be appear SPOTLESS, and the two times that I went they were not. If you make me feel like I am in the New York subway folks, I am not going to continue this relationship, (translation: I will sit at the bar at The Pig).
The entire reason that people dine out at a tapas place is for a totality of EXPERIENCE. Take some time to process that; it’s all the matters.
The food holds good promise, and SOME of the menu items are good enough for me to choose this location over others in DT Decatur; this is not small praise!
These I will order again:
Solomillo de Ternera — Beef tenderloin, garlic and sherry cream sauce, rosemary sauce, grilled artisan bread.
Serrano Ham — ham, roasted red peppers, caramelized onions, bleu cheese.
These are missing the mark by a mile, and I will NOT order again:
Patatas Bravas — Crispy potatoes served with a spicy smoke tomato sauce and garlic sauce. TRANSLATION: teeny home fries in a spaghetti sauce puddle.
Pimentos del Piquillo Rellenos — Roasted piquillo pepper stuffed with manchego cheese, chorizo, over baby arugula, piquillo pepper vinaigrette. TRANSLATION: sounded right up my alley, but the pepper was mushy, I tasted NO manchego cheese… really anything else for that matter. It was mush enveloping nothing going on in the middle.
The service is a bit of an enigma, the host last night was IMPECCABLE! The server… mm, mm, mm. He bore the scarlet letter for Sever in such a place; suffering from «A» stunning lack of polish. I felt like I got on the 7 train from Manhattan headed to Queens; and I am not in Manhattan anymore. I think that is enough said.
The takeaways:
1) make those floors impeccable
2) TRAIN, TRAIN AND MORE TRAIN (and don’t SEVEN TRAIN) all the staff by someone who understands fine dining like BREATHING
3) revise menu items that people are concurring as not great
4) know that there is a local community that is going to give you every chance in the world to succeed– all you have to do is deliver

I really loved it. The food and atmosphere is very unpretentious but still very elegant with white table cloths and a chef who seems to really want to make you happy to be there. We had a nice lunch and stuck with seafood and sangria. The menu is wide enough to make this a regular place to be.
Update: Now that the restaurant has been open for a few weeks, I’m changing my star rating to 5. They have gotten over their ‘opening jitters’ and I can’t wait to see this potential classic soar to new heights in the Decatur dining scene.

Really enjoyed this place! I went a few days after grand opening. While the food took a bit longer than I expected, it was worth the wait. The mussels were so good. We asked for extra bread so we could sop of the incredible cheesy sauce, and they were more than happy to accommodate that request. The little pizzas were very good as well. We had one with tuna and one with wild mushrooms. This price was very reasonable and the portions were good. There were two of us, and we were full afterwards. The service was quite good. I was impressed. And the location — one of the few places in Decatur with parking! The patio has long been considered a top patio location amongst Decatur restaurant-​goers, so I am so happy there is a wonderful restaurant to fill this space.

My first experience at Rezagarse was during their opening weekend. For this reason, I’d like to give the restaurant another visit and update my review when the time comes. Much like the first reviewer, I’m a huge supporter of our local businesses — especially in Decatur — and want them to shine. That said, the competition is tough in this area, and while I think this location has potential, it also has a lot of room to grow.
Parking /​/​Week nights are going to be your best bet in finding a few open spaces available. This restaurant shares two small lots with the loft apartments it is attached to, and there is also a bit of street parking on East Howard Ave. Fortunately, Decatur is very walkable, but this corner is tucked away ten walking minutes down from the square. One of the reasons the previous tapas restaurant located here didn’t survive was the lack of foot traffic. Date nights, those parking spaces are going to be filled by folks making their way to Kimball House, an amazing dinner spot with arguably the BEST cocktail program in Atlanta.
Setting /​/​The space is cool. Bright with lots of light and a sweet open air patio for al fresco dining. For those of you who frequented Carpé, the restaurant only spans the top right area, as opposed additional left corner and lower level.
Food /​/​I’m always excited to see a restaurant’s unique personality when it comes to tapas. We ordered a few items including a flatbread, some scallops (which were pretty tasty), ceviche, and their Albondigas (not very flavorful). I’m a huge fan of another popular Spanish spot in Decatur, so I have to be transparent here; it was difficult for me to be objective about the flavors and presentation. If Spanish tapas are on deck, they have stiff competition right around the corner. For drinks, similar situation as the programs in Decatur are phenomenal and deliver with excellence and consistency.
Service /​/​Our server was super nice and catered to our every need. Thoughtful and considerate of our requests. The experience with the hosts was the same, super friendly and all smiles.
Overall, I would recommend you give it a go and see what your experience is like. I plan to take a second visit since my first was during opening weekend.

Best tapas. Ever. (Ok, maybe that’s too much hyperbole, but these are fantastic!)
I’m not your typical « Unilocaler» but these guys deserve some recognition.
A Unilocal search for tapas while walking around Decatur brought us to this place, and it was only a 10 minute walk from the square. We were the first ones there, and lavished in the attention from the owners and staff who explained they had opened only two weeks prior.
The restaurant and menu are modeled after a city in Spain (hence, the name) that the owner had been to. Now, I’ve never been to Spain, but the atmosphere of the huge open-​air patio coupled with the flavors to make it feel that much more authentic. Each round of tapas we ordered was excellent! For example, I’ve stopped ordering the patatas bravas at tapas restaurants, because it was always the same thing. Do yourself a favor, spend the $ 7, and check out their take on them. So good.
They are still perfecting their sangria, but all good things come in time. I will definitely be back to try more.

As a local, I really want all our non-​national chain restaurants to succeed, so I write this review not as an unfounded rant, but rather as an attempt to help the place improve before going the way of the previous tenant.
We went here today on their official grand opening. Maybe it was grand opening day jitters, but Rezagarse unfortunately failed to deliver. Being that it was the official opening, I was fully expecting some mishaps. In any other circumstance but opening night, I would have given 2 stars, but I will give them room for some growing pains tonight.
After waiting for our food for about 20 minutes, we watched as a food runner or other server delivered our tapas to a table that had just ordered about 5 minutes prior. I knew it was our food, but I didn’t feel it was our role to yell across the patio, and neither the server or recipient table seemed to mind they were getting food they clearly didn’t order. After letting the food runner know they had given our food to a table that had just sat down, she conferred with our server, and they realized their mistake. Our server, who was very sweet, let the manager know, and the manager offered us both free drinks to apologize for the mishap. I thought this was handled very well, as most restaurants would not have done much of anything to make up for their mistakes, and a good bit wouldn’t even acknowledge their mistake. So kudos to the management and the server for the way they dealt with this.
Service mistakes aside, the worst part of Rezargarse is the food and drink. We ordered the Albondigas, the patatas bravas, the Coca de Jamon, mejillones, and the pimentos rellenos:
Patatas– ordered these first and received it timely. Pretty good, but nothing to write home about. Kind of like home style fries with tomato sauce and aioli
Albondigas-​very dry and flavorless. Seemed to be overcooked. Compared to the albondigas at the other tapas place in Decatur, these were nowhere near the same level. Would definitely not order again.
Coca de Jamon-​flatbread with serrano ham. The ham was more like Smithfield’s and was not your typical thin-​cut Serrano ham. Was just OK, but again, not great. Would not order again.
Pimentos Rellenos-​flavorless ground beef in little red peppers. Not much flavor or anything else to this dish. very disappointing.
Mejillones-​ordered but never received. Wasn’t really concerned, because based on the other food, didn’t mind this never being delivered.
So as you can see, the food, at least the food that was delivered, left a lot to be desired. On to drinks, which were equally if not more disappointing:
Sangria-​Red and White-​I was excited to see on the menu that Rezagarse was putting brandy into their sangrias as I remember having in Spain when I lived therefor three months, so I had high expectations for these. Most sangrias around town are just red wine with some bits of fruit in it. Unfortunately, Rezagarse seems to load these up with juice and soda to make them overly sweet and diluted. Not good sangrias at all, and couldn’t detect any taste of the advertised brandy over the juice/​soda mix. Don’t let the 16oz volume fool you. It’s all filler.
House Manhattan with Sherry– one of the worst manhattans i’ve ever had. came with a little ice floating on top, which to me indicated they shook it. off to a bad start. Supposedly contains sherry of a bottle i own, but couldn’t detect any of that distinct sherry taste so i doubt any was actually used. Sweet vermouth also seemed to be lacking and no bitters at all in this. It essentially tasted like watered down rye whiskey with no flavor. When you have the likes of Kimball House and Iberian Pig right in your backyard, you better bring your cocktail A-​game if you’re going to charge $ 11 for a drink. If I ever go back here, I’ll stick with a beer.
So to summarize: bad food, bad drink, several FOH mistakes, decent service, good management. Hopefully the bar and kitchen can improve so this place can succeed. Decatur is a tough place to open a restaurant due to the numerous quality competitors, so in order to survive, this place is going to need to make some quick changes for the better.