Food: Las Iguanas Review

A few weeks back, we took a little night away and stayed in the amazing Marriott Hotel in Leicester, while we were there, we headed out for food to celebrate 25 years of Las Iguanas and to try their brand new additions to the menu! Starting with 2 for 1 Cocktails we couldn’t wait to order our food...

Las Iguanas is a Latin style Bar and Restaurant with scrumptiously combined flavours and styled foods sourced from South America, Spain, Portugal and Africa and fabulous Cocktails, both alcoholic and non-alcoholic, it’s the perfect place for a date or catch up with friends! The Leicester Restaurant is ideally located amongst several other bars so it’s a great place to start off a night of fun or to end a days shopping in the city centre. You can walk in but it’s recommended that you book on busier nights Thursday-Sunday. 

 The New Menu is full of amazing dishes including starters, tapas dishes, bigger main meals and salads - not to mention the delicious range of deserts! We wanted to try and taste as much as we could so ordered a bit of everything: 

*New Dish* Pao De Queijo - Cheesy, Garlic style Dough balls and Chipotle Butter which was incredible (Adam swore it was the best thing he’d ever tasted!!) 

Holy Guacamole - basically Guacamole in it’s original form! It came as a plate of mashed avocado, tomatoes, onions, coriander and lemon ready for you to mix and dip the tortillas in!

*New Dish* Dadinhos - cubes of Cheese coated in crispy breadcrumbs and a spicy chilli jam. These were yummy however a little underwhelming, as I imagined they’d be bigger!

Albondigas - Lamb Meatballs with Mint and Parmesan sat in a Tomato and Chilli sauce. These were incredible! The meat was so tender and tasty and the mint really came through in the sauce! A little too meaty for a starter though so I would have these if you were having Tapas.

Millie’s food was from the Kids Menu which had so much choice on! She went for the Lamb Meatballs in a Tomato Sauce which were served with a small side of salad and boiled rice! She loved it, ate quite a lot but all she wanted was her ice cream for desert! 

Chipotle Chicken Burrito - everything you know a Burrito to be including a garlicky chipotle sauce. I didn’t enjoy this one as much as I did the Beef one, I felt like it was a mix between a tortilla and burrito! The chicken was tasty though and the portions were huge!! 

Shredded Beef Burrito - everything you want a Burrito to be! This was the best thing I ate all night! I couldn’t finish mine though so Adam finished it off. It was full of flavour and packed with meat!

Patatas Bravas in Bits - Crispy Potatoes with Chipotle and Alioli, these really disappointed. They did taste ok but there was far too much spice on the potatoes which overwhelmed us both. Unfortunately, we barely ate any of these but did mention it to the staff for future reference. 

We simply couldn’t fit desert in however I did have my eyes on the Churros - if I ate anything else I probably would have been sick! The food was really good with a few minor personal taste issues and the restaurant is really lively with lots of room whilst eating and plenty of space at the bar too! They were welcoming when we arrived with Millie, buggy and all, and found a table that was out of the way so that we didn’t disturb or block anyone else in! 

The only fault we both made a comment on once we left was that we were there for over two hours. I do appreciate it was a busy Friday night (our table was at 7pm) but we have a toddler, a toddler who gets bored very easily and trying to keep her entertained whilst we also tried to eat/feed her the rest of her dinner was hard. They did provide crayons and paper but there is only so much you can do until both you and they get bored! We didn’t leave the restaurant until 8:55pm and once we had finished eating we just wanted to go as we had got a little stressed out trying to keep her busy. I know that this isn’t a problem to some people but those who have children who want a ‘sit-down-eat-and-get-out’ meal, this may not be the place for you. 

I’d love to go back and have more of a Tapas style feast, without Millie too and sample some more of the Cocktails! A date night may be on the cards sometime soon... 

(*Sponsored review)