Arbequina in Oxford

It is always a pleasure to dine at Arbequina. Food is delicious and portions are the right size to allow you to try a few differnet things. Great wine and cocktail list. Highly recommended!

Food was good if not a little overhyped. Unusual tapas menu but I liked a lot of things I wasn’t expecting to like. Patatas bravas was perfect, aiolis lovely, bread good. The tortilla was OK, the beetroot meh and the octopus a little tough and served when we’d finished most of our dishes.Drinks were lovely but pricey. I had a homemade lemonade and it was so good I went home and tried to recreate it several times. The waitress was excellent and super friendly. Would try it out again.

A real disappointment. We came here for a special occasion and left blown away by the limited selection, bang average dishes and how unbelievably overpriced it was. Drinks first - they have two beers on draft starting at £3.50 for 275ml which is already pretty expensive even by Oxford standards, but is also, to my knowledge, illegal to serve in that measure. It isn't even half a pint! Wine comes in small 125ml glass, 'carafe', or bottle, but the carafe is a paltry 375ml and is priced at what you might expect to pay for a bottle elsewhere. The menu is pretty limited and even for tapas the portion sizes are small, especially given the prices. The £13 chicken thigh was two small, thin thighs in a tomato sauce with a couple of spring onions. In many places along the Cowley Road, £13 would get you a full main course. The pork belly was even more expensive and even more meagre. It bared no resemblance to any belly pork I have had before; it was small, dry and lacked any real flavour. The sobrassada was probably the biggest joke - £8 for a single very burnt slice of toast spread with a layer of sausage meat so thin that it was undetectable by taste. The honey did little to complement this. The crispy chickpea salad was the only notable dish in terms of its innovation. It was genuinely tasty and the chickpeas were cooked in a really novel way. The other dishes we tried: sardines, betroot borani, aubergine, roast cauliflower and octopus were all fine but largely unremarkable, which would be forgivable if it weren't for the sky-high prices. Service was good, cocktails were tasty and the main room where you enter had a nice atmosphere, although we were seated off in the side room which was pretty dingy with little in the way of decoration save some small prints on the wall and the saddest string of hearts plant I have ever seen. I presume this place must have been much better in the past as I find it hard to see how it would have gained such popularity in its current state. Perhaps I'm missing something, but I won't be rushing back. There are plenty of better tapas places in Oxford, even on the Cowley Road.

I've been meaning to go here for a long time and finally went today, it seems I've been missing out on a gem of a restaurant in Oxford.Arrived around 20 minutes early but that was no issue and we were seated immediately. The menu has around 15 tapas dishes and a small number of desserts - around 4/5.We shared around 6/7 of the more innovative choices and all were superb, the service was also excellent throughout.

Favourite tapas, love the aubergine and pork dish. They used to have a larger menu… plz bring more back :)

This was magnificent. We had a lovely warm evening sitting outside and the waitress could not have been more helpful. Two coeliacs in the group and she took the through every detail and offered GF equivalents where required.The food was beautifully prepared and presented and the taste was sublime. The roast chickpeas, pats bravas, crispy pork belly and raspberry tart. Just to die for. Well worth the price.

very good tapas. a pity they dont have octopus and paella. most impressed with the sardine and sausage. worth a try.

Wonderful food (that tortilla...!) and fantastic service. When we lost track of time and were asked to move up to the bar to finish our desserts, I asked if we could sit at a low seat as my mother had a really bad back that day. They were so lovely and managed to clear another table for us to sit at and finish at our own leisure. I would definitely come back next time I'm in Oxford.

Staff are super friendly, food is just consistently good. Have been here a few times and have never been disappointed. Easy 5 stars. ✨

Such warm and friendly staff, great Spanish/Mediterranean dishes, nice decoration, good cocktails!