Basics
Reservations
Recommended for busy days.
Location
On Fb
Per Person
€17 for a load of food and two drinks.
In Short
Hopes? A cold, cold drink at the stop of a short, steep hill.
Reality? Scores in the critical areas.
First Impressions? It's a brick shed in some trees.
A USP? It's the bar at the Silla de Felipe II!
The food in three words? Worth walking for.
Can they get the staff? It ain't necessarily so.
Service with a smile? On busy days, you li'ble to hear words that ain't in the bible.
Would you take your friends? We did.
Rating for a dating? Day out material for the like-minded, really.
Tip? Bill rounding up only.
If you could change one thing, what would it be? I'd get them upstairs to up the temperature a bit.
Going back? If you're up there, you will.
In Pictures
On Google Images
In Depth
Cheap lunch after a nice stroll in the sun.
We're at the top of a small hill. A couple of seats carved from the granite offer a rather fine view of the mountains and monastery. Certainly worth a stroll up from the car parks - either at the zebra crossing on the main road or just below the monastery in town.
The last few minutes' walk are a bit of a scrambly climb. Nothing if you're a regular walker. A bit more if you're a regular sit-in-restaurants-and-sarky-commenter. But at the top, waiting for you, is the Felipe II Kiosk - let's call it the F2K.
It's a tiny menu. A dozen items, no more. Vegetarians have a choice of tortilla or tuna-free tuna salad. Vegans have a choice, of sorts. Tuna-free tuna salad with olives, our without.
There's no messing here. It's as simple as can be. The Mahou comes bottled and as chilly as the locals expect. The omelettes come large or small. Mustard yellow egg properly undercooked, but just a smidge hard of spud. The grilled chorizo is terrifically fresh and juicy. The morcilla, Burgos style, is 15cm long and top notch. Some lovely little lamb chops are seasoned in the Spanish style but also deliciously freshly grilled. The salad's nice too. Again, as fresh as, so worth the five euro or so. There are no desserts and coffee wasn't being served until 3pm as the F2K crew were simply too busy to spare time for it.
And that's it. You can - and probably will - reorder a couple of times and sit watching the hordes climb up, the massed doggies try to rifle the chorizo and, from time to time, people wander past carrying portable mattresses on their backs. There seems to be the odd horse knocking about somewhere up there too. We're sure we heard one.
If it's a public holiday and chronically busy, you'll also probably get free entertainment too.
[Cue cheesy mid-atlantic voiceover.]
Ladies and Gentlemen. Live from the top of a hill, it's...
Look on as later arrivers who haven't booked shiftily make sure any pesky reserved signs get, ahem, blown away in the breeze. We'd booked for 1330, got there an hour ahead and were very glad we had.
Gawp as the owners berate the customers - and vice versa - for turning up late.
Stare as more late arrivals, with a sense of entitlement that would earn them jobs as UK Brexit Ministers (you bet your buttocks we're taking sides, what do you expect?), moan about the prebooked table they've liberated from someone who's not turned up yet. There's almost exactly too much shade and it needs shifting into the sun. Soon, and I'm not making this up for ironic effect, it becomes clear, however, that's not what they really wanted. It gets too hot. The Sun. A right pain. In Spain. Not only on the plain.
Nod sympathetically as the rest of the staff - an amiable bloke in a yellow t-shirt, today - attempt to defuse the arguments while navigating the chaos balancing three plates of egg and chips.
Then there's the ongoing saga of finding who is current holder of the mystical key that gives access to the gates of paradise. You've got it. The toilet hut. There's rarely a dull moment up there.
So take a stroll. Enjoy. Just go with patience. And an hour earlier than you'd planned.
Reservations
Recommended for busy days.
Location
On Fb
Per Person
€17 for a load of food and two drinks.
Hopes? A cold, cold drink at the stop of a short, steep hill.
Reality? Scores in the critical areas.
First Impressions? It's a brick shed in some trees.
A USP? It's the bar at the Silla de Felipe II!
The food in three words? Worth walking for.
Can they get the staff? It ain't necessarily so.
Service with a smile? On busy days, you li'ble to hear words that ain't in the bible.
Would you take your friends? We did.
Rating for a dating? Day out material for the like-minded, really.
Tip? Bill rounding up only.
If you could change one thing, what would it be? I'd get them upstairs to up the temperature a bit.
Going back? If you're up there, you will.
In Pictures
On Google Images
In Depth
Cheap lunch after a nice stroll in the sun.
We're at the top of a small hill. A couple of seats carved from the granite offer a rather fine view of the mountains and monastery. Certainly worth a stroll up from the car parks - either at the zebra crossing on the main road or just below the monastery in town.
The last few minutes' walk are a bit of a scrambly climb. Nothing if you're a regular walker. A bit more if you're a regular sit-in-restaurants-and-sarky-commenter. But at the top, waiting for you, is the Felipe II Kiosk - let's call it the F2K.
It's a tiny menu. A dozen items, no more. Vegetarians have a choice of tortilla or tuna-free tuna salad. Vegans have a choice, of sorts. Tuna-free tuna salad with olives, our without.
There's no messing here. It's as simple as can be. The Mahou comes bottled and as chilly as the locals expect. The omelettes come large or small. Mustard yellow egg properly undercooked, but just a smidge hard of spud. The grilled chorizo is terrifically fresh and juicy. The morcilla, Burgos style, is 15cm long and top notch. Some lovely little lamb chops are seasoned in the Spanish style but also deliciously freshly grilled. The salad's nice too. Again, as fresh as, so worth the five euro or so. There are no desserts and coffee wasn't being served until 3pm as the F2K crew were simply too busy to spare time for it.
And that's it. You can - and probably will - reorder a couple of times and sit watching the hordes climb up, the massed doggies try to rifle the chorizo and, from time to time, people wander past carrying portable mattresses on their backs. There seems to be the odd horse knocking about somewhere up there too. We're sure we heard one.
If it's a public holiday and chronically busy, you'll also probably get free entertainment too.
[Cue cheesy mid-atlantic voiceover.]
Ladies and Gentlemen. Live from the top of a hill, it's...
The F2K FloorShow
Look on as later arrivers who haven't booked shiftily make sure any pesky reserved signs get, ahem, blown away in the breeze. We'd booked for 1330, got there an hour ahead and were very glad we had.
Gawp as the owners berate the customers - and vice versa - for turning up late.
Stare as more late arrivals, with a sense of entitlement that would earn them jobs as UK Brexit Ministers (you bet your buttocks we're taking sides, what do you expect?), moan about the prebooked table they've liberated from someone who's not turned up yet. There's almost exactly too much shade and it needs shifting into the sun. Soon, and I'm not making this up for ironic effect, it becomes clear, however, that's not what they really wanted. It gets too hot. The Sun. A right pain. In Spain. Not only on the plain.
Nod sympathetically as the rest of the staff - an amiable bloke in a yellow t-shirt, today - attempt to defuse the arguments while navigating the chaos balancing three plates of egg and chips.
Then there's the ongoing saga of finding who is current holder of the mystical key that gives access to the gates of paradise. You've got it. The toilet hut. There's rarely a dull moment up there.
So take a stroll. Enjoy. Just go with patience. And an hour earlier than you'd planned.
