Bootsy and Ruby create flash, fun, fine food

Jen Pritchard and Katie Elfers have a laugh while dining at Bootsy's Produced by Jeff Ruby on Walnut Street. (Credit: David Sorcher | Metromix)

Would Bootsy Collins wear regular shoes if there were leopard-skin platforms in his closet? Would he just keep rhythm on the bass when he could lay down a funkadelic groove?

Heck no. So a restaurant with Bootsy's name on it, especially in partnership with Jeff Ruby, also no stranger to excess, has to be a little outrageous.

Bootsy's Produced by Jeff Ruby is an exciting new downtown night spot, restaurant, sushi bar, and music museum.

The place is a bit blinding at first. There's Las Vegas glitter in the stairs going up to a big bar topped with a colorful glass ceiling. There's intimate tastefulness in the lounge's couches and chairs, the painted sinks in the ladies' rooms and beautiful painted doors.

Through one of those doors is the restaurant, a large room that's flashy but warm, with an open kitchen, a sushi bar, a blackboard menu, cushion-covered bench seating and booths separated by bead curtains.

I'd say it's crazy but it works. And it's fun.

This menu, Spanish and Latin-American with sushi on the side, has nothing in common with other Ruby restaurants. The only steak is a Kobe skirt steak.

Have a pineapple mojito (so good) while you look over the enticing menu. Decide whether to make a meal of the tapas or just have one as an appetizer before a large plate.

Each little plate we tried packed more bold flavor than you'd think would fit. A square of unashamedly rich pork belly ($11) is matched with sweet onion marmalade - the first bite made me stamp my feet on the floor. Blue crab bisque ($8) is briny with the intense taste of a real shellfish stock, accented with a little jalapeño. Cigales ($13) is blue prawns, served head-on with plenty of garlic. Ropa Vieja (old clothes) is a bite of boldly flavored braised beef on a corn cake.

The entrées were almost as good. Two of us got the mixed-seafood paella, which looks fabulous with a moist rice base in a wide pan loaded with small scallops, clams, calamari, shrimp, white asparagus, and roasted peppers ($17 per person). Though nearly faultless, it added up to less than fabulous for me.

Pork tenderloin ($19) was delicious roasted adobado-style, but the rustic chick peas and carrots stew was a little one-dimensional. Manchego ravioli ($21) is perfectly tender and light, with an unconventional tangy topping. I'd recommend getting the half-order of this ($11).

Desserts ($6-$7), ranging from crisp, creamy churros to flan lightly perfumed with orange and a delicious light rolled chocolate cake, were all great.

Sit at the sushi bar sometime. Behind the counter is Shigenobu Kajiwara, formerly of Jo An, an old-school sushi chef. He made me a perfect platter of mackerel topped with a translucent slice of seaweed, eel just warmed and a little crunchy, and surf clam like a miniature red and white sculpture.

Service is casual and warm. Both pros who waited on me were never stiff or pushy, but ever-alert to what we needed.

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