This handsome restaurant and tapas bar named for the royal guards known as “Beefeaters” opened in 1974 in a historic tavern where nobles and literati rubbed shoulders before the Civil War. There are several small and rather formal dining rooms, including one in the cellars. The dining room menu represents a light approach to contemporary Spanish cooking with dishes like bream roasted in a salt crust and served with a sauce of fresh tomatoes and basil, or oxtail stewed with honey and cinnamon. It’s a terrific place to have a civilized Spanish meal. In the bar, on the other hand, you’ll probably have to stand and might have to shout to converse, but the food is even lighter (chilled almond soup with prawns and grapes, “meat” balls of fish and shellfish, brochettes of pork with mushrooms and pineapple). The sherry collection behind the bar is excellent.