Spanish Restaurant Near Me Downtown LA: Vaca DTLA on Seventh Street

If you work in a Downtown LA tower and type spanish restaurant near me at lunch, Vaca DTLA is now the obvious answer. It opened on November 20, 2025 at 960 W. 7th Street, under The Beaudry apartment high-rise, as the second location of the Costa Mesa original that chef Amar Santana and partner Ahmed Labbate launched in 2015. The menu runs from tapas and Ibérico ham to paella and wood-fired steaks, and the full menu is served at every hour the restaurant is open.

By train, the 7th Street/Metro Center station, served by the A, B, D and E lines, is a couple of blocks away, which makes Vaca one of the easier sit-down Spanish meals to reach without a car in Los Angeles. That matters at dinner, because the bar list is long and the steaks are big. The restaurant says it is just blocks from The Broad and Walt Disney Concert Hall, so it also works before a show on Grand Avenue.

Santana is the draw for many diners. He started cooking at 16, graduated from the Culinary Institute of America and opened his flagship, Broadway by Amar Santana in Laguna Beach, in 2011. He has competed on Bravo's Top Chef three times and was named Fan Favorite in Season 20. At Vaca he builds on classic Spanish cooking from Barcelona, Madrid, Andalucía and the Basque Country, then adds his own twists, such as a shrimp toast on brioche and an albacore tataki with yuzu.

Start with the classics before the twists. Pan con tomate, toasted bread rubbed with garlic, olive oil and tomato pulp, is $13. Croquetas de pollo, creamy chicken fritters, cost $12, and La Bola, crispy potato and ground beef balls with garlic aioli and salsa roja, are also $12. Gambas al ajillo, sautéed shrimp with garlic and chili flakes served with grilled bread, are $28, and pulpo a la gallega, warm octopus with fingerling potatoes and pimentón, is also $28.

The ham program is the most Spanish part of the menu. Cinco Jotas Jamón Ibérico de Bellota, acorn-fed ham cured for more than five years, is hand carved to order at $65 per ounce, so one ounce shared at the table is plenty for a first taste. Fermín Jamón Serrano, aged 24 months, is a gentler $13. The Bikini Sandwich, $17, is Vaca's version of the Barcelona ham-and-cheese toastie, pressed with Paleta Ibérica, Manchego and truffles.

Paella is cooked to order and sized for the table. The paella de mariscos is $64 with prawns, clams, mussels and octopus in saffron bomba rice and garlic aioli. The paella de carne, at $53, packs pork belly, chorizo, blood sausage, duck confit and beef cheek. The paella Valenciana costs $60 with scallops, shrimp, chicken and chorizo, and a vegetable version made with fideuà noodles is $40. Order the paella early, since it takes longer than the tapas.

Vaca also calls itself a steakhouse, and all of its beef is grilled over a wood fire. The house specialty is a prime ribeye dry-aged for more than 50 days and sold at $89 per pound. Smaller cuts include an 8-ounce prime hanger at $46 and a 12-ounce prime flat iron at $54. For a Spanish touch on the side, patatas bravas with tomato sauce and garlic aioli are $15, and grilled Spanish morcilla with Pedro Ximénez onions is $15.

The bar takes the Spanish gin tonic seriously, with a whole Gintonica section on the cocktail list. The Spanish Armada pairs Gin Mare from Spain with Q Spectacular Tonic, grapefruit peel, olive and oregano for $17. The Sanlúcar de Barrameda cocktail, $20, mixes Manzanilla sherry with olive leaf gin and salted honey. Red sangria is $18, and there is vermouth on tap, the way it is poured in Madrid bars on a Sunday afternoon.

Timing is easy to plan around. Vaca DTLA is open Tuesday through Friday from 11:30 am to 9 pm, with lunch from 11:30 am to 3 pm, and on Saturday from 5 pm to 10 pm, when the bar opens at 4:30 pm. It is closed on Sunday and Monday. Happy hour runs Tuesday to Friday from 2:30 pm to 5:30 pm with 25% off, the best value window for tapas and gin tonics after work.

The restaurant's own advice is that reservations are highly recommended, and that goes double for Saturday, the one night it opens for dinner only. Vaca offers indoor and outdoor dining, and it hosts private parties as well as themed community dinners, which are announced on its website. For a solo visit or a quick lunch, a bar seat is the simplest way in.

For dessert, the Mama Santana flan, $12, carries the chef's family name and is the classic choice. Churros con chocolate cost $13, and the Basque cheesecake, the burnt-top style from San Sebastián, is $16. There is also a tres leches cake for $14 and house-made ice creams and sorbets for $7. The cheese list, with Idiazabal, Manchego, Cabrales and Mahón, comes as three cheeses for $30 or five for $40.

Make an evening of the neighborhood. Walk up Grand Avenue to The Broad, the free contemporary art museum, and to Walt Disney Concert Hall, home of the LA Phil, both a short walk from 7th and Figueroa. FIGat7th, right below the restaurant, has shops and a food court for a casual stop, and the InterContinental tower across the street is the landmark to look for when you come back out at night.

Practical notes: Vaca DTLA is at 960 W. 7th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90017, email la.info@vacarestaurant.com. The original Vaca is on Town Center Drive in Costa Mesa, so make sure you book the Los Angeles location. Expect full table service and a polished room. Vaca suits business lunches, pre-concert dinners and birthday paella for a group, and its happy hour is a good first visit if you want to taste the menu without the steak-dinner bill.