Eater DC: Boqueria Penn Quarter’s Paella Pro Branches Out With a New Rockville Restaurant

The outgoing chef de cuisine at Penn Quarter’s tapas bar Boqueria will showcase his polished Spanish cooking skills at his first solo project opening in Rockville Town Square this winter.

George Rodrigues hopes to debut El Mercat Bar De Tapas in mid-December in the 2,000-square-foot space that housed short-lived Cajun and Puerto Rican restaurant Gumbo Ya Ya (101 Gibbs Street, Rockville, Maryland). Rodrigues was part of Boqueria Penn Quarter’s opening team in 2019 and learned how to perfect his paella under its Barcelona-born executive chef Marc Vidal, whose group oversees a pair of locations in D.C., four in NYC, and one in Chicago.