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| - Day of the Dead decor in a restaurant can be a bit unsettling, but don't let entering through skull door handles and being surrounded by skeleton murals make you think that the food will speed you on your way to the other side--the modern Mexican food was mostly muy bueno, but the prices could have been adjusted for the lunch crowd. From the start I was pleased that they actually had a nice variety of beer on tap; I chose the Mr. Pina to accompany my pineapple highlighted meal. However, I was disappointed not to sit and sip while munching some chips since they charge for chips and salsa and it seems for $7.00 beers you should be entitled to some chips, c'on....
Friend had the meal I wished I'd ordered, Chicken Tinga Torta ($12) which was deliciously flavorful smokey ancho sauce, stacked high with pretty pink pickled onions on top, and the street corn as his side (nice and charred, but needed more cheese--was there any?).
My "Flying Saucer Al Pastor" for $14 was not as big of a taste treat. I liked the generous crispy flour tortilla base with the layer of bean spread, but the toppings just didn't come together into a memorable flavor. I had to ask my pleasant and attentive server Marianne for a side dish of green salsa and some tomatillo hot sauce to taste anything. The al pastor pork was flavorful when I isolated it, but what I tasted the most, unfortunately, was the shredded lettuce which had that bagged and chemically treated not-to-turn-brown smell and flavor. With roasted tasty pork that should be the centerpiece along with caramelized pineapple and cheeses, why on earth would you bury them under a shroud of lettuce and pico (oh, guess I've fallen into the Day of the Dead motif haven't I?) and sauces like avocado cream and cilantro cream and red salsa? Celebrate the ingredients and maybe divide the saucer into 3 sections of sauces so they can be differentiated and make a visual statement, or pick the one that works best and tweak it to perfection and have that as the signature flavor.
There's lots on the menu that I'd like to try, esp. a variety of creative-sounding $3 tacos, so I'll be back and hope most of the meals are more like my friend's sorta.
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