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| - I wish Yelp would let us give half stars...cause this place would definitely be getting 2.5 stars from me. However, since I don't have that luxury, and since I'm feeling generous, we'll go with 3.
Suffice it to say, I didn't think this place was anywhere NEAR as good as some of my foreyelpers. According to my dinner-mate (who also lives in Phoenix), the restaurant at the Claredon Hotel has had some identity crises in the past...Gallo Blanco is merely the latest manifestation and has only been open a few weeks. The ambiance was pretty good (earning this place one of its stars)...the dimly lit, minimalist-designed dining room with exposed concrete flooring lent itself well to the theme of the restaurant, with great big windows on one end.
Our waitress was an adorable blonde from Manchester, England, who was very sweet and attentive, and the service was fabulous the whole evening...seriously, our food came out in the blink of any eye! I know others have complained that the service was slow, so all I have to say to them is that maybe they stepped up their game in the past few days or something...anyway, it was wicked fast (point for Ms. Manchester and the quick entree-serving, too).
So...here's where lack of stars comes in: the food. We started with the Guacamole, which one yelper claimed was the, "best guacamole you'll ever taste." This is false. It is NOT the best guacamole you'll ever taste. It doesn't even rank in my top 10. I guess I like more traditional guacamole, because this was NOT traditional, and it just didn't really hit the spot for me. It was very chunky and had actual slices of little tangerines (i think) in it. The "hint of orange" was, in my opinion, a drawback. I just...didn't love it. Or even like it that much. I think I make better guac at home. Along with the guac, we also got a tomatillo sauce that was very boring...I've had some excellent tomatillos, and this didn't rank.
For my meal, I ordered the Cochinita Torta, which is basically pork served on a bun with some lettuce and some sort of aoili. I had read good reviews about the pork torta, but was hugely disappointed. First of all, the bun is like...one that you'd buy in the grocery store. NOTHING special about it, which was slightly disappointing. It just didn't have the constitution to really contain or complement the contents of the torta. The torta contents themselves were also nothing to write home about. My biggest complaint was the fact that there wasn't much pork, and the pork that was there wasn't, honestly, all that great. The aoili (which was seriously not much of a step above mayo) totally overpowered the pork and made the sandwich kind of...soggy. A soggy mayo and pork sandwich. That's what I had. It wasn't very good.
I think next time I'd go with the tacos...my friend ordered them and they looked less...disappointing. She appeared to like them pretty well.
The other star that I HAVE to give this place, though, is for the prices...$6.50 for the torta and $4.00 for the 2 tacos. We didn't get any alcohol, so all in all we spent $11 apiece. I may not have liked my food, but at least I didn't spend a fortune on it. The price is the only thing that would entice me to come back and try something else.
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