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| - I've been to the Patron Mexican Grill in Fox Chapel (or NEAR Fox Chapel - I wouldn't want to ruffle any bourgeois feathers by stating that a place 'outside' their gentrified borderlines was a part of THEIR community) and was actually quite impressed. The best Mexican food I've enjoyed in da burgh so far has been El Campesino, and Patron is pretty much an El Campesino clone. The food is made well, flavorful, fresh, prices are about the same, and the staff is friendly and helpful for the most part, with a dash of Latino eye candy thrown in occasionally.
I had heard that the Monroeville location offered a buffet, but frankly, I had a heck of a time finding out much about it. Not one word about it online, and even when I found them on Facebook, the person who runs their FB page didn't know anything about it. When I told them that the Fox Chapel (ish) store told me that Monroeville had one, the person looked into it, and confirmed, but that it is only on Sundays from 11 am to 2:30 pm.
So once it was confirmed, I thought 'Y'know, I've never HAD a Mexican buffet' and was kind of craving giving it an audition. My best friend decided that we were going to GO! So we scheduled her Access van, and off we went.
Patron has taken over the old Chili's building near Monroeville Mall - wait - wasn't Chili's like the ultimate suburbanite dream??? And it failed in MONROEVILLE?? But I digress.
We were greeted at the door by Latino Guapo, tall, dark and handsome, who started to seat us away from the buffet, and since I was plating up for a blind woman and myself, I asked to be seated close to the buffet. He changed direction, and we were seated next to the buffet.
The restaurant is quite large, very colorful in that Latin way, lots of neon, the Mariachi flavored tunes filling the air. Of course, for da burgh-ites, they also have several TVs hanging around the restaurant with ESPN sports news. *sigh*
Now, I knew what their regular menu was like, and have always enjoyed it, and as I've stated, I've never been to a Mexican buffet before, so here it is, the buffet.
VERY basic, a little bland, but filling.
Mexican restaurants I have always equated with Italian restaurants. At an Italian restaurant, you find three dozen ways to combine pasta, in a variety of shapes, with cheese, meet, and a handful of sauces. Roll it and stuff it with cheese, top it with tomato sauce and voila Manicotti. Leave the noodle flat, stick the cheese and sauce in between the layers, and, voila - lasagna! Well, at a Mexican restaurant, you have basically two styles of tortillas, which you can roll, fold, or rip, to combine with beans, rice, meat, and cheese, sprinkled with a variety of veggies and a handful of sauces. Roll it and stuff it, and voila - burrito. Fold it and stuff it, and voila - taco! Rip it up, and scatter it around a plate, top it with all the goods, and voila - nachos.
The only real difference between ordering from the menu and having the buffet is that now the rolling, folding and stuffing becomes do it yourself, but with more bland and 'bulk' ingredients aimed at the trough-like palates of suburbanite Pittsburghers. The parts are all there, they just aren't as flavorful as what would come out of the kitchen.
The buffet had spanish rice and refried beans, chicken and beef enchiladas, taquitos, fajita guts (one chicken, one beef), taco shells and a very bland ground beef for stuffing into burritos, or tacos, or sprinkling over your self-assembled nachos, a pan of hot white cheese sauce (a yinzer standing next to me in the line said 'what's THIS?' and I told him it was the cheese sauce - he then started to rant that he wanted to make sure it wasn't 'summa dat white gravy fer biscuits' - and I opted out of the chat.) There were also taco shells, warm tortillas in foil for making your burritos or fajitas, hot wings and ribs (??) another pan of some kind of softer mini-burrito stuffed with something, a cold 'topping' section with lettuce, pico de gallo, cold shredded cheese, and small containers of sour cream and guacamole. Finally, there was a small 'dessert' area with a warm banana stuffed tortilla, those crunchy cinnamon stick things whose name eludes me at this time, and a variety of cut up fruit.
Everything was basic. Nothing was heavily seasoned or spiced, or especially flavorful. Even the hot wings (??) which were plump and juicy just had a tabasco like sauce, tasty but not challenging. The guacamole was fine, the beans were fine, the rice was fine, the cheese sauce was fine.
But for an $8.99 all-you-can-eat buffet, 'fine' is just fine. I don't expect 'spectacular' when I can stuff myself. Stuffing yourself with 'spectacular' is called 'brunch' and usually comes with a MUCH heftier price tag.
Give it a shot when you're in the mood for more than what would just come on a plate from the kitchen. It's 'fine'.
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