Every Christmas Day save two of the past 40 years has found us hoisting margaritas and brunching at Mi Tierra Café y Panaderia, the heart of San Antonio’s Market Square since 1941.
We are far from alone celebrating in the restaurant known for its festive over-the-top Christmas decorations, most of which remain year-round. Seemingly thousands of other San Antonians choose to embrace the city’s Tex-Mex roots for the holiday. Year after year after year.
Wait time for a table hovers around an hour, but that provides the opportunity to take a number at the bakery to purchase some of the best and freshest pralines ever to melt in your mouth. And, of course, there is the bar.
Opportunities to buy things large and small present themselves almost every few steps you take in Mexico City.
The city is famed for its street food and inventive ways to sell it, such as the motorized empanaderia. We stumbled across one food truck that sported a second story with stools and a counter for rooftop dining (sorry, no photo). It’s amazing how one can start with a healthy mango and add layers of psychedelic toppings to completely disguise the fruit at its base. Vibrant colored chips and doodles fail to convince they are high in beneficial beta carotene.
bookstore in Roma Norte
year-round Christmas store
quinceanera dresses
all-weather pedicabs
Que Bo chocolate toys from Mercado Roma
Beatles photo-bomb Casasola image
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psychedelic mangos
photo opportunity in Chapultepec Park
colorized chips and doodles
esquites – Mexican street corn
empanaderia bike
hair cuts that will make you famous
unicorns overlooking the cathedral
Proyecto 125 wines from La Contra in Roma Norte
Proyecto 125 wine label showcasing essential bike accessory, a wine carrier
Loteria Nacional
Never tempted to hire a clever all-weather pedicab, but did keep envisioning mounting the trio of horses in Chapultepec Park corralled by a vendor for photos for a fee, the perfect souvenir to share on facebook for holiday greetings. But, alas, the Mister and nuestra hija declined. Bet they are sorry now that Christmas is almost here.
Chocolates and Proyecto 125 wines were about our only purchases outside of restaurants. Kind of wondering if we should have succumbed to the numerous offerings of loteria tickets. Potential winnings look so impressive when promoted in pesos.
Close to 60 vendors are squeezed into the multi-story Mercado Roma, yet somehow I ended up with no photo overviews to show you even though we ducked in there several times. I tend not to enjoy the crowds crammed into narrow aisles of gourmet food halls, but, by visiting midday midweek, we found sitting at a counter very pleasant.
Serrano ham, Puebla-style cemitas, Spanish tapas, cheeses. One quickly senses this is a playground for chefs from established restaurants to experiment. So many places seductively beckoned us, but we stopped twice near the front at Saigon Cocina Vietnam. Large, plump shrimp punctuated with lemongrass atop rice starred in a made-to-order daily special. The flavorful scene-stealer proved to be the tuna banh mi spiked with the perfect amount of ginger sandwiched in fresh, firm French bread. A nice bottle of red can be procured from an outpost of Tinto Mx to accompany your meal.
The danger in eating at the counter at Saigon Cocina is posed by its neighbor, Que Bo, lurking behind your back. Chocolatero Jose Ramon Castillo tempts you with a display case full of gleaming Crayola-colored chocolates. On several occasions I managed to limit myself to letting just one melt in my mouth, slowly releasing layers of complex flavors. Also, tucked away in a back corner of Mercado Roma is a booth full of gourmet paletas, Bendita Paleta, that represent successful crossbreeding of traditional Mexican popsicles and Italian gelato waiting to be dipped in a chocolate of your choice.
Seneri fried charl taquito amuse bouche
Seneri Uruapan helado de aguacate
Seneri callo (scallops) y fresas
Seneri avocado and cheese amuse bouche
Bendita Paleta
Que Bo box of chocolate toys
Saigon Cocina Vietnam arroz with shrimp and lemongrass lunch special
Seneri pollo de campo
Saigon Cocina tuna bahn mi
chocolates in the display case of QueBo
Seneri
Seneri crudo de pescado
open kitchen at counter of Saigon Cocina Vietnam
On a Saturday when the market was hopping, we opted to seek refuge in the soothing, serene surroundings of a full-service restaurant upstairs, Seneri. Chef Fernando Martinez adds a contemporary twist to traditional foods from his home state of Michoacán, and he won us over immediately with an amuse-bouche of a rustic corn taquito topped with a sassy-looking fried charral, a crispy little whitefish we enjoyed mountains of served aboard one of the floating boat/restaurants on Lake Patzcuaro about 25 years ago. The crudo de pescado nestled in a foamy bed adorned with perky flowers was almost too pretty to eat, but we managed. Chicken de campo was enriched by a sauce of wild mushrooms. Avocado ice-cream served as a refreshing but not-too-sweet dessert. The entire meal was perfectly paced. We were never rushed, yet never left glancing toward the kitchen in search of the next course.
Mercado Roma might have won me over on the concept of gourmet food halls.
Leaving you with a glance at more of the chocolatero’s mouth-watering creations….
Postcards from Barton Springs 