Tag: restaurant reviews

Postcard from Oaxaca, Mexico: Final flavorful food photos

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Aside from Los Danzantes and La Biznaga mentioned in an earlier post, we patronized other restaurants worth suggesting. Again, will mainly let the photos do their own self-promotion.

  • Mexita Restaurante definitely is in the running to become a place we enjoy going to multiple times during a trip, but, alas, we didn’t visit until the last week. In the past year, the Italian restaurant moved out of the historic center to the Reforma side of the city, which seemed to have changed the profile of its customer base from overwhelmingly American to mainly Mexican. The individual-sized arugula salad is ample for two, and we split a stunningly gorgeous seafood pizza.
  • We fell in love with Origen a year ago, yet only went once this time. We loved the casual intimacy of the small inner courtyard, where you could feel the chef-driven kitchen pulsing beside you. Now there is a more formally appointed dining room upstairs. The innovative takes using regional Oaxacan ingredients were still beautifully prepared and are recommended, but we ourselves were unprepared for the stiff, more traditional atmosphere.
  • Café Bistrot Epicuro offers Italian Mediterranean dishes in its quiet interior. Its grilled shrimp and calamari platter and its seafood linguini are well presented, but my favorite part is the eggplant amuse-bouche. More please.
Don Camaron ceviche
Origen pescado
Don Camaron opened-up smoker marlin taco
La Teca appetizer platter – a meal in itself
La Jicara carrot and lentil tostadas
Epicuro eggplant amuse-bouche
Mexita seafood pizza
Origen huitlacoche risotto
Origen sweetbread tostada
coffee shop near Susannah Trilling’s new storefront
Epicuro fish
Mexita “small” arugula salad
La Jicara jamaica tacos
Epicuro seafood linguini
Origen pescado
La Jicara chicken curry
Epicuro grilled shrimp and calamari
Mexita amuse-bouche
Don Camaron pulpo and shrimp
Epicuro octopus
Gourmand blue cheese burger slider
Trattoria apple and gorgonzola pizza
Gourmand Delicatessan
  • La Teca is a homey spot. Because it is actually a home. Pass through the tables set up in the almost garage-like entryway if the front door through the family’s living room is not open, and head back to the pleasant little patio. The food presented is Istmos-style. Unless you haven’t eaten in days, don’t be persuaded to order the works. The multi-course meal is both too expansive and expensive. The food is heavy, so stick to one or two items al a carte.
  • Gourmand Delicatessen presents a major change of pace. The small deli is a spot we order whole Spanish tortillas to take home for breakfasts or dinners. Sandwiches, sliders (particularly the eggplant one) and salads are all good, and Gourmand bakes their own rolls and bagels.
  • We keep looking for a good Sinaloan seafood spot in Oaxaca. We tried off-the-tourist-track Don Camaron this time. The ceviche was good, and the smoked marlin taco was something I’d never had before. But maybe one of the places with the lines running out the doors on a Sunday might prove more atmospheric.
  • A bright interior cozy patio surrounded by a book store characterizes La Jicara, offering numerous vegetarian options. The lentil and carrot tostadas were wonderfully refreshing.
  • Not a destination if you are on the other side of town, but the little Trattoria y Pizzeria fronting Conzatti Park is a nice neighborhood pizza place. The apple and gorgonzola pizza was simple and had a wonderfully thin crust, and the server delivers an amazingly addictive dish of olive oil loaded with thin crisp slices of caramelized garlic as a complimentary starter.
  • We loved picking up earthy breads from Pan y Co, and would pick up freshly roasted and ground coffee from a shop on a pedestrian plaza-like street running off Los Arcos and almost next door to chef Susannah Trilling’s new storefront offering her Seasons of My Heart moles and chocolates. So new even her website doesn’t list it and its address yet, and so new she herself was standing in it arranging things and talking to us about her products and classes. Sorry, those aren’t very helpful directions…. Maybe next time, in addition to wining and dining, I’ll break down and take one of her cooking classes.

Postcard from Oaxaca, Mexico: Favorites on the food front

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The Mister came across a blog post somewhere online that read, “La Biznaga is the reason I moved to Oaxaca.” Can’t find that post, but we feel almost as strongly about the place. Casually comfortable, a diverse menu and hands-down the best, most generous and potent margarita we have ever had anywhere.

As during our prior visit a year earlier, our other favorite spot is Los Danzantes. Danzantes is more upscale in service and price, but still avoids feeling stuffy.

Since writing about food in Oaxaca numerous times in 2013, I’ll just let photos speak for these two restaurants.

Los Danzantes quesillo fundido with huitlacoche, epazote and serrano chiles
La Biznaga las calendas, hoja santa stuffed with quesillo, zucchini blossoms and poblanos
Los Danzantes seafood chilpachole
La Biznaga Turista, nut-encrusted redfish over salad
Los Danzantes shredded chicken with Candy’s red mole
La Biznaga Zandunga, chicken breast wrapped around plaintain in guava mole
Los Danzantes creamy rice with purslane
Los Danzantes grilled octopus with roasted beets
La Biznaga Geulaguetza, chicken breast with purslane, cacti, sweet potato chips and black mole
Los Danzantes rosemary flavored creme brulee
Los Danzantes, chicken breast stuffed with goat cheese
La Biznaga susto, coconut flan in caramel and mezcal suace
La Biznaga La Tehuana, watercress, pear and roquefort salad
Los Danzantes
Los Danzantes grilled flank steak
La Biznaga Mazunte, tuna with asparagus, roasted tomatoes and avocado
La Biznaga margaritas
La Biznaga squash soup with ginger
Los Danzantes mashed plantain filled with Ismo-style wedding stew
Los Danzantes, hoja santa stuffed with goat cheese
Los Danzantes roasted watermelon and tomato salad

I promise the Mister and I did not consume every bite of these during our month-long stay. Some friends joined us part of the time, so we had the opportunity to sample some additional dishes.

And, if you ever hear we have packed up and moved to Oaxaca, blame it on La Biznaga.

Postcard from San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico: She-chefs and expats revolutionize restaurant scene

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Looking over the food photographs from our visit to San Cristobal de las Casas, it immediately struck me. Where is the Mexican food? What a dramatic change from our visit to San Cristobal more than three decades ago. There are so many contemporary fusion and international options lining the streets, we failed to eat much traditional fare.

Chef Marta Zepeda offers beautifully presented “haute” Chiapan cuisine at Tierra y Cielo, a boutique hotel focused on the food at its heart. Service was old-school Mexico; the presentation was not. Dishes we sampled included a julienned squash and apple salad with candied nuts; tamales with mole; and chicken with a pipian sauce on one side of the plate and a red mole on the other.

Another woman, Chef Daniela Mier y Teran, is at the helm of the contemporary Restaurante LUM in Hotel Bo. Our amuse-bouches were seafood empanadas, and the Mister opted for a spicily sauced tender pork dish. I jumped out of the country and plunged into a rich shrimp risotto.

Pizzaria El Punto vegetable pizza
Arez grilled meats
El Cau pulpo
Te Quiero Verde couscous salad
Frontera Artisan Food
Frontera Artisan Food ahi tuna salad
Te Quiero Verde coconut curry
El Cau more tapas
Restaurante LUM shrim risotto
Frontera Artisan Food gelato
Restaurante LUM
El Cau lomo del puerco
El Cau “el dolor”
El Cau tapas
Trattoria Italiana cheese ravioli
Restaurante LUM amuse-bouche
El Cau salmon
Restaurante LUM pork
Tierra y Cielo apple and squash salad
Trattoria Italiana pumpkin and sage ravioli
Tierra y Cielo chicken with pipian and mole sauces
Te Quiero Verde
Trattoria Italiana ahi tuna basket
Trattoria Italiana chile poblano lasagna
Arez appetizer platter
El Cau
Tierra y Cieolo tamales with mole
Tierra y Cielo tostadas
El Cau honied eggplant
Te Quiero Verde falafel burger
El Cau eggplant tapas

Which leads us to pizza. We found a simple vegetarian pizza cooked in a wood-fired oven and loaded with chopped fresh tomatoes at the small, unpretentious neighborhood Pizzaria el Punto on a plaza reached by a flight or two of stairs in Barrio el Cerrillo. If directed to the second  floor with a view of the plaza, anyone over five-feet tall needs to watch their heads on the way upstairs.

What many consider the best Italian restaurant in town, Trattoria Italiana, was half a block from our house. Ordering is complicated because the owner-chef speaks Italian and Spanish and has no written menu. He recites the daily options – which are extensive – to you. We ended up over-ordering, which made our bill add up. An appetizer of ahi tuna was served in a crispy parmigiano reggiano basket. A successful Mexican take on lasagna layered cheese, custard and strips of poblano pepper instead of the customary pasta. The three-cheese ravioli was not exciting, but the Mister swears the pumpkin and sage ravioli was absolutely the best ravioli he has ever put in his mouth. We kept wanting to return for more pumpkin ravioli, but somehow didn’t make it.

Part of the reason is sometimes you long for something light, which led us to Te Quiero Verde for fresh vegetarian fare, such as a simple couscous salad. The Mister managed to bite into mountainous falafel burger, and not a drop of my coconut curry remained on the plate.

My favorite healthy meal was the ahi tuna salad found at a comfortable café around the corner from our house, Frontera Artisan Food. Preparation of coffee was raised to artistic levels, and the kitchen turns out wonderful gelato.

We even took a break to order Lebanese food at Arez Restaurant on Real de Guadalupe. The assorted grilled meat platter was nothing spectacular, but we enjoyed the appetizer platter laden with hummus, baba ghanouj, tabouleh, stuffed grape leaves, spicy potatoes, green beans and sort of an eggplant ratatouille. The friendly owner and his wife were enjoying an off-menu dessert they shared with us – a custard flavored with orange flower water and topped with pistachios.

But I saved the best for last. Our favorite spot was also on Real de Guadalupe, a Spanish tapas and wine bar – El Cau. We actually enjoyed it more than anything we found in Spain. The tradition of providing some complimentary tapas with orders of wine or beer lives on here, but we never stopped there. Everything we had was delicious, including lomo de puerco, pulpo, salmon, eggplant brochettas and the highly addictive honied slices of eggplant. We stopped here for lunch and a bottle of wine at least three times.

Am including a photo of the toy truck at El Cau bearing what a friend of ours in Mexico calls el dolor – the check – because it reminded me of one of the lessons from Portugal that should be replicated in San Antonio. Imaginative ways of presenting the final bill.

In Portugal, we had checks presented every which way – in elegant wooden boxes, in the pages of books and even curled up in an unused sardine can. It makes getting the dolor (pain, grief) so much more bearable.

However, settling the bill in San Cristobal de las Casas was rarely painful. The total bill for food and a bottle of wine generally was the equivalent of a single bottle of wine – no food – in a restaurant in San Antonio.