Sarah S.
Yelp
I've gotta say, I didn't expect to be this disappointed, seeing as how this place has some really great reviews. But nevertheless, I was. It wasn't even the fact that the place is so crowded at 7:30 on a Saturday night that it's hard to move, or the fact that they don't take reservations and you'll have to hunt for a table like a circling vulture. No, the greatest disappointment here was the food itself.
We wanted to try a little bit of everything, but with the priciness of the food, this wasn't very feasible. If you've ever been to Mexico, you see that the price differences between true Mexican food sold in its native country and the gentrified versions in the US are really staggering. It's really mind-blowing, considering the fact that the Americanized versions are rarely ever as good. For the price that we paid for our food here (approx. $40 for 2 tortas, 3 tacos, and 2 bottles of coke), I could've survived off of authentic street tacos in Cancun for at least a week. Alas, I realize this the United States and not Mexico, and it doesn't work like that here.
We decided to try the tacos, which are 1 for $4, or 3 for $11. They are pretty tiny, similar to actual Mexican tacos--although blasphemous when you realize they're charging $4 for a single one. We got 2 pastor, and one carne asada. Their use of ingredients was very authentic, with the pastor tacos being served with pineapple, cilantro, a nice drizzle of salsa verde, on top of two tortillas. However, the authenticity stops there. I was not blown away by the flavor, which these were seriously lacking.
Along with the tacos, I got a bistec torta. I was very excited about this, because I absolutely love tortas, as they are thick, and have some stiffness to them so it is easy to physically put in your hand and eat. However, this torta was the exact opposite of that. When I tell you the torta (which is the bread), was as soft as white bread....omg. You couldn't even pick it up because it was so soggy and falling apart. You couldn't even call the thing a torta, because it required that you eat it with a fork and knife. On top of this, it ALSO lacked flavor.
But wait. There's more.
My usual remedy for lack of flavor is to just put a nice layer of hot sauce on the food. Mexico is famous for its habanero hot sauce, which is staggeringly hot. I don't expect the food to be like this, considering we don't all like our food spicy, but at least have some actual hot sauce in the building?! They had something that was labeled as habanero, but it might as well have been some spicy mayo because it was NOT spicy at all. Along with this was some chipotle Tabasco, and considering that Tabasco is made in Louisiana, you're not really doing any justice to traditional Mexican food at all. El Yucateo hot sauce is really cheap, authentic, and you can find it at any Walmart. Or even a house made hot sauce that's actually hot. But please, don't leave us with that bland, boring excuse of a hot sauce that you had the audacity to label as "habanero sauce."
You know the feeling when you're full, but the food wasn't that great so you're still left feeling unsatisfied? That was me after this meal.
On top of this, they ran out of bottled water (????). They do sell "Mexican cokes" though (at 2.50 a pop), which as you know come in the fancy glass bottles and scream authenticity. However, THEY WERE OUT OF THIS TOO. Instead they sold regular cokes in plastic bottles, at the same price that they would the Mexican cokes. *sighs*.