Tacos at Cascabel
Hey kids, I figure you have noticed I have been slooooooow at posting. I guess the more you write about the food the harder it is to keep up the blog. The good news is, there are tons of reviews for you to read! I have also started writing for Edible Brooklyn, which is pretty exciting. Anyway, all these restaurants are Mexican themed, my favorite. Click the link to read full review.
While spending time with my grandmother in Denver, Colorado, we did what we usually do–we went out to lunch. This is always an event because my grandmother can never make up her mind about what she wants to eat. So this time, I merely said “Mexican” and she twittered about this new place that had opened up in one of her favorite, now defunct, breakfast spots in Aurora. › Continue reading
Just six miles short of the New Mexico boarder at the Dutch Mill in Antonito, Colorado, I greedily took on the South-Western Mexican menu in front of me. Enchiladas, tacos, sopapillas stuffed with cheese, burgers, and tostadas. Usually, at a restaurant like this, the main ingredients are beans, ground beef, cheese, and chili. While trying not to drool, I chose the pork enchiladas with red sauce, a little spicier than green. We got our salted margaritas, basket of fresh corn chips, and mild pico de gallo.
When the food arrived, I had all ready filled up a portion of my belly with the chips and drink. It’s so hard to resist the fresh tomato and cilantro tinged salsa. But lucky for me, I didn’t indulge too much. My “petite” order of enchiladas came out on a heaping, hot plate with cheese oozing off the side. The red sauce bubbled and I inquired if this was indeed the small plate. After taking a moment to gawk, I dived in, picking apart the soft corn tortilla and stabbing a chunk of shredded pork on my fork.
Divine. The sauce had a kick but it didn’t deter from the savory taste of the pork, which had been pan-fried before it was stuffed into the shell, giving it a slightly crispy texture. I am not normally a refried bean kind of gal, but these were non-greasy and heavy with meaty flavor. That, and the cheese had made its way over to cover them like a yellow blanket of comfort food. Despite my bulging middle, I finished the plate, and another margarita too.
Now for dessert, on thing I haven’t found easily in New York are sopapillas, the Mexican version of a fried doughnut. I remember dipping this tasty bread in honey at Casa Bonita, possibly the worst Mexican restaurant in Denver that caters to kids by having sky divers, a water fall, caves to explore and as much as these sweet treats as you want. The sapopillas at Dutch Mill were unlike anything I could have imagined from my childhood. Dense yet with a fluffy inside, these golden squares hardly needed the honey provided, given the bread was already sweet. Not too greasy and still hot, I downed my sopapilla in blissful moment and then eyed the one next to my companion greedily. He ate it, which was probably a good thing since by that point I could barely move. As we waddled back to the house, I couldn’t help but grin the whole way there while planning the next Mexican meal I would get there.
