Cinema Taco

subject: Cinema Taco
take-out vehicle: paper bag
cost: $6

1.20.10 update: Alex George has decided on a name—Cinema Taco.

Despite its opening several weeks ago, the little restaurant inside The Jefferson downtown still has no official name. Kinda unusual, yes, but honestly I don't care what it's called, just so long as they keep serving me pork empanadas.

Made daily by Alex George, formerly of Just Curry, they may not be as filling as some other foods you can buy for $2.50, but I daresay none are as satisfying. The crust was rich, buttery, and flaky, and inside there was perfectly cooked, juicy pulled pork; little al dente cubes of potato; and a wee bit of chili. Seriously, I don't know a better way to spend $2.50.

Besides empanadas (of which they have several daily flavors), Cinema Taco also serves handmade soft tacos and burritos. Today I had a fish taco (which I think is a relatively new option) with grilled cod, chipotle salsa, guacamole, red onion, cilantro and lettuce. While not quite as flavorful as the empanada, the taco was very fresh. Cradled in two yellow corn tortillas, the ingredients came together well in each bite, but I could still taste each of them individually. I'm especially thankful that the cod wasn't fried. Not only did it blend with its neighboring ingredients (whereas fried fish would overpower), it tasted really healthy.

But healthy shmealthy. Pork and butter make me happy, so as long as those empanadas are available, I'll definitely be a regular.

Oh, one more thing: When ordering an empanada, don't be tempted by the complementary papaya habanero hot sauce. It's great with the tacos, but the empanadas are perfect by themselves.

(Here's a secret from Alex George: When he first started making the empanada dough, he used lard instead of butter. I didn't find out why he decided to switch to butter, but I've got a hunch: self-preservation. Lard is just too irresitable. I bet he was afraid of something like this.)

El Pollo Loco

subject: El Pollo Loco
take-out vehicle: lots of styrofoam
cost: $10.02

Josè: "So are you going?"
John: "Yeah, I'm going there right now."
Josè: "Awesome. What are you going to get?"
John: "Isn't the rotisserie chicken supposed to be really good?"
Josè: "That's what I hear, I mean it's in their name, right?"
John: "So you haven't had it?"
Josè: "Haha, no. Everything I go in there, I end up ordering something else."
John: "Then I'll definitely get the rotisserie chicken."
Josè: "Great. You'll have to let me know how it is."

Well, Josè...the tacos were pretty good.

I'll be honest, I didn't see a rotisserie. I did see some chicken quarters in the display behind the counter, but when I asked the guy who took my order what his favorite thing on the menu was, his answer was tacos.

So I listened to the guy who took my order.

Unlike my trip to La Michoacana earlier this month, here I ordered three different tacos: one carne asada, one pollo, and one al pastor. My three tacos also came with a serving of Mexican rice, pinto beans, and two salsas. Feeling gluttonous, I also ordered a serving of fried plantains.

I was puzzled when I first opened the styrofoam take-out box. There were my three tacos, but I also saw three balls of aluminum foil. However, after opening the first to find sections of lime, I knew the contents of the other two: chopped onion and cilantro, all the toppings of a traditional taco.

I don't know how exactly its meat was cooked, but of the three, I found the taco al pastor to be the best in terms of flavor and texture. The pork was juicy, tender, and mildly spicy, and the lime, cilantro, onion, and tomato salsa complimented it well.

The taco carne asada was my second favorite. The beef paired well with the salsa verde and had a nice meaty flavor of its own, and it too was fairly tender. The chicken in the taco pollo, on the other hand, was a little bland and over-cooked. I tasted it, but I tasted the salsa verde and the tortillas a whole lot more.

The tortillas themselves were good, though a bit thinner than I was expecting, and I suspect it was for that reason two tortillas were used for each taco. The extra tortillas turned out to be a good thing, though, since one of the two from each taco ripped during my meal.

I found the rice to be decent but unremarkable, though the beans were very good. The guy who took my order told me they were slow cooked with sausage, bacon, and onions, whereas the also-offered black beans were cooked with jalapenos. I didn't try the black beans, but I have a feeling a chose correctly. The pintos were savory and satisfying, and the bacon gave it a subtle smokey flavor.

The plantains were also very tasty. As far as I could tell, they weren't spiced or seasoned after being fried, but they were every bit as good, if not better, than the ones I ate at Just Curry.

La Michoacana is closer to my home and office, so I doubt that I'll travel across town just to get these tacos, but I'll certainly keep this place in mind when I'm looking for lunch on Emmet St. After all, there's still the matter of the rotisserie chicken (somebody's got to try it). And where else in town can you watch music videos like this?

Note: If you're thinking of stopping by in the next few days, you may want to wait a week or so: I was told that new management is taking over soon, and though the existing menu is being retained, expect to see new items from El Salvador and Central America, including pupusas. The guy who took my order seemed pretty excited about it.

La Michoacana

subject: La Michoacana
take-out vehicle: styrofoam box
cost: $6.80

I went to Tucson a few years ago to visit some friends, and while I was there, we all had dinner at a small, authentic taqueria. The tacos I got there, without a doubt, were the best I had ever tasted. Besides being hands-down fantastic, that meal really illustrated to me the shocking difference between Mexican food on the West cost and on the East coast. Why, I asked back then, couldn't we have any decent tacos in Charlottesville?

Well, they arrived about a year and half ago under the banner of La Michoacana. I can't say they make the best tacos in town (there are still a few I haven't tried), but I'd be willing to wager a cookie or two that they do. For those who haven't been, La Michoacana won't impress you with its decor or its ambiance, and it certainly won't draw you in with a fancy exterior (it shares a small building with Merry Maids on E. High Street). What it will do, however, is showcase how tacos are supposed to be made.

I'm not sure how many times I've been to La Michoacana, but I've been enough to watch them grow as a business. They recently doubled their seating capacity by rearranging the now-open kitchen, and the line is a little bit longer every time I go. This visit was remarkable because, for the first time, Caucasian people outnumbered the Mexican-American staff. Don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled that they're doing well, but I used to get the feeling, when I would visit and be one of but two Caucasian people in there, that I was in on some little secret. Now, not so much. But at least they're not in danger of closing.

On this visit, I ordered three taco locos mexicanos: tacos made with a mixture of shredded chicken (pollo), shredded pork (carnitas), and crumbled chorizo (chorizo) topped with cilantro and fresh diced onion. As sides, I chose a pickled jalapeno, avocado sauce, the mild salsa, and the fresh onion, carrot, and habanero salsa cruda.*

The tacos, as always, were made with fresh corn tortillas, which I've grown to very much appreciate. I never really liked them when I was younger because they were more porous (thus increasingly mushy) and rarely stayed intact while I ate them. Like the tortillas I had in Tucson, however, these tortillas were soft and malleable, yet firm and cohesive. It also helped that the meat, through which the chorizo's flavor carried entirely, was not overly greasy. Even the sauces I added did little to harm the tortillas.

Unfortunately, I did notice that there were a few chunks of potato in my meat. Not many, but definitely a few per taco. While not a unforgivable sin in these economic times, I was not at all happy to see such obvious filler. I'd never noticed them before, so perhaps they were only visiting and had firm plans to go back to where they came from. My fingers remain crossed.

The salsa and avocado sauce (called such because it seemed to be only pureed avocado with lime juice and water, not true guacamole) were very good. There were two salsas from which to choose: the milder tomato-based salsa and a spicier salsa verde. The salsa I chose was fairly mild but had an appreciable taste of dried, smoked chiles (if I had to guess, I'd say ancho and/or pasilla). The avocado sauce, on its own, was largely tasteless save for a hint of lime, yet on the taco it brought all the flavors of the meat, onion, cilantro, and salsa together quite nicely.

The curtido was another thing altogether. I remember the first time I tried it thinking it was only onions and carrots in vinegar. Silly me, I failed to notice the huge chunks of orange habanero hiding amongst the carrots. I remember being very glad that I'd gotten the large bottle of water with my order.

Now that I knew better than to dump it on willy-nilly, the curtido added a very pleasant amount of freshness and heat to the taco, which otherwise would have been defined by the spices of the meat and the salsa. (In the spirit of full disclosure, I will admit that I shied away from eating the almost fully intact habanero I had inadvertently picked up.)

I could have ordered the tacos with more familiar toppings, including lettuce, tomato, and sour cream, but, as I learned in Tucson, the main ingredient(s) of a taco shouldn't be covered up by unnecessary stuff, especially stuff that only dilutes the flavor of everything around it (I'm looking at you, lettuce and sour cream). To me, the taco should simply be about celebrating, and enriching, the flavor(s) of the main ingredient(s).

I'm glad to know that La Michoacana shares my view, but even more than that, I'm glad I don't have to buy a plane ticket to get real taco.

* Traditionally, Mexican salsas are supposed to be cooked, thin, and sauce-like. Salsa crudas, on the other hand, are more similar to "Americanized" salsas: fresh, thick, chunky, and great on a chip. In my opinion, this particular salsa cruda could also be classified as a salad due to the large size of its ingredients.