Change Isn't Always For the Better: Taquería Los Potrillos

For the past couple of years, Taquería Los Potrillos, on Starcrest, has been my preferred taco-spot on the far North Side. This was not so much because it was particularly good, but because it was the best available in that part of town, from what I could find after a long and arduous, and fattening, search.

But ownership of Los Potrillos has changed (I understand that the former owners have opened a place of the same name on the South Side, closer to their home), and after an initial period during which nothing much changed, the new owners have started to put their stamp on the food. The results are seriously disappointing.

The chips and salsa are much different, and nothing good has come of that. Before, the chips were an unusual blend of corn and flour tortillas fried up and served out in generous portions; I was particularly partial to the flour tostadas. And the salsa was a delectable in-house concoction that never allowed one flavour to overwhelm the others. It was a nicely balanced mix of tomatoes, onions, peppers, a little cilantro, and seasonings in a sauce that was neither runny nor viscous. Now, chips and salsa at Los Potrillos means what I suspect are commercially-processed chips of inordinately regular appearance, fried just past the point of best quality, and served up with salsa dipped from a restaurant-sized can of (one can only hope) Pace Picante Sauce, and not even the chunky variety. It is tomato sauce, with all the other ingredients necessary for salsa making a perfunctory appearance, as if they had other, more important, parties to go to.

My friend's beef fajita tacos were lousy. Nearly tasteless lumps of meat with only a nodding acquaintance with any kind of seasoning were scattered onto a tortilla and delivered up to an ungrateful palate. There was nothing of interest about them at all.

The stuffing of the migas tacos I had was generous, and tasty enough to insure the restaurant's rating for food would go no lower than it did, but the plate was unduly messy. By the time it arrived, only moments after ordering, my tacos had already leaked a vaguely orange sauce onto the plate, making the outside of the tortilla slick and wet, and threatening the integrity of the taco altogether. And there was no cheese in the mix, a ghastly, even unforgivable departure from previous practice.