Excursion Along Hildebrand, Part I

After posting my last review, a couple of days ago, I decided to visit some of the other places on Hildebrand that I haven't been to, or haven't been to lately, just for comparison's sake, and to put more substance into my often-stated belief that there are more good taquerías and Mexican restaurants on that street than in all of Loopland. Today was a good start.

Today I visited 

El Manantial Mexican Restaurant

1136 West Hildebrand

(at I-10, next to the railroad tracks)

This restaurant is in one of the seedier-looking strip centers in, let's face it, a not-too-glamourous part of a no-longer-glamourous street. There was a time when Hildebrand Avenue was the City Limits, and by the time they moved farther out, Hildebrand was reaching what would be its peak of trendiness. It has long ago subsided from what was never a particularly frothy avant-garde position, but neither is it continuing to decline. If anything, it's threatening to experience a sort of low-level gentrification. 

But not here by the railroad tracks. It's a semi-industrial area, the natural home of machine shops, contractor supply houses, tattoo parlours and bars you only hear about on the blood-and-guts local news. This particular strip-center is so tatty-looking that I've never considered stopping at whatever restaurant has occupied the space on the end over the years, and there have been plenty of them. (Though I did consider buying the little shopping center when it was for sale a few years back.) El Manantial is only the latest kitchen to set up shop there. 

No city inspection yet.

I wonder if its predecessors in that space were as good. If they were (and plenty of good restaurants have failed in this town, like in any other), then I regret not having tried them. Because El Manantial is one of the best on a street filled with good ones. It is totally lacking in aesthetic attractiveness on the outside, but once in through the doors, you find a large space, brightly painted in attractive colour combinations: two-toned side walls with a terra cotta theme are juxtaposed with muted yellow (my friend Rick calls it "goldenrod"; unlike most men, he knows the names of more than eight colours) on the back walls and a section of ceiling. The décor is for the most part done with more of a thought toward, if not elegance, then cohesion. The exception to this is the area around the counter, in the back, where the tasteful decorator's work concedes to the exigencies of a mom-and-pop business, and all is hand-lettered poster boards advising of specials, rules, and so on. Oh, well.

The place was empty when we arrived, though apparently everyone was just waiting to see where we went to eat, because it filled up quickly when noon came. Many of the people who joined us in the restaurant are regulars, as evinced by the greetings they gave the staff, and each other. We, however, two gringos in a swarm of mejicanos, received service as prompt, as pleasant, and as efficient as any of that regular crowd. Our waitress spoke about as much English as I do Spanish, but between us we got by just fine. I believe she's one of the more effective waitrons* I've encountered lately. 

The food was very good overall. The corn tortillas holding my tacos (made in-house, naturalmente) were medium-thin and not at all lacking in coherence. That's a fancy way of saying they didn't fall apart even though they weren't heavy. Rick's flour tortillas (also made in-house) were good, but unremarkable. The fillings he chose (his usuals, beef fajita and picadillo) were on the high side of average, with plenty of meat, good seasoning, and, in the fajita taco, a good accompaniment of onion and pepper. 

My machacado taco was better than average, and average, as you must know, is pretty good. There was good dried beef in it, and the egg was cooked solid but not dry. The other requisite ingredients were all present, although if anything there was rather more onion than I would call perfect; but it only obtruded mildly, and in passing. It wasn't enough of a flaw to really complain about. Usually I wouldn't let that stop me, but the overall quality was so good that I'm in a forgiving mood.

The real standout was the chilaquile taco. From the first bite, I knew that I had found a truly superior chilaquile. I do not know what about it makes it so good. I thought it was that the eggs were scrambled in butter — they had a very buttery taste — but the waitress was sure it was done in oil. There was plenty of sharp cheddar cheese, not that cheap and common (in both senses of the word) stuff that can't legally be called cheese; and the veggies were grilled to absolute perfection. The chilaquiles themselves — the fried bits of corn tortilla — were also cooked perfectly. They were cut in a square shape, which makes them look less than thoroughly authentic, but that's just appearances. The flavour and texture was right up there with the best.

The only other thing worth mentioning was the basket of tostadas brought to us after we had ordered. The salsa accompanying the basket of chips was good but not noteworthy (by contrast, the salsa verde that came with our tacos was excellent), but the chips were ... oh, let's just say disappointing. A little too thick, a little too greasy. But that was not enough to detract from the total experience of tacos at El Manantial.

* Thanks to Biff and the Hankmeister for that very useful coinage; Biff for thinking it up, and the Hankmeister for passing it on to me.

Yet Another Taquería

Taquerias La Huasteca #3
3901 San Pedro

(at Olmos Drive, just north of the railroad underpass)

There is a building on the corner of Olmos Drive and San Pedro that, in the 20-plus years I've lived in the area, has housed probably half a dozen restaurants. None of them have thrived, or even survived. Most of them — all but one, in fact — opened and closed before I'd even had the chance to try them. The other day I was stopped at the traffic light on Olmos, and realized that yet another restaurant occupied that space now.

It was a fairly long light, so I had the chance to study the building. It's a sort of mid-50s industro-retail space, all plate glass windows with a gaudy orange overhang; a few parking places facing both streets, a warehouse behind, a failed bank (now a lawyer's office, I believe) across the side street, and used-car dealerships on the opposite corners. The name in big letters was amateurishly painted across several of the windows.

Those windows are coated with a glare-reducing shading material that is so dark, it makes the business look closed. If it hadn't been for a small lighted "open" sign above the door, I would have concluded that yet another restaurant had come and gone un-noticed. But this one was still in business; it hasn't even been there long enough to fail.

So today, on my way to take part in the Black Friday shopping experience — something I normally avoid like flavoured mineral water — I took my chance and had a late breakfast there.

In a neighbourhood that has more good taco houses than grackles, why would anybody think there's a call for another one? This is not some novice restaurateur: the same people have another location about a mile away, on Hildebrand, near the Deco-B. They must have a lot of confidence in their ability to draw trade away from the sixteen thousand other good places within a mile. Okay, that's a slight exaggeration, but only a slight one.

When I try a new taco house for the first time, I like to order things that I'm most familiar with. How can I evaluate a place rationally if I order something I rarely, or never, eat elsewhere? So this morning it was what I think of as My Usual: one chilaquile taco, and one machacado taco, both in corn.

The interior of the place seems cavernous. It's not really that big, but would comfortably hold nearly twice as many tables as it currently has, about a dozen. Or a dance floor; there's room for a dance floor. But instead of music, you have the audio from a television in an entertainment center, rescued from somebody's living room, over in the back corner. And of course the TV is tuned to some telenovela at this time of day. This is where that cavernous room really comes in handy, as I could sit far enough away to ignore the TV entirely (and read a little in my "car book" — I always keep something to read in the car, and it always takes forever to get through; currently I'm reading an interesting and well-written, if somewhat oddly focused, history of New Orleans).

No city inspection yet.

If I wanted to complain (and unusually for me, I don't) I would find some slight fault with the service. It was relaxed to the point of distraction, but good enough under the circumstances, and everything was done correctly. No particular effort went into making me feel welcome; it was kind of like the second week visiting your mom's house. Yes, they're glad you're there but the novelty has worn off.

The food I got was well-made, good enough to justify this additional taco house in the neighbourhood. The corn tortillas had good texture and reasonably good flavour, and they were packed with well-made fillings. The veggies in both tacos had been cooked sufficiently — I find a lot of places are in too much of a hurry at that stage, which is on the way to becoming a pet peeve — but not over done. The eggs were thoroughly cooked without being the least bit dry. And the machacado was nicely chewy, while the chilaquiles had just the right amount of crunch. All that gets the place a rating slightly above average, but I left feeling that it could easily have done it all better. The seasoning seemed mundane, unadventurous. The people in the kitchen seem to know what they're doing; I would just encourage them to try something a little out of their routine.

NOT A RESTAURANT REVIEW

One or two restaurant owners or managers have taken exception to my review of their establishment in the past few years. That's alright: I'm entitled to my informed opinion, and they are entitled to take umbrage when I say what I think. I'm not a perfect critic, but a review I recently spotted on Urbanspoon San Antonio makes me feel like one by comparison.

This appeared on the page for Il Sogno, a trendy, new-ish, Italian place in the Pearl, owned by a guy who's as close to being a celebrity in this town as anyone who owns a mandoline, Andrew Weissman:

Bad service
by Food Lover (1 review)

I took my guest for a birthday dinner. There were six of us.

The food was great, but the service was unbelievably terrible.

First off, our waiter could not pour a bottle of wine evenly. Two people, including the birthday guest hardly get any and he suggested us to order another bottle when we had a plan to order a different kind of bottle next to match the entrée.

Secondly, he could not get our orders right. In addition to that, he kept rushing us. We felt at the point we sat down, they were already trying to hurry us out for next customers.


Thirdly, we order a cake with a candle on it, of course, it is a birthday dinner. They brought a cake with a candle on it, but they brought the cake when the birthday guest was not at the table!!! The waiter did not know what to do so we had to ask a manager to take it back and wait for a right timing.


Lastly, we ordered two pots of coffee, but we had to use a desert spoon to stir the coffee .not to mention they did not bother to bring any sugar when there is a party of six.


I will never use the restaurant for a company event.

I don't know who "Food Lover" is. The fact that he (or she) has only posted one review (and — why pass up the opportunity to quibble? — that he doesn't know the difference between a "dessert" and a "desert") indicates to me that he doesn't really take any serious interest in restaurant dining. 

The fact that he thinks you can get six glasses of wine out of a bottle makes me think that he's the sort of person who either drinks wine straight from the bottle, or gets looped by the second glass & so doesn't know how much he drank after that. 

The fact that he blames the waiter for his guest of honour's not being at the table when the birthday cake came indicates to me that he is a person who looks to place blame anywhere but where it belongs. 

And that makes me think that, if the waiter really did have a problem getting the table's orders right, it was probably their fault, not the waiter's. 

And I will even go so far as to assume that the reason his party was being rushed was because the house staff wanted these people out of their restaurant, but were too considerate to simply throw them out. And I reckon that, if the people at Il Sogno read the review and remembered this party of six, they're very glad not to have the threat of a company event for Food Lover.

All in all, it makes me feel like I'm a damn good restaurant critic. And maybe I'll take the wife to Il Sogno tonight. 

Potential Unrealized

Bunz Burgerz & More
1012 South Presa Street

(in Southtown, across from Pig Liquors, a 

charming little place y'all should visit)

Southtown feels different from the rest of San Antonio. The congested, urgent newer developments out in Loopland and beyond feel, unavoidably, like Anytown, USA. The postwar developments inside the Loop feel, generally, like comfortably bland sets for Leave It To Beaver. The old pre-war neighbourhoods closer to downtown feel like where your grandma used to live, where you could play stickball in the street and then walk down to the ice house for a soda pop. And downtown feels like, well, like a fairly ordinary city on the day before a holiday, when half the people have taken off early from work, and the rest are just kind of relaxed in anticipation. 

Southtown, though, reminds me of a cross between small-town America and small-town Europe. Not a large area, it's not really easy to get lost in, but it is easy to not be sure whether you want to turn to the right, or to the left. As you travel its few streets, criss-crossing each other at odd angles and turning with the nearby river, you start to decelerate, and very quickly you're feeling the hum of its low-key, slightly quirky trance. You relax. You drive slow enough to irritate the city folk behind you, who are probably from Dallas or somewhere, and so have farther to go to reach a state of bliss. You start to notice the old buildings, the galleries and small offices, the low-aesthetic art, the oddities that surround you. You mellow.

Bunz Burgers and More fits right in. A newish occupant of the pointy end of the building that stretches the entire block, its large glass windows with northern exposure are like the viewscreen on the bridge of the USS Enterprise, except that you're not going where no one has gone before; you're sitting still, and letting it all pass by you. Bright, bright walls of primary colours, broken stucco, only two annoying flat-panel televisions, and a few too many tables more or less lined up in two rows across an oddly-shaped dining room, with the kitchen in back behind a low counter, so pleasing aromas drift out to excite you: you feel comfortable enough because the huge windows make the place feel much more expansive than it is. The volume on the televisions is off (thank the Lord, because they're tuned to different sports stations; the audio would make it hellacious) and, despite the hardness of all the surfaces in the room, even the buzz of conversations at other tables stays in the background. 

The servers are cheerful; a tad overworked during the lunch rush, but they're capable people, and you appreciate the effort they make to get you what you want, and get it right, and make sure you're happy with everything. They seem genuinely glad to have you in their restaurant, so you avoid mention of anything that's less than perfect: just as they are being good hosts, you want to be a good guest. 

Everything, unfortunately, is less than perfect. It is, so far, all potential, unrealized. But the place is young, only about three months old. And it's a burger joint, not an haute-cuisine nosh house. It may yet improve.

The afore-mentioned pleasing aromas wafting in from the kitchen made us eager to try the food. The menu features several varieties of burgers, including an intriguing version of surf-and-turf: grilled beef with charcoal-grilled shrimp; but Rick opted for a slightly more traditional sandwich, the Flamin' Jack (beef, Jack cheese, grilled onions and roasted jalapeños), while I wanted to try the house's version of the Cuban sandwich, the Miami: roast pork, ham and Provolone on a pressed hoagie roll. We also asked for a side order of fries and onion rings, half and half.

Last city inspection:
October 2011
4 demerits

We split the sandwiches. We also split on the verdict for Rick's burger. He thought it was a non-specific "pretty good." I didn't. The onions and cheese were good, and the roasted jalapeños gave the sandwich a subtle but very pleasant kick; but I thought the burger's main feature, the half-pound of grilled meat, was overcooked, to a point where it was bone-dry and had lost almost all its flavour.

My sandwich was not as deliciously messy as the best Cuban sandwiches, but it had excellent taste nonetheless, and the meat in it was finely cooked. But it was kept from being a complete success by the fact that the hoagie roll was pressed almost into cardboard. Some bites, my teeth could barely penetrate the solidity of the bread.

The onion rings were excellent. They were thinly-cut and breaded in a well-seasoned flour mix, cooked long enough but not too long, and served hot and crumbly. If only the rest of the meal had been prepared with as much attention. The fries, on the other hand were a huge disappointment. We received them in two batches (I'm not sure why; the waiter apologised when he brought the first part, then returned with another basket containing more). The first was undercooked and cold, with a greasy texture and almost no potato flavour. The second batch was undercooked and hot, but with the same greasy texture and as little potato flavour as the first. Maybe if they'd been cooked a little longer, in hotter, fresher oil, they'd acquire a bit of crispiness that would help them overcome their limp, flaccid feel. They were a great deal like the fries that keep Chester's from being a really good chain of burger joints.

But like I say, Bunz has only been around a little while, and as much as this sort of cooking has an artisanal side, it ain't rocket science. Clearly the folks behind the counter have some idea of what makes a good burger joint. When they get it right, there'll be one more reason to hang out in Southtown. Until then, though, I'll be finding my burgers elsewhere.

A Surprise, and not the good kind

Cappy's
5011 Broadway

(in Alamo Heights, behind Cappychino's; parking lot entry from Mary D Avenue)

I admit to feeling a certain gratitude to Cappy Lawton and his wife Sue (or Suzy; I forget which she goes by) for resuscitating La Fonda on Main a number of years ago. That place is an institution in the neighbourhood, but one which was on the verge of being dismissed. They bought it, and fixed the problems, and while it may not be the absolute best Mexican restaurant in town — a mythical title anyway, in this town — it's certainly a good one, and charming, and reliable.

The Lawtons had already had success with Cappy's, their signature restaurant on Broadway; and in many ways The paradigmatic Alamo Heights restaurant. It's always been a little on the pricey side, being geared as it is to the upscale end of the '09 zip code, but it's always been a comfortable, charming and enjoyable place for those of us who feel that eating there is an occasionally-worthwhile splurge.

Planning our weekly Friday culinary excursion, I realized we had not been to Cappy's in far too long. We rectified that last night, and I come away feeling an ambivalence about the place that I've never felt before. 

The restaurant itself is invisible from Broadway, but somehow everybody knows where it is. It hides among the live oaks behind its little sister, Cappychino's, a more informal place that is as much bar as café. Cappy's looks and feels like the common room of a medium-range Colorado ski lodge. Wide blond flooring, large glass walls set at an angle to give onto the patio area, a few tasteful if not exquisite paintings; tables with white cloths properly spaced along the walls of the narrow front dining room, a small bar area, the hint of other rooms farther back. It has a feel that is both intimate and open; it is the sort of place where you wish to be seen. 

Our waiter was with us in a flash. The entire staff was, as always, capable and industrious, but our waiter — I'm pretty sure I recall correctly when I say his name was Rene — seemed to be the best of a good bunch. Another waiter, at a nearby table, made a slight nuisance of himself by going on and on at a graceless pace — think New York — and in an unnecessarily loud voice; but once he finally reached the end of his spiel, calm was restored, and reigned until our leisurely departure.

The menu was a disappointment. There was, I thought, a serious lack of variety to it. It was heavily biased toward seafood, which constituted over half the entrées on offer, and for which I was not in the mood. The only beef dishes available were steaks, which are a fine choice sometimes, and the house-specialty "Heights Burger," with a $16 price tag that would guarantee dissatisfaction for me. The most interesting dish remaining was Mustang Chicken, which was my wife's choice, leaving me either roast chicken or gumbo; neither of which appealed. Off-menu specials included a cut of prime rib, which in the end was my choice, not because I wanted it, but because I didn't want anything else they had.

The city of Alamo Heights can't be
bothered to make restaurant health
inspections readily available on line.

We each started with mushroom bisque, a dark medium-thick soup of the day. My wife thought it excellent; I thought it a little bland, and found the texture off-putting. The outstanding bread Cappy's offers went a long way toward making this course much more enjoyable for me.

On the plus side, that Mustang chicken dish my wife ordered was marvelous. Coated with horseradish and served with a red pepper coulis, it was absolutely delectable, one of the greater taste sensations of recent memory. Unfortunately I only got a single taste, since it wasn't my dish. It was served on a bed of garlic mashed potatoes, with a vegetable medley.

My own plate of prime rib was another disappointment. I had ordered it medium rare. When it came, I hardly noticed that it was served medium — such distinctions are often slight, and beyond the ken of both cooks and customers; I probably would have forgotten to mention it at all had the check, when it came, not shown that somewhere between my lips and the cook's ear, "medium rare" had become "medium" — because it had what I can only describe as an odd density. It was a thick cut, thicker than I was expecting, but had none of the marbling I was accustomed to seeing in prime rib; nor did it have the soft rind of fat that should give it so much flavour. It was tender but not at all juicy, and had sort of a pressed look, as though cooked under some heavy weight. At bottom, I find myself entertaining the suspicion that the meat I was served was not from prime-grade beef; how else to explain the peculiar texture of the meat? It had an undistinguished taste, palatable but not more, even with the aggressive application of a very nice horseradish sauce.

The prime rib was served with delicious mofongo mashed potatoes and the same vegetable mix of green beans, mushrooms and yellow beets* as was served with my wife's dinner. The beans were perfectly crispy, while the  beets were unbelievably tender, making the entire medley a textural thrill one can only expect in the best restaurants.

I had gone into Cappy's knowing that its prices were not of the shy, retiring variety. Had the food been of the quality I had expected from eight or ten previous visits, I would not have been too unhappy. But because it did not live up to expectations, I came away feeling very unhappy about a check that surpassed $80. This dissatisfaction was made sharper, too, by the recollection of a more artful and satisfying meal for about half the cost the week before.

As I say, this is the first time I've been less than completely satisfied with Cappy's. After all these years, it would be too curmudgeonly, even for me, to simply dismiss the place as no longer any good. But next time I go, I will unavoidably approach it with somewhat lowered expectations, and the sense that it will have to work to regain the respect it has lost in my esteem.

* Beets are second on my list of Five Foods I Will Not Eat. These were interesting enough to make me give some thought to revising my list, but on reflection, I still hate beets.

¡Impresionante!

RoMo's Café
7627 Culebra, Suite 107

(at Ingram Road)

The local campus of the Culinary Institute of America has been putting out graduates for a while now, but Rob Yoas is the first alumnus of that campus, that I know of, to open a restaurant locally. He and his wife Monica (who, I understand, is an on-camera talent on one of the local Spanish-language stations) have put this interesting little place into a strip center out beyond Ingram Mall. 

CIA grads have something of a reputation for quality, and the success of some who have been through the program at the New York or California locations allow the school to bask in their reflected glow. If it is "just" a trade school, it's a prestigious one, and one that shows what trade schools can aspire to. This country could use more such trade schools.

The space chosen for this culinary venture is airy, with its very high ceiling painted dark red, its wainscoting and dark furniture set off against light yellow-tinted walls. The décor has a warmth to it that is only mildly disturbed by the two gigantic projection television screens (and five smaller flat-panel sets) that cover three sides. While they seem grossly out of place in a "refined but casual" restaurant, they are, mercifully, placed high enough on the walls that they don't continually assault your vision; even better, they were all turned off.

I was more than a little surprised to find the place so sparsely attended. Contrary to our normal practice, we had waited until seven o'clock to leave home for dinner (to let that awful Loop 410 traffic die down), and arrived at what should have been well into a peak part of the Friday night dinner rush; but there were only three or four tables occupied. And while it had picked up some by the time we left, my impression afterwards is that this place deserves to enjoy the same kind of fashionable buzz as any of the other snob-appeal places in town. It ought to be packed, despite its unfashionable suburban strip-center location.

The waiters on duty — only two, both also named Rob — were attentive and capable. The one whose table we were at seemed tentative, as though he were very new to this table-waiting business, but he had the virtue of not guessing at answers to our questions. If he didn't know, he found out. He was able to give us full information about the unusual food on offer, and was very helpful in our decision making; which was particularly good, because there were so many intriguing things on the menu. I agonized over the sandwiches and entrées on the menu, and on the specials board near the entrance; it was a chore to finally make a choice, but in the end I chose the duck and gator tacos, paired with a Shiner hefeweizen; my wife went with pasta in vodka sauce, with some kind of red wine. I have no interest in red wine so I can't tell you the first thing about it.

Last city inspection: September 2011
A perfect score!

The gator taco was chunks of tail meat (and no, it doesn't taste like chicken; it tastes like gator) that seemed to have a light, seasoned breading on them, served in a flour tortilla with some kind of light sauce and a few familiar vegetable accoutrements. That doesn't sound like much, but it may have been the best taco I've ever eaten. It was certainly the best alligator meat I've ever eaten, much better than I can fix at home (and I take some small snobbish pride in being the only person I know who actually has prepared alligator at home, though not for many years). The only thing that kept it from being perfect was that the oil from the duck taco had coated the outside of the tortilla, making it feel unpleasant to hold.

The duck taco was also purdy damn good: a portion of delicious meat topped with a dollop of veggies and a thin ribbon of something white. (I don't remember, now, what it was. Yogurt? Sour cream? Ricotta cheese? Whatever it was, it was good.) Except for the afore-mentioned oil, that dripped off the taco and infested the other tortilla, the dish was exquisite in its flavour and texture.

The vodka sauce on the pasta was light, nicely coloured and tasty. There were chunks of what looked like minced garlic in the mix, and the sauce was unevenly distributed over the pasta. (That's a good thing, actually: it shows that the kitchen isn't taking easy shortcuts, by pre-mixing and re-warming the dish. Of course, in a house that is trying to establish a reputation as a premier-class venue — a distinction well within its grasp — such shortcuts would be shocking and untenable anyway.) The pasta was appropriately al dente, who is rather hard to satisfy on that point. She was quite satisfied. The only downside to the pasta dish was the rather drab piece of French bread served with it, which stuck out like a Kia Rio in the parking lot at Bill Gates's wedding.

This wonderful meal was topped off by a serving of pastel imposible, a traditional Mexican cake. In RoMo's variation, the cake is more an English tea cake than the traditional smooth chocolate cake popular down South. It is served with a rich, sweet cream sauce, and one slice should satisfy two sweet tooths.

RoMo excels in value as well. Food of this calibre is normally priced noticeably higher, yet even with a glass of wine and a bottle of beer, we managed to get out for well under $45, well below average on our weekly excursions into the world of restaurant cuisine. That, my friends, is really impressive.