Food Routines Bookend

If you're reading the blog in reverse chronological order, here begins our eating out chapter. The best food in DF is a balance of convenience, quality, and price. So basically, we've found the cheapest and most delicious places to eat within a stone's throw of our house (Liverpool/Versalles in col. Juarez).

-PJ and Kenny

Tacos al Pastor

on Hamburgo / Sevilla in the Zona Rosa

the salsa selection is great

manchego cheese and wheat tortilla quesadilla with a crusted 'chicharrón de queso' on top

the tacos al pastor meat is cooked gyro-style (they got the idea from Lebanon)

marinated pork, onions, cilantro, and fresh pineapple on corn tortillas

HEAVEN!

Pollo Rostizado

Dig in! We get these tender chickens from the main square in Coyoacán, several meals' worth of meat for about $4USD.

tacos de canasta

"Little sweaty" tacos from a basket filled with re-fried beans, potato, or chicharrón. Our favorite place to get them is right in front of the cafe Delirio in colonia Roma.

The tacos serve as a great vehicle for their killer salsa verde cruda (the inspiration for Kenny's video!).

Bisquets Bisquets Bisquets

Café con leche and a buttery biscuit at the local chain Los Bisquets Bisquets Obregón.

Burritos

Burritos with flour tortillas are actually hard to come by in the DF, it's more of a northern Mexican tradition. This stand near Insurgentes and Reforma always had a line around the block, so we decided to give it a try.


Hot hot hot! This one (called the "Avocado") has beef, onions/peppers, cheese, lot's of avocado, a thin layer of re-fried beans, and bacon salsa. All the components and flavors melt together harmoniously. Pure satisfaction. Needless to say, we are now regulars and the stand recently moved even closer to our house.

Note: none of the burritos contain rice.

Tamales

For a quick breakfast, we stumble out of bed and grab a guajolota from a stand across the street. It's a tamal served in a bread roll. Plenty of starch and easy to eat.

La Veracruzana

La Veracruzana is where we go for reasonably priced, yummy seafood. It's hard not to spoil our appetites on the freshly fried totopos (tortilla chips) and home-made salsa that come complimentary with the meal.

Ceviche de pescado


Filete al Ajillo- baked huachinango with dried guajillo chiles and garlic

Filete empapelado con Hoja Santa- Mero filet with tomato, onion and an Hoja Santa leaf all baked in a foil pouch. Hoja Santa is an herb with a unique flavor that is difficult to describe but similar to sassafras and anise.

Quesadillas Fritas

This nocturnal quesadilla stand is our original food routine living in the DF. (Kenny wrote about it back in 2009.) We have a cute relationship with the family who runs it, and now we can actually talk to them! Like the previous two entries, it's located at the intersection of Colima and Morelia in Colonia Roma.

Fried quesadillas are the ultimate comfort food. The hot fillings can include melted cheese, potato, meats, squash blossom, huitlacoche, mushrooms, and more. Our lady prepares each one to order. She presses out some fresh masa with the tortilla press and lays down the filling on top (let's say mushrooms and Oaxaca cheese). She then folds the raw tortilla in half over the filling and seals it up by pinching together the two edges of the circle. Then the exciting part- she slips the delicate pouch into a vat of hot oil, and it bubbles violently. After she's flipped it over a few times and the bubbling subsides, she fishes out the golden and crispy quesadilla with her spatula and places it on a cooling rack with the others. When they're ready to serve, she cracks them open with her thumb (to check what's inside) and dresses them with salsa, crema, lettuce, and crumbly white cheese.

To hold us over during the wait, we usually order a chicken tostada. It can be thrown together in about ten seconds, and their tinga de pollo has the perfect balance of sweet and spice.

Sunday Tacos

An outdoor mercado appears every weekend just across the street from our hamburger stand. Every Sunday on our way to work, we sit down in the cafeteria section and enjoy a hearty breakfast:

Steak tacos with french fries, grilled onions, lime, and fresh salsa.

Hamburguesas 24/7

The sizzlin' and charred patty is served on a toasted bun with chopped jalapeños and the usual condiments. Add some cheese or a slice of grilled pineapple!

GABI.S

Our local coffee joint Gabi's is a neighborhood institution.

They roast and grind their own coffee beans.

Godly capuchino.

Egg, chorizo, and cheese torta with chipotle sauce.

Molletes (downstairs)

On the ground floor of our apartment building is a branch of the city's most popular ice cream chain "La Michoacana". But it's not the mango-chile-lime popsicle that keeps us coming back...

It's the molletes! An open face grilled sandwich with re-fried beans, melted cheese, tomato, avocado, and jalapeño. So simple and perfect. (USD $1.50)

Tacos Miranda

A few blocks east of our place (close to the Balderas metro station) is a pop-up restaurant called "Tacos Miranda". It's much more elaborate than your average street-food stand with about ten employees.

The women of the group work exclusively making fresh corn tortillas. One woman scoops out a fist of masa dough, forms it into a ball, and presses it flat into a circle. Another woman cooks the tortillas on a large comal, flipping them over when they start to blister. When both sides are cooked, they're sent straight over to the meat station to become tacos. The men are loud and boisterous as they take orders and cook the meats, "Gueros!" "Si, hay!" "Pasele! Pasele!" "Cuantos?"

We usually get beef or alambre (marinated pork - grilled peppers/onions - melted cheese), but we should probably branch out and try tongue.

They offer an assortment of toppings and sides: cilantro, onions, limes, radishes, chiles, cucumbers, potatoes, crumbly cheese, papalao, nopal...

...and this delicious rustic salsa with avocado.


Hot tacos in hot sun. The freshly made tortillas hold together to the last bite.

Food Routines

After a year's worth of research, we now know exactly where to go to satisfy our stomachs with some Mexico City realness. The subsequent posts will highlight ALL of our favorite local spots to eat and snack.

Provecho!

PODOLOGOS

I bought tumeric

Six minute egg, spinach with toasted cumin seed, Indian spiced potatoes, crema, avocado.

casual

Saffron brown rice, beans cooked in chicken stock, avocado, tomato and spinach.