mmm-yoso!!!

Saturday Stuffs: La Playita and BBQ Chicken Close, Chaba Thai Kitchen replaces Gyro n' Kabob Cafe, and Isa.Bella replaces Bollweevil

Sheeesh, have I been gone that long? So many upcoming openings and even recent openings (more on that in future posts) and a couple of closings. So here's a quick round-up.

La Playita closes:

I'm kinda sad about this one. Cathy emailed me when I was away telling me that La Playita had taken down their website. So naturally I dropped by and found them closed.

Man, I was looking forward to a nice, refreshing,  Vuelve a la Vida when summer got into full swing.

5185 Clairemont Mesa Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92117

BBQ Chicken Closes:

I was never really impressed with B(est of the) B(est) Q(uality) in San Diego. Even after they started opening for lunch.

The version of K(orean)F(ried)C(hicken) served here wasn't my cup of tea, and I'm not really the type to be happy just "to finally have something" in San Diego. 

I do believe I saw what was perhaps a KFC joint in the new location of Zion Market?

4768 Convoy St
San Diego, CA 92111

Chaba Thai replaces Gyro n Kabob Cafe:

I went for a Lamb Gyro and found that Gyro N Kabob Cafe had closed. It's to be replaced by a Thai Restaurant called Chaba.

Like I've said before, we can always use a new Thai restaurant, but really don't need yet another Ameri-Thai restaurant in the area......so we'll see. Though some of the folks I work with loved the "Thai Burrito" from Dusit....yuck....

8010 Clairemont Mesa Blvd
San Diego, CA 92111

Bollweevil in Bay Park being replaced by isa.bella artisan pizzeria & beer garden:

Yep, it's all lower case....how hip and modern!

I'll readily admit to thinking that this is a Bay Park money grab.

So I asked a friend of mine who is really on top of the brewpub scene. The response was "just jumping on the craft beer and brewpub train". I'm hoping I'm wrong....so we'll see.

4015 Avati Drive
San Diego, CA 92117

So that's it. Hope you're having a great weekend!
 

La Casa Blanca-La Mesa

mmm-yoso!!! is a food blog.  You somehow found your way here, either from a Bookmark or a Google or a Bing. In any case, stay a while and read a post from Cathy, who is writing today. 

In the middle part of very large San Diego County, in the City of La Mesa, which some people consider "East" is a nice sit down Mexican restaurant serving homemade/grandma's recipes of simple Mexican foods.  La Casa Blanca has been here, parallel to the I-8, next to the Charcoal House, just East of Grossmont Center since 2007. { Yes-charcoal and blanca-The Mister and I sometimes say 'do you want to eat at black or white?' once we park the car.}

There is plenty of parking behind the restaurant, not too much right in front. 

There are three tables in front and about eight in the front room. The Cantina is to the back of the building.  Not too large, always neat and clean, with friendly waiters. We feel at home here.

Fresh house made salsa and fresh, warm corn chips are brought to your table while you peruse the menu.

This is a lunch special- the Mi Amigo plate ($6.95).  Three mini tacos (tortillas made here)one topped with carne asada, one with pollo asada and the third carnitas.  This comes with a choice of rice or beans...and the beans here are very good (lard). The meats are all very good, moist and properly seasoned. 

The lunch soup and salad ($5.95).  Chicken tortilla soup.  Excellent, magical chicken tortilla soup.  This always hits the spot for me. It's another one of those deceptive bowls; quite deep.

An a la carte chile relleno ($3.95).  Made here.  Light, crunchy eggy crust on a fresh Pasilla chile stuffed with a fresh Mexican cheese topped with a house made sauce. We always order something with cheese.

...The Queso Fundido appetizer ($6.95) Melted cheese, topped with either chorizo (this version) or rajas (roasted sliced Poblano chiles; my Friday/meatless choice). Served with the house made tortillas. Cheesy gooey spicy goodness.

A simple Caesar salad ($7.95). Sometimes this large serving of crisp lettuce topped with garlicy goodness is shared along with some other item.

The shrimp coctele ($10.95).  

I particularly like the seafood here.  The shrimp for the coctele are large, butterflied and plentiful in the very fresh lime-tomato-cucumber avocado topped broth.

La Casa Blanca is very nice, family run restaurant that serves good fresh food.  If you happen to be in the area, it is worth the stop.

La Casa Blanca 9570 Murray Drive La Mesa, CA 92042 (619) 466-2912 Website

Tacos de Mexicali

Tacos de Mexicali is one of those places that I pass at least once every week or so, always reminding myself to visit one day. Well....one day finally arrived a couple of months ago.

On one of the trips to North Park Produce.....this was before the Clairemont location finally opened, I decided to check the place out.

To be perfectly honest, I really don't know what "Mexicali tacos" are....what comes to mind are vampiras, like what Ed from Yuma had, but I was pretty sure this was not that. I would have heard about it sooner if that was true.

The interior of the restaurant is bright but a bit worn, but I appreciated a the simple menu, a single page.

You could by the prices that these aren't the smaller "street tacos", but probably more substantial. Another plus is that all the tortillas are hand made.

The one person I knew who had actually visited Tacos de Mexicali told me that I just had to have the lengua, which I thought was strange since he barely has anything else other than polla asado and carne asada....in fact, he once told me he "hated cabeza and lengua".

So I ordered a Taco de Lengua ($2.95) and Taco de Cabeza ($2.70). The tacos come to your table with nothing but the meat, It's then up to you to dress them as you wish at the salsa bar. The salsas were routine, except for the spicy guacamole which I enjoyed for some reason.

 I had requested corn tortillas, but these were obviously flour. It was a happy mistake since the tortillas had a nice stretch to them.

One bite of the lengua and I knew why the dude liked them so much. In terms of tongue, this was very mild in flavor. I thought that the condensed beefy, almost offal flavor of the tongue was missing. In those terms, it was really well prepared, soft and tender. For me it seemed like everything I enjoy about tongue had been cooked out of it. The slight waxiness, the almost luxurious richness was missing.

Ditto the cabeza.

This could have been stewed and shredded short ribs, or chuck.

I guess I could recommend this as "beginner's lengua and cabeza". It just seemed that all the redeeming qualities of tongue and beef head had been removed. If that's talent and skill, I'll tip my hat to the cook, but it's not my thing.

Still, I returned a couple of weeks later. I thought I'd try the Taco Al Pastor ($2.70) and the Carne Asada ($2.95).

As you can tell by the lack of color on the carne asada, it was pretty bland, tough, and in need of some caramelization which would probably made it a bit more interesting.

The Al Pastor, was pretty much Adobado. The marinade had a powderiness to it and the flavor was very one dimensional with just some heat from chilies. I would have enjoyed it more if it had some sweetness and acid to it. At least it was much more tender than the carne asada.

A word on the tortillas. This time I did receive the corn tortillas. These are quite refined and thin, though the masa flavor is quite clear and clean. It seems almost a bit too processed.

In terms of price-point it's not bad, but really not my cup of tea. The flavors are a bit too mild and tame for my tastes.

For another view of Tacos de Mexicali please read Mary's post.

Tacos De Mexicali
3450 El Cajon Blvd
San Diego, CA 92104

Eating on the hood of your car: The Mariscos Alex Truck

So there I was running low on petrol in City Heights. I decided to stop and fill up at the station on the corner of ECB and Fairmount and what do I see but a mariscos truck! I've passed this corner dozens, maybe hundreds of times and had never seen this truck before.

Since it was almost lunchtime and I was famished, this seemed like the perfect stop.....all the stars were aligned it seemed.

All the standard mariscos offerings were present on the menu posted at the rear of the vehicle. I did find it kind of strange that there were no prices posted, except for fish tacos which were a $1.25.

The woman manning the window looked familiar.....was this truck once one of the Mariscos German fleet? She always seemed a bit gruff before and this time was no different.

The consomme was decent, way too much celery for my liking, but not bad.

I ordered a fish taco and a gobernador, which came out to $6.25.

As fish tacos go, this was ok. All the usual suspects. The crema was mild and the tortilla routine. There was too much batter on the fish, which was on he gummy side. The fish tasted a bit off as well.

I hoped my Gobernador would be an improvement and while not as good as, say the original Mariscos German(no tomatoes), Beyer, or El Pescador, it was not bad.

The shrimp were plump and juicy, though the vegetables were undercooked for my taste. The cheese was perfectly melted and this was super hot, though it could have used more seasoning...oregano, salt, pepper.  Still it wasn't too bad.

So I returned the following weekend for another try. Same gruff woman, though she must have a heart of gold as she gave the homeless guy a fish taco......me on the other hand, I just a "yes" as she looked down at me. This time I ordered the tacos de camarones and a taco de marlyn, which cost $7.50 total.

Quite a bit of shrimp in my taco, though this confirmed that I'm not a big fan of the gummy and not especially crisp batter. The tomtoes were green and not very good. The rest was decent.

The taco de marlyn....smoked fish taco was the best item I've had here.

The fish had a nice smokiness to it and while the versions at many places teeters on salty, this one isn't.

Again the peppers, celery, and onions weren't stir-fried long enough, making it them and raw tasting.

It was also a decent sized portion though another customer ordered the same thing while I was leaving and was only charged $6.50. Shades of Vietnam!!!

I'm hoping the pricing was a mistake. I wouldn't want to think the place does random pricing based on customers. 

Overall, just ok, not quite in the same league as other trucks I've been too.

Mariscos Alex
In the parking lot of Qwik Corner Service Station
4357 El Cajon Blvd
San Diego, CA 92105

The Corner of First and Main Part 1: The Blind Burro

As I mentioned in my post on Sage, we've been finding firsts and appetizers to be much more interesting than main courses recently. And we've had a couple of meals that seem to support that theory. The first was at the Blind Burro, a rather trendy, fairly new "concept" bar/restaurant in East Village. A very nice and stylish sort of Baja-ish fusion restaurant. I'm more substance focused, so I'd usually pass on places like this. The menu however, seemed interesting and I'd heard good things about the place. So when my dear FOY (friend of yoso) Candice asked us to join her for food and drink, the Missus and I jumped at the chance. Of course there is always the parking thing, but hey, it's about location, right?

Like I said, very nice atmosphere and the service was decent. The Missus really enjoyed the rather thick, but very crunchy chips.

There were some interesting items on the menu. We started with the Sweet Potato-Chorizo Taquitos ($7.50).

First off, we thought the chorizo, made inhouse was very good, smokey, with a nice blend of spices. The sweet potato added a touch of starchy sweetness. The Missus really enjoyed the mole, the combination of savory-salty-sweet flavors was nice as well. The crunch? Well, the Missus loved that as well. This was a very nice start for us.

The Missus also enjoyed the Quinoa and Squash Cakes ($9).

I really enjoyed the cilnatro pesto, especially on the grilled panela cheese which always seems to work well with herbaceous and even pungent flavors. The Missus loves quinoa....we still joke about getting it for 79 cents a pound back in '06......nowadays it's sticker shock. The inclusion of black beans gave it a bit of heft and a mild smokey flavor. The shaved calabacitas salad was....well let's just call it zucchini, was pretty mild and really fell into the shadows.

At this point we were starting to really enjoy the food here. It seemed that the BBQ Yellowtail Collar ($13) spelled the end of that feeling for us.

I love the richness of hamachi kama, as I do the flavor which is perhaps a bit strong for some, but for me it just adds to the enjoyment. Grilled in a too sweet and sour glaze killed the richness, it blocked the flavor....you might have well been eating chicken wings. A bit too sweet and sticky for me, I really didn't taste the smokiness of the chipotle in this.

The seafood in the Mariscos Stew ($17) were perfectly cooked.

The mussels were especially tender.

Unfortunately, the whole dish was way too salty, even for a sodium lover like me. It got to the point of being rather unpleasant, though it didn't seem to bother JohnL who joined us at about this time.

The Angus Skirt Steak($18) was decent.

I mentioned that the flavoring tasted like something out of Rick Bayless's playbook. Candice cracked-up and told me that the Executive Chef has gone on those chef excursion/tours that Rick Bayless has every year and is infatuated with the food. The beef could be a bit more tender, the salsa macha was pretty weak, more like a watered down chili oil. The best part of this dish were the red mole beans which had a nice complex flavor and though you could make out the touch of sweetness, it was still restrained, as was the spice, giving this nice balance.

Overall, his was a decent meal. But as we've been finding recently, appetizers have been outshining the entrees on menus. So in the case of the Blind Burro, the next time we visit and reach the "corner of first and main"....we'll be turning onto first and checking out more of the botanas, ensaladas, and probably a side or two.

The Blind Burro
639 J Street
San Diego, CA 92101

 

It's Pollo Amigo!

Sorry, I couldn't help but add bookends of the It and the exclamation point to the name of this very low keyed nondescript little shop in Chula Vista. Last weekend, I drove down to Chula Vista to pick up some mantarraya from the El Vaquero truck for the Missus. Even though there are a couple of newer mariscos trucks in the area, I decided to check out this little shop I saw on my last visit to the area.

The tiny shop looks a bit worn, with simple communal picnic like tables and a small television running.

The kitchen was spotless though and seemed larger than the entire dining area.

The menu featured standard taco shop fare in the form of tacos and burritos. But since this place is named Pollo.....Amigo, what else would I order but the pollo, amigo?

I went with the Special#2. A half chicken, beans, rice, salsa, corn tortillas(3). Then I drove home with lunch.....mantarraya for the Missus and for me, well, it was pollo, amigo! (last time with this silliness, I promise)

The chicken was surprisingly good, much better than most, if not off the hook delicious. Well seasoned and moist, I really enjoyed it and will definitely get it again. Though I won't include the beans which were tragically runny and bland, nor the salsa which was also watery and had the over-powering "green" flavor of straight on jalapeno. The rice was ok, but o the dry side.

Next time, I'll just get the half chicken for $5.99, chop some white onion and cilantro, use a good hot sauce......

And be perfectly happy......

The couple that run this place is very nice, the prices seem good....so perhaps you should ignore the rather shabby exterior, stop by, and have some....pollo.....ok, I promised no more silliness. You get the point.

Pollo Amigo
2540 Main St.
Chula Vista, CA 91911

 

Thursday Tacos: Tacos el Paisa - Imperial

The Missus: Why do they have taco Tuesday?
Me: Well, I think that Tuesdays are usually a pretty slow day for business, so it's a marketing thing....
The Missus: But why not Thursday?
Me: I believe because business starts picking up on Thursday so they don't need a....
The Missus: That's really not fair....
Me: Ummm, to who? Thursday???

Sometimes it's hard to get past the conversation.....so in deference to the Missus...after all, my boss always tells me, "happy wife, happy life!" It's Taco Thursday. At least here it is.....

I recently had a fun dinner with my friends Candice, Howie, and Jenne. It had been a while since we had gotten together and we had a blast. Anyway, during the conversation Howie mentioned that one of his favorite taco shops is El Paisa. I suddenly realized that I haven't paid this location of El Paisa a visit since it was Tacos el Rico. So I made a mental note to check them out. It was easy enough for me, since I'm in the habit of dropping by the San Diego Public Market every Sunday. Imperial is just a couple of blocks away....there's really no excuse.

Man, they've really renovated this place sine the last time I passed by.

The deck area look really nice......

You can get two different sizes of tacos here; the "minis" run from $1.80 - $1.85, though you can get three for $4.99. The regular sized tacos run from $2.25 - $2.99.

On this day, I went with the Al Pastor and Cabeza ($2.75 each):

The Al Pastor was on the dry side, the spice quite mild, and it lacked the depth of flavor that a good al pastor would have. The tortillas were pretty much middle of the road, nothing outstanding. Ditto for the two salsas I tried....the verde and the roja.

The cabeza was very moist, though it could have been more tender, and rather than being rich seemed more like greasy to me. There were hints of the nice beefiness that I enjoy in cabeza.

The service was rather indifferent to me, though it seems like they really tend to cater to their Hispanic customers.

Still, I could see some potential and thought it only fair that I return. On this visit, the young lady was very friendly. She even brought out squeeze bottles of the salsas to me. On my last visit, all the other tables got those bottles....except me. When I stood up to get limes, she told me to have a seat and brought them to me. Very nice.......

On this trip I went with the Lengua ($2.85) and Carne Asada ($2.75):

The carne asada wasn't too salty and I don't know if it was a byproduct of the griddle, but I could taste hints of what tasted like chipotle and perhaps achiote as well. Just look at the meat and you can see what I mean.

Sadly, this was dry and tough as heck.....it really brought out how gloppy the guacamole was as well.

Looking at the rather grayish lengua wasn't very encouraging either.

 Looking closer I could make out the actual papillae of the tongue's surface on the pieces of lengua. It also looked a bit too waxy, but the fragrance was heavenly. And it was surprisingly tender with that somewhat offal-beefiness that I enjoy in good tongue. The onions and cilantro helped to cut the richness and the salsa roja added that bit of pungent push in flavor.

This was good; I'll have it again.

Since I'm in this area every Sunday, i'm thinking I'll hit up La Fachada again. I haven't visited since they moved things around in the parking lot a bit. Unless anyone has some other recommendations for tacos in the area at 10am!

Tacos El Paisa
2494 Imperial Ave
San Diego, CA 92102
Hours:
Sun - Thurs 8am - midnight
Fri - Sat 8am - 3am

Is that Don or Dan...Diego that is: First up let's try Don Diego

A strange thing occurred round these parts over the last couple of months. Two restaurants with similar names opened up, Don Diego and Dan Diego. At first I thought they were possibly related, but they couldn't be more different....one is a "Taco Bar" and the other is a "Euro Cafe and Pub". Both of them have one thing in common.....a huge selection of beer. I believe each has over a hundred different bottled and a good amount on draft.

Actually, I really wasn't too motivated to try the place out. But the Missus was working one evening and gave me a list of stuff She needed me to pick up. The last stop was from Sprouts (formerly Henry's) on Genesee. It was kind of late and I was both tired and hungry, so I thought why not check out this place.

The place looks more like a sports bar than a taco shop. They've really brightened up the place. You might remember it as being Trattoria Firenze.

There were ten beers on tap and at least a hundred bottled, with a good selection of local beers. I decided to try the various proteins in mini taco form, each ran about $1.85... and got a Yellowtail.

They quickly ran me out a basket of chips, which were thin and crumbly, not really that great, but hey, it's gratis, right?

The salsas are pretty straight-forward. I also noticed that the folks who seem to be running this "Taco Bar" didn't seem to be Hispanic. Which factored a bit into my ordering.

I've developed a bit of a habit when it comes to tacos....I always taste the protein on it's own first, just to see how it tastes. And the Adobada wasn't a good start as the meat was mushy and the marinade very bland.

The carnitas followed the same bland profile.

The carne asada took things one step further and was not only very bland, but also tough as heck.

I think the folks running the place are Middle Eastern, though the guy manning the grill is Hispanic. With this in mind, I ordered the birria just out of curiosity since it was listed as lamb on the menu. This was more like an asado of mutton as it was pretty tough. It did have a surprisingly decent gamey flavor to it.

One out of three ain't a bad batting average for bland meats in store bought tortillas with what seemed like store bought chips. The guys working here were very nice however, they even offered me more chips (I passed). So I thought it only fair to visit one more time.

While the place was pretty busy on my previous visit, things were pretty quiet on this day. Same nice group of guys working though.

I did notice something curious about the salsa bar on this trip...notice the olives and sliced pepperoncini.

I decided just to go off the deep end and try a gyro taco (gasp!), along with the birria this time out.

It was some very dry gyro meat on cold tortillas, topped with a tasteless under ripe tomato slice, topped with a sorta-tzaziki sauce that was too thick. Man, this was just plain bad.

The birria tasted just like what I had before.

I also tried one of the TJ style bacon wrapped hot dogs....ketchup and all.

So let us take this apart, shall we? A mushy hot dog, wrapped with burnt bacon, looking like a certain charred body part in a dry, cold, hot dog bun. I'll go out on a limb here and say the ketchup and mustard were the best part of this.....

No mas......

I will again say how nice the guys here are and I was told that they were going to soon have 32 beers on tap. As for what I ate......well, you can figure that out, right?

Don Diego's Taco Bar
4421 Genesee Ave
San Diego, CA 92117
Hours:
Daily 10am - 10pm

 

 

Caguamanta - The Barbacoa & Frutas El Vaquero Truck

Until this past weekend, I hadn't been back down to Chula Vista in a while. On Saturday I made a trip to Hogetsu Bakery and since I had a bit of time took a drive around. I saw at least three trucks that I hadn't seen before. One of them was of particular interest, so I made some time to return the next day. In the lot of the liquor store where Third becomes Beyer and intersects Main was this truck.

Just the barbacoa sign would usually be enough to lure me in. I did enjoy the sign for some of the more "interesting" tacos and though fish tacos were priced at a dollar on the sign, they were going for 75 cents on this day!

So I placed my order and received a cup of consomme of the barbacoa type. Hot and soothing.

And of course I had to try the Barbacoa de Res Taco. It was worth the $1.75 as there was quite a bit of meat.

Loved the fact they brushed one side of the tortilla with consomme and put it on the griddle....I still haven't bought into having beans in these though. The salsa roja had some kick and the lime added some nice acid, but as a whole, the barbacoa was a bit too mild in flavor for me.

Still, I was really here because I saw this sign on the previous day:

In this case Caguamanta, a soup made with re-hydrated, dried manta ray. I love the intense, briney, ocean flavor of mantarraya, ever since I first had it while visiting Ed in Yuma back in 2005. It's not something very common; Mariscos Godoy sometimes serves Manta Ray Machaca, but other then that it's pretty slim pickings....

I ordered a "chica", the small size, not cheap at three bucks. I had it with cilantro and onions with crackers instead of tortillas. It arrived steaming hot.

The broth was pretty straight-forward and nothing fancy. I loved the addition of avocado which added an interesting creaminess to the whole deal. I was surprised at the amount of shredded mantarraya in this little cup! The flavor is not what you think; think of less salty bacalao meets less intense dried scallop. I've been told that mantarraya is a good substitute for sea turtle dishes.....though I can't really say from experience if that is true.  As Ed from Yuma says, there a "Manhattan Chowder-ry" flavor to this.

I ended up buying the large size....which was a bargain at six bucks for the Missus who loved it.

 The woman who took my order was quite nice as was the rather serious looking young man who replaced her. It seems like this is a family operation. It's good to have some variety amongst all the taco trucks in the area and I hope they keep the mantarraya on the menu.

 Barbacoa & Frutas El Vaquero Truck

On the corner of Main and Beyer.

Current hours are from "about" 830 to as late as 5pm. The nice woman told me that they are currently in this location daily, but are thinking of taking Sunday off.

COMC Calorie Bomb Edition: Carmen's Mexican Food, Harry D'z BBQ, a Caliente Burger, and one repeat

I know that my timing tends to suck......I have a tendency to do these posts right after the New Year. It's really not on purpose...really. What happens is that I try to close out the previous year and always seem to have some of these "one-off" type photos, so I basically have stuff for a "COMC" (Clearing Out the Memory Card) type of post. So anyway, here's some "stuffs" from the last quarter, of last year.

Carmen's Mexican Food:

A couple of folks have mentioned Carmen's to me and I tell them that I had eaten at Carmen's back when they were located in Linda Vista, across from what is now K Sandwich. I really wasn't impressed with the food, which seemed more Am-Mex, then Mexican. Eventually that whole area was razed and Carmen's was gone. I did feel a twinge of sadness, because even if I didn't care for the place, a lot of folks did. Then a couple of years ago, Babylon Cafe closed down, and Carmen's reopened in that location.

I was still not really motivated to eat there, but more than one person mentioned how good their Carne Asada Fries were. After my post on Yesenia's, I actually received two recommendations for Carmen's. So after a short CAF recovery period, I decided to drop by for lunch.

The crew here was friendly and all the customers seemed to be regulars, talking about kids, vacations to Disney, Disney cruises, relatives, not seeing "so and so" for a while....you know, that kind of stuff. I actually kind of felt like an outsider, but this gave me an understanding of how the place has cultivated a customer base over the years.

Everything was cooked to order so it took a couple of minutes before my Carne Asada Fries were ready.

This really wasn't my cup of tea. First, thought I love my dinner fries, I'm not fond of them in my CAF. Since there's always some guac-crema-salsa action going on, I prefer a higher ration of crispness. Second the guacamole was kind of pasty with no flavor. Third, the carne asada was a lot more tender then it appeared, but was rather tasteless. I'm sure they make their own salsa here, but for some reason it reminded me of Pace Picante. Nothing against Pace, but several decades ago I had a coworker whose second favorite hobby was....how shall I say it...partaking of the "cash crop". We'd go over for beers and would instantly know when he was enjoying himself....he'd be having this concoction of melted Philadelphia Cream Cheese mixed with Pace Picante and chips. Ick......

The rather substantial pool of oil at the bottom of the plate could either be an added treat or not...depending on your point of view.

Still, like I've said many times...there's a big difference between "favorite" and "best" and I understand that. There are many reasons why folks hold a place close to their hearts and the food may not be the main reason(hey, I'm just as guilty). Based on the rapport between the two guys working on this day and the regulars, I'm thinking this is one of those places.

Carmen's Mexican Food
4937 Diane Ave
San Diego, CA 92117

Harry D'z BBQ:

During one of the early days of the Morena's Farmer's Market.....having not been back in a while, I'm wondering if it still running? I passed a couple of weeks ago and na-da?? Anyway, it was getting close to evening and I hadn't had lunch and this little stand looked interesting.

Actually, there should be some kind of law against sticking pork in front of a starving man's face.....

So I decided on the pulled pork sandwich, which was a reasonable $6.50.

The pork was quite moist, but I had a hard time believing it was really smoked based on the mild flavor. The sauce was too sticky sweet and what seemed molasses heavy for me......

The Caliente Burger at Tommy's:

I'm not sure what it is about San Diego's Tommy's, but it just doesn't seem to be the same as the Tommy's back in LA...even the one in our old neighborhood. But there I was, standing in line at Sprouts and the two customers in front of me were going on and on about this "new" burger at Tommy's that was "oh so good, but so spicy". Now what kind of bonehead would actually go visit Tommy's after overhearing two women talking about something "oh so good"??? Hello, I'm bonehead, nice to meet you......

The young lady at the counter was really friendly and told me that they top the chili burger with pickled cascabel chilies and chipotle cheddar. She was very nice and even gave me a little tray with some extra chilies in them. Funny, these reminded me of the bottled Del Monte Chilies I used to eat when I was a kid.

The burger was actually better then I had during my last visit, maybe five or so years ago now. The chilies weren't really that hot. I've kind of noticed that the chili at this location is heading into two divergent directions....as it becomes more and more like refried bean glue in texture, the flavor becomes more watered down. Right now it just seems like heartburn fuel.....though I've only had heartburn once in my life(a funny story) and it wasn't from Tommy's

Serves me right to eavesdropping on folks in the grocery line......

Original Tommy's
7415 Clairemont Mesa Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92111

So there you go....man, that's more then enough calories and saturated fat...sheesh.

I think I'll go and quietly have my plate lunch in the corner now.