Las Herraduras: Lucky for Yuma

Kirk has been eating his way through some foreign country. Cathy has been eating a lot just to keep this blog current. And ed (from Yuma) has been eating and finally has the time to share a new Yuma restaurant with you guys.

It's got to be tough opening a Mexican restaurant in Yuma, the kind of city where almost everybody has two or three favorite Mexican restaurants already.  So when I heard that a new restaurant was going in the old Chile Verde location on 4th Ave between the post office and Fry's, I didn't give it much of a chance for long success:
On my first visit, the large main dining area was largely empty.  On the other hand, it was clear that the owners had enough capital to redecorate the restaurant, keeping the comfortable booths and adding  high backed wooden chairs marked with horseshoes (Herraduras) around  sturdy tables.

I was immediately impressed by the thin corn chips and outstanding salsa:
 The salsa is both spicy and full of chunky goodness:
That day the special was green chile.  Of course, I had to try it, and soon received a steaming bowl of wonderful old school, Yuma style green chile:
This was an excellent version served more like soup than a stew.  The broth was wonderfully beefy and flavored with both tomato and green chile.  The coarsely ground beef fit the rest of the dish perfectly. I was amazed by the lack of grease as well.

To my surprise, the next time I ordered green chile, the dish looked completely different:
This is what I consider standard green chile.  Chunks of tender pork swimming  in a mild and complex sauce with balanced flavors of green chilies, tomatillos, and fresh minced cilantro. The differences in this version let me know the range of flavors and dishes the kitchen could prepare.

At this point, our Friday Munch Lunch Bunch (MLB) agreed to get together and try some different items. Everyone loved the salsa (and what's not to love), but the cheese crisp lacked a certain complexity of flavors, though the tortilla itself was nicely crisp:

One of my friends had the fish taco special, which she proclaimed was very nicely done, with crisp batter and fresh flavored fish: 
Chip opted for the asada torta and was very happy with the flavorful beef, the crispy grilled bolillo roll, and the numerous toppings including numerous slices of avocado on the sandwich and the pickled jalapeno slices on the side:
Someone else ordered the caldo de res (beef soup), which tasted better than it looked, the clear stock being full of beef flavor:
But I think I ordered the best of all the meals, the albondigas: 

 
Here the rich beefy stock was thickened with tomatos, giving the whole bowl the flavors of an excellent beef stew.  The meatballs themselves were both full of flavor and soft and tender.  As good an albondigas as I've had in Yuma.

After the lunch, we compared notes, and every one was pleased with his or her dish, and considering the varied palates of the group, that rarely happens.

At this point, Tina and I started trying various other dishes.  Once, Tina had the hass burrito, a nice combination of carne asada, fresh green chile strips, and cheese:
 The beef was both tender and flavorful and Tina was impressed by how the cheese and the green chile slices contributed to the overall flavor.

Once I ordered a Lenten special, calabacitos:
The melty white cheese covered a stew of squash, fresh sweet corn, and fresh tomatoes:
Another common lenten dish in Yuma households is Chile rellenos.  The first time that I ordered the chile rellano lunch special at Herraduras, it was truly outstanding: 

 
The mild green chile was well fried in its egg batter, but the highlight of the dish was the tomatoey sauce that covered the chile.  That sauce combined perfectly with the vegetable flavors of the chile itself:
In the six months since Las Herraduras opened, I have only been disappointed in two dishes.  The chicken fajitas:

And the pollo asado burrito:
In both cases, part of my problem is the rather dry chicken breast meat.  The burrito would have been 100% better if it had contained a generous portion of guacamole -- of course, that preference probably reflects the two years I spent living in San Diego where the art of asada/asado burritos has been perfected. The chicken fajitas no doubt would've been better served on a hot platter in the restaurant, but the chicken breast just didn't have much flavor and the vegetables were not uniformly cooked.  Nonetheless, I can imagine that these chicken dishes might well be favorites of white meat chicken fans. 

Since I hate to end a post on a down note, I want to finish by talking about and showing you pictures of what I think is the best menudo in town, served with chopped cilantro and onion and a nice bolillo roll:
Lover of tendon that I am, I was delighted to find a slice of pata de res hiding in the bottom of the bowl:
 
The perfectly grilled, crispy crunchy bolillo roll matched perfectly with the tendon, the succulent and tender tripe, the chewy kernals of nixtamal, and the rich chili flavored broth:
It doesn't get much better than that.  And Mexican restaurants don't get much better than Las Herraduras. Let's hope these are lucky horseshoes. 

Las Herraduras, 2256 S. 4th Ave, Yuma AZ, 85364, 928-783-0559. Open daily 11am-9pm.

Comments

[bill]

Oh man talk about food porn.
The soup looks awesome reminds me of all the good food I've consume while traveling Mexico.

[Carol]

Wow, all the dishes look so good. Those fish tacos made me want to lick my screen.

[Jessica]

Love the pictures! The food looks delicious and your descriptions are making my mouth water! LOL I'm certain that if they continue preparing their dishes this way, they will do well.

[janfrederick]

Man, your posts always have a way of making me extremely hungry, even after a large breakfast.

[ed (from Yuma)]

Thanks for the nice comments. The restaurant seems to be doing well, Jessica, which shows that good food sometimes wins. I appreciate the comments from all of you about the pics. 5 years ago when Kirk first talked me into taking food photos, I was terrible at it. Now, if given enough light, I am better. Glad you guys liked this set.

[mindless]

The Lenten dishes look great. It always seems that when squash or chayote is used in Mexican cooking, the cooks are able to strike a perfect balance of flavor and texture, that adds a richness to the plate.

[AZ]

Dang! I wish I lived in Yuma! The menudo looks wonderful, I hate it when I get a bowl of menudo and there is a grease slick on top, someone in the kitchen spends a lot of time skimming their soups, just like I do at home.

[ed (from Yuma)]

The lenten dishes were good, mindless, but the odd thing is that I didn't think about chile rellenos as particularly lenten until someone mentioned it to me this year.

And yeh, AZ, the menudo wasn't greasy at all. The folks that run the restaurant told me that they steamed the beef in the old school green chile to extract the fat before assembling the soup. So they are aware of greasiness issues.

Myself, I usually prepare stock ahead, refrigerate it, and lift the congealed fat off in sheets. I find that easier than skimming.