Las Milpas – For Better or Worse

Double Dodges
3036 South Port, Corpus Christi, TX 78405 • (361) 884-3050
Carne G – $2.10 • Chorizo & Egg – $1.65 • Coffee – $1.10

This morning we dined at Las Milpas on Port.  Full disclosure: years ago my lovely wife did payroll for this place, and the kid even did some child labor there.  This was back before my love of tacos plucked me from the strong field of amateurs here in Corpus Christi and dropped me into the flush position of professional breakfast taco enthusiast (sans pay).

I usually google these places when I start to put these posts together, and I try to link to urbanspoon.com.  In the process I see a few reviews almost always varying wildly : “This is the worst place ever!” or “I named my first born child after the caldo”

Most of the places we review, after going through our rigorous statistical analysis, end up with a grade of a high B or a low A.  Sometimes we’ll go weeks with each restaurant varying less than 2 percentage points from the prior weeks.  You might think we’re padding our data, that we’re engaged in some kind of tac-ola. I can assure you we’re not, and I’ll stick to that story until the FCC (F the FCC, by the way) comes to indict me.
I thought it would make sense to shed a little light on tacotopia’s rating system.  I modeled it after academic grades, the most familiar system I could think of. 90-100 is an A, 80-90 is a B, 70-80 is a C, anything else is unacceptable.  Here in the Texas Rivera our tacos are at a level that is so exceptional we can barely find a place that, judged objectively according to the most comprehensive and advanced statistical methodologies, isn’t really tasty.  Sometimes I think, they can’t all be so good – is there a problem with our instruments?  Is our math sound?  Then I try to get a taco out of town and I quickly realize Corpus Christi is the Breakfast Taco Capital of the World.
But I digress.

So Matt the Hoople and I are early, even after a stop at the gas station and a full check of the oil, coolant, tranny fluid, and a fill-up.  We opt to wait for the Hat inside, who showed up shortly with ‘Sea-Shell,’ his better half, who when averaged in brings the Hat’s score up pretty well in anybody’s book.

I didn’t really need a menu but I have to mention the menus at Las Milpas have huge photos of all the items with large print in black and gold. Blind people could read them from their heat signature. There are literally only four items on some of the pages, all laminated, and spiral bound.  They’re so heavy they should put a ‘team-lift’ label on the back.

LasMilpasBigAssTortillas

And if that weren’t enough, then came the tacos.  The chorizo & egg, as well as the carne guisada, were a solid B.  Not great, but very tasty.  The salsa was good.  The food was out quickly (except for the Hat’s), and the coffee kept coming.  The real shining star were the tortillas – not only were the huge in diameter but they were thicker than the fog on the harbor bridge this morning.  Resembling few things more than a pancake, they were very tender and fairly light – almost a little cakey.  The outside of mine was pretty well toasted but you could hardly tell biting into it.

The place was clean, and the waitress adept.  We did have to struggle a bit in conversation to keep from being drowned out by the flat screen TVs adorning every wall.  At least they weren’t all tuned to Fox.

Shout out to Oscar Ramirez who put it in our heads that we should check this place out.  If you have any suggestions, and maybe some time free early Fridays, let us know and you might be selected as a special guest commentator.



From the Hat
Something Shelly said this morning got me to thinking.  She was busy with her huevos a la Mexicana when she said, “There REALLY are a lot of good taquerias in Corpus.”
She’s right, of course.  But it’s more than that.  Each one does the same thing in different ways and I’m always amazed by how different people like different things.  Two people can see the same movie, eat the same meal, hear the same band, and not agree on any of them.    I say, “Yay! New Star Trek Movie.”  But it gets a resounding “Boo” from my friend Thomas.  Sometimes someone’s in error, as is Thomas in this case, but mostly we have different priorities and those priorities shape how we experience something.  I won’t go deep into, nor linger long in movieland for fear of being squashed like a bug by those who dwell there.  So I’ll move it to the realm of breakfast tacos.  I purposely did not order the chicharron taco this morning.  This past weekend we went to Sonny’s where they have what I think are the best Chicarrones known to mankind.  I didn’t want the lingering memory of another taqueria to cloud my judgement as to the chicharrones at Las Milpas.  M. ordered a chicharron taco, however and I was curious how they were done.  Were they the airy, out-of-the-bag kind, or were they my favorite, the dense and crispy, deep-fried-on-the-spot kind?  Or were they the soft, braised-for-hours kind?  My point is that some like them soft, others not, some stewed, others fried, and still others that find the whole idea of eating pig skin (or barbacoa, or tripas, or mollejas) repulsive.  So what does my proclamation about how good the nopalitos and egg taco is mean to someone who finds the idea of eating cactus disturbing?  What are we doing when we meet Friday for tacos then (blab) blog about it?  Well, we’re visiting, and drinking coffee, and eating tacos.  And this morning is no exception.
Las Milpas was brightly lit and chilled to hang beef.  It was a first visit for me and thought I’d celebrate by ordering the barbacoa.  Unfortunately for me Las Milpas serves barbacoa only on Saturdays and Sundays so I opted for the lengua con cebollas y cilantro on a homemade corn tarp, and a nopalitos con huevos a la Mexicana on flour.  The flour tortilla was a sleeping bag-sized monster that if stuffed full would have taken a forklift to get off the plate.   It was distinctive in my experience, for its fluffiness.  The nopalito stuffing was good – with a load of eggs and a good mix of vegetables and cactus.  Good ingredients, I think, but no fireworks.  The lengua taco was on a smaller tortilla – thin and corny.  As homemade corn tortillas go, it was good, but not a home run.  The lengua, however was very good.  Tender, roasty…a pinch of salt made it a very respectable effort.  The salsa was delicious.  It was an interesting, not-green-but-not-red color not often seen in a salsa.   I found myself wanting something a bit hotter, but I think that might have been about me and not the salsa.  The coffee was café good and I knew right away that I could not keep up with the waitress’s coffee deployment regimen and just gave in to the idea of a perpetually-full cup of Joe.


Las-Milpas-Graph

Jalisco #1 – Survive or Perish

Outside

Jalisco #1
902 South Port Avenue, Corpus Christi, TX
361-881-8379
Chorizo & Egg – $1.39
Carne Guisada – $1.75
Bottomless Coffee – $0.99

Survival in Tacotopia is not something to be taken for granted.  You’ll notice a taqueria or two that we’ve reviewed where our record of the experience is all that we have left.  When hunting for new spots we see little red pins on google maps pointing to places we know aren’t there.  It stands to remind us that we could be just as gone, just as quickly, if we don’t watch our backs. I turn on the news at night and I’m always surprised at the degree of violence. It’s good to have backup when I show up at these taco shops, especially when I’m carrying around enough camera to supply a crackhead for, well, about an hour.  Crackheads have an uncanny ability to adjust their intake so that however much they have it’s done in about an hour, but enough about crack. It’s not like I don’t have my own addictions: whiskey, tacos, eggnog, corned beef, troll dolls.  The eggnog & corned beef I keep under control, seasonally satiating myself and then sublimating the craving.  The tacos are another story.  It’s just like in nature: when you want to find an animal, you go to the source of its food and wait. It’s dog eat dog, play or be played, we’ve got a president that accepted the Nobel peace price while waging two wars. Private Joker said it better in ‘Full Metal Jacket.’ “The dead know only one thing: it is better to be alive.”

Taqueria Jalisco has used a classic technique to defend it’s place in the Corpus Christi food chain. Boasting ten Corpus locations on their website it’s not easy to find a spot in the metro area that isn’t 4 or 5 blocks from a Jalisco, and that’s just in Corpus. Jalisco’s reach must extend further as one of their CC locations is #19. We ended up at the first, Jalisco #1, this morning.  Dug in on Port, on the west side of Crosstown Fwy, Taqueria Jalisco sits between Carniceria Jalisco and the the Jalisco Bakery on both adjacent blocks like a cult compound. This is a neighborhood where you’d do well to live in a compound, though not nearly as dicey as some – and it’s caddycorner to the lot where the chicken trailer parks on weekends.  Opinion is mixed on the quality of Jalisco’s food. Some locals will tell you to avoid them, but they are always busy with full parking lots and drive-throughs. An inquiry directed toward the lady at the counter determined that this location had been open for around 25 years. That’s no small papas. They must be doing something right in order to survive that long.

the 'ladybug' presentation

the 'ladybug' presentation

The Hat and myself walked in the front door, half expecting to find a butcher greeting us with a blood-soaked apron and a cleaver. No such luck, it was nice, tidy, and clean. The waitress was on point, and we couldn’t go 2 minutes without her offering to refill our coffee cups. The tacos quickly arrived in the ‘ladybug’ formation. The chorizo & egg was not bad: dry but not too dry, without a strong flavor of chorizo but still quite serviceable.  The carne guisada was about the same – not bad, not great.  The flour tortillas weren’t standout but they came hot, fresh and soft.  The salsa was powerfully hot – and not at the expense of flavor.

The most impressive thing about the place is the signage, and not even the signage on the taqueria itself, but on the carniceria.  It is a work of art, flawless in its execution.  You see tags around this part of town but I could see no evidence that anyone had tagged that wall. Taggers are not entirely without respect for talent.

TripasYChicharronWhile we try to quantify the tangible qualities that make a place good or bad there’s so much that we can’t put our fingers on. Jalisco #1 is not excellent but well worth the trip. In any other town you’d be hard pressed to find anything better. It just so happens we aren’t in any other town, we’re in Corpus Christi.  The Great Corpus Christi, a little town I like to call Tacotopia – Breakfast Taco Capital of the World.  You might think different but if your tacos try to upset the natural order of things, they might become part of the circle of life.

From the Hat

We found ourselves at Jalisco because the taco joint we had selected was closed.  Gallus gallus hadn’t even announced the day and we were standing in an empty parking lot on Ayers.  I wonder what the street life thought at the sight of two Nerds brandishing iPhones, bringing technology to bear to locate a suitable substitute taqueria…”prey” probably.

Prey…Back in the day, I used to be quite the hunter.  Bow, black powder, rifle or shotgun – it was a great way to spend some time, spend some money, visit with friends, and perhaps bring home something for the freezer.  But I haven’t been hunting in more than five years… dove hunting a few times, but no deer.  So I decided that I’d go out and try to shoot a deer this year.  My uncle Bob sets up blinds on our place in Papalote and has taken a few pigs.  He’s seen some deer, but nothing he thought about shooting.  He hunts often so is looking for big impressive deer, or those that need to be culled.  Me, I prefer the does.  I’ll shoot a buck or an atypical of course, but does are so tasty and I’m in it for breakfast.

So I got up early and went and sat on a blind.  I’d never been up in one of these tripod blinds and I must say that I felt a bit uneasy hoisting my butt 12-15 ft in the air and sitting on a swiveling chair – a swiveling chair filled with water my butt would tell you.  Lesson one, take towel.  From my gantry view, I could see and hear the brush wake up.   I love the sounds of the dawn chorus.  Foghorn Leghorn in the distance, coyotes yapping, the occasional mystery sound, and wild birds of all kind singing as if the coming sun had just thawed their syrinxes.  It was steamy when I got there and there were mosquitoes as big as bumblebees flying around.  That didn’t last long, though.  A front blew in and it got cold, and my wet butt got cold.  I hung a couple of hours and watched a feral hog and a doe, but didn’t get a shot at either.

I went back out that afternoon and put in another several shivering hours and was rewarded with a nice doe.  The rifle was true and the deer dropped where she stood.  I always feel kind of sad when I kill a deer.  They’re really quite beautiful up close and she hadn’t done a thing to me.  But I’m looking forward to backstrap and eggs for breakfast, not this morning, though.  This morning it’s tacos.

We hadn’t reviewed one of the ubiquitous Jaliscos before and figured why not?  You can’t turn around in Corpus without running into a taqueria, and there’s a good chance it’s a Jalisco.  We chose the one on Port because it was fairly close.  They had tripas on the menu, and chicharrones, so I had one of each.  The tripas taco on a corn tarp was not stellar – but not cellar either.  The tripas were ice cube-sized Borg ships cut from a frozen block then fried in very hot grease.  Most were so fried that they had very little taste, but there were a few in the center of the cubes that were still too soft.   The corn tarp was of higher quality than those al paquete, but did not hold up to being manhandled.  Not my favorite execution of the dish, but I managed to assimilate it.  The chicharron con huevos taco was better, on a better (flour) tortilla.  The chicharrones were toothy and there were plenty of them mixed with the eggs.  The vegetables making it a la Mexicana were fresh.  Both tacos had ample filling.  The red salsa was screaming hot.  I think jalapenos.  Ian may differ.  It was good though.  The service was excellent and my Bunn-driven coffee never dropped more than a half an inch below the brim.  Tomorrow, venison and eggs.

Salud

Jalisco-1

Signeage

Survival in Tacotopia is not something to be taken for granted.  You’ll notice a taqueria or two that we’ve reviewed where our record of the experience is all that we have left.  When hunting for new spots we see little red pins on google maps pointing to places we know aren’t there.  It stands to remind us that we could be just as gone, just as quickly, if we don’t watch out backs. I turn on the news at night and I’m always surprised at the degree of violence. It’s good to have backup when I show up at these taco shops, especially when I’m carrying around enough camera to supply a crackhead for, well, about an hour.  Crackheads have an uncanny ability to adjust their intake so that however much they have it’s done in about an hour, but enough about crack. It’s not like I don’t have my own addictions: whiskey, tacos, eggnog, corned beef, troll dolls.  The eggnog & corned beef I keep under control, seasonally satiating myself and then sublimating the craving.  The tacos are another story.  It’s just like in nature: when you want to find an animal, you go to the source of its food and wait. It’s dog eat dog, play or be played, we’ve got a president that accepted the Nobel peace price while waging two wars. Private Joker said it better in ‘Full Metal Jacket.’ “The dead know only one thing: it is better to be alive.”
Taqueria Jalisco has used a classic technique to defend it’s place in the Corpus Christi food chain. Boasting ten Corpus locations on their website it’s not easy to find a spot in the metro area that isn’t 4 or 5 blocks from a Jalisco, and that’s just corpus. Jalisco’s reach must extend further as one of their CC locations is #19. We ended up at the first, Jalisco #1, this morning.  Dug in on Port, on the west side of Crosstown Fwy, Taqueria Jalisco sits between Carniceria Jalisco and the the Jalisco Bakery on both adjacent blocks like a cult compound. This is a neighborhood where you’d do well to live in a compound, though not nearly ad dicey as some – and it’s caddycorner to the lot where the chicken trailer parks on weekends.  Opinion is mixed on the quality of Jalisco’s food. Some locals will tell you to avoid them, but they are always busy with full parking lots and drive-throughs. An inquiry directed toward the lady at the counter determined that this location had been open for around 25 years. That’s no small papas. They must be doing something right in order to survive that long.
The Hat and myself walked in the front door, half expecting to find a butcher greeting us with a blood-soaked apron and a cleaver. No such luck, it was nice, tidy, and clean. The waitress was on point, and we couldn’t go 2 minutes without her offering to refill our coffee cups. The tacos quickly arrived in the ‘ladybug’ formation. The chorizo & egg was not bad: dry but not too dry, without a strong flavor of chorizo but still quite serviceable.  The carne guisada was about the same – not bad, not great.  The flour tortillas weren’t standout but they came hot, fresh and soft.  The salsa was powerfully hot – and not at the expense of flavor.
The most impressive thing about the place is the signage, and not even the signage on the taqueria itself, but on the carniceria.  It is a work of art, flawless in its execution.  You see tags around this part of town but I could see no evidence that anyone had tagged that wall. Taggers are not entirely without respect for talent.
While we try to quantify the tangible qualities that make a place good or bad there’s so much that we can’t put our fingers on. Jalisco #1 is not excellent but well worth the trip. In any other town you’d be hard pressed to find anything better. It just so happens we aren’t in any other town, we’re in Corpus Christi.  The Great Corpus Christi, a little town I like to call Tacotopia – Breakfast Taco Capital of the World.  You might think different but if your tacos try to upset the natural order of things, they might become part of the circle of life.

Taqueria Jalisco on Urbanspoon

Sonny’s – Menudo Minute

DriveThru

4066 S Port Ave

Corpus Christi, TX 78415

(361)808-7711

Chorizo & Egg – $1.40

Carne Guisada – $1.95

Large Menudo – $7.00

Small Menudo – $4.50

Menudo is served daily

MenudoMy ancestry is Irish, with a little english, dutch, french-canadian thrown in for good measure.  I am fortunate enough to have been born in Texas, and to have had a lot of interaction with the blended Mexican American culture of Texas.  What I’m trying to say is I’m an outsider, but I’m not an ignorant outsider.  I make these observations with a fair amount of experience – what with having spent more than a little time in Mexico.  Mexico has had a profound effect on my life, both good and in one case tragically. So when you read what I have to say consider this: I am trying to be funny but I am dead serious about what I’m doing.  I think the taco in all its forms is the perfect food.  I have a deep love for tacos and for Corpus Christi where my family goes back on two sides for three generations.

CokeAll this said, I’m still a gringo.  I think it helps me to make objective observations but there are things about which I know very little when it comes to Mexican Food.  Take, for example, Menudo.  I know what it is, I know what it tastes like, and I know what it’s good for but beyond that I’m still in the dark.  So one fine Sunday morning I called upon an insider – Dee, my father-in-law – to bring his not insignificant experience to bear on the subject of Menudo.

My wife and I met Dee up at Sonny’s on his recommendation, and when we settled into the tiny booth (I like to blame the booth).  Haggis, Chitterlings, the Irish Drisheen, Andouille are all dishes that were improvised by cultures who weren’t able to get much of the more desirable parts of their livestock.  I related a bit of menudo history I’d read: that during the Mexican Revolution cattle ranchers in Sonora dried all their beef and sent it to the fronts, and what they had left to eat themselves was the tripe from which they made Menudo.  Dee told me ‘I don’t know about that’ but went on to talk quite a bit about his experience with this Mexican delicacy, and how to eat it, and what makes good and bad Menudo. He talked to us about the social import of Menudo – that folks would sit around for many hours telling stories while tending cauldrons of the stuff, and that the reason it’s good for hangovers is that it ‘gets the blood up.’  I don’t know for a fact that it’s good for a hangover, but I doChicharron know that it’s good, at least at Sonny’s.  I got the small bowl and it was still pretty big, though it looks tiny next to the 500 ml bottle of Mexican Coke.  Dee would frequently dip a rolled-up homemade corn tortilla into the soup and eat it.  I ordered a Chicharron and Egg to go with it and it was really good – fried but not fried out.  The service was good and they called Dee by name.  It was almost as if we were eating at a friend’s house.

After it was all over we went our separate ways and I’ll remember the experience for the stories and conversation, and of course the Menudo. It was so good that I had to go back with ‘the Hat’ and refresh my memory before I was willing to post this missive.  I could go for a little refresher right now!

20090902-Sonnys