We come to my favorite time of year.  Sure, there’s not a pronounced difference in the seasons of Sur de Tejas, but at least the heat doesn’t beat you over the head.  I enjoy the Fall festivals, Halloween, and the general celebration of things harvest-related.  Up north, they’re enjoying the wonderful colors of the changing leaves – from green to shades of yellow, and red, and orange.  We notice a change in the season’s color here too, but our shades of orange and yellow show up in the decorations of the various retail establishments.  Still, we’ll see a welcome drop in the humidity.

I took note of Moon in her fullness this month.  A good time to do it because it was a special moon.   The full moon nearest the equinox, the Harvest Moon, fell on the equinox this year (making it the Harvest-est Moon) – an event that hasn’t happened in twenty-five  years and won’t happen again for a two decades.  That’s about as often as I’ve hit the gym.  Not something to be crowing about.  So with the appearance of the Super Harvest Moon, I went to the gym.  It was sobering. . .I had a fitness assessment so that I could start a wellness plan.  They assessed me, but there was no fitness to be found.  Now don’t get me wrong.  It wasn’t all bad.  But there’s certainly ample room for improvement.  I don’t want to compete in the Iron Man, or the Mr. Universe competition, but I would like to have the speed and endurance to go birding all day  and the strength to wrestle a flat tire without busting a gut.  Modest goals…attainable goals.  Already I’ve cut my taco consumption to Breakfast Taco Friday’s, tacos in foreign cities, and the occasional taco for verification or ground-truthing.

And so in celebration of Breakfast Taco Friday, Taco Show Host and I met at Las Milpas on Navigation near the Interstate.  I had a chorizo con papas en maiz, and the daily special:  a breakfast sausage with scrambled eggs on flour.  We had a bit of discussion as to why I’ve been on the chorizo and potatoes kick lately and I think the reason is chorizo.  Usually, and today was no exception, the chorizo is sauteed with already cooked potatoes so it doesn’t permeate the potato, but covers it generously.  I get to taste both separately, and together and this morning it was very good.  The corn tarp was a bit dry and had a not-all-too-unpleasant crunchiness to the edges.  The taco was large and adequately filled with goods.  The special was good.  Nothing special if you know what I mean.  It was a generous portion of sausage and egg scramble in need of salt.  The tortilla was an off-round saddle blanket with quite a bit of hand-made non-uniformity.  A hunger-buster for sure.  The thing I found funny was that there was no salsa.  Our waitress delivered a Ranchero sauce, but nothing more traditional.  Later she asked if we wanted some hot sauce and when she delivered, she mentioned that it was habanero.  And it was.  It came in a squirt bottle as well it should because you’d have to be pretty dedicated to dip a chip in it.  Taco Show Host and I thought that the day’s version might just have been the hottest we’ve seen in a taqueria.  The coffee was good and happily delivered by a doting waitress.  The building was clean on the inside, if a bit run-down out.  Pretty good and worth a try.

Salud

Our Taco Award Winner for this week is:

Sigourney Weaver

Sigourney Weaver is a true talent of our times and her list of acting accomplishments is long.  Born in New York, 1959 she began her career in the mid 70’s.  Exploding onto the scene as the no-bullshit-bad-ass Ellen Ripley in Ridley Scott’s Alien. Ms. Weaver always looks good whether killing an alien (No one makes crawling half-naked into a space suit look as good.) or playing one, a nine-foot tall one  in Avatar.  You can also see her in the movie, You Again with the larger-than-life Jamie Lee Curtis.  How can you go wrong?

Offer includes 2 tacos, an audience with the ‘tacoteurs,’ and a free tacotopia t-shirt. Please redeem this offer at Whetstone Graphics on a Friday morning of your choice. Offer subject to cancellation by order of the wives of the tacoteurs.  Enter to win by emailing your name and an extra large pair of Galaxy Quest Special Edition DVD sets to tacos@tacotopia.net.

I have been out of sorts lately. The work I’ve been doing is frustrating, and I’ve had many obstacles come up to impede it’s progress. Machines breaking down, employee drama, scheduling problems, and on and on. That’s why it’s called work.  I have moved back and forth between working long hours and taking brief trips into the heaven of my wife’s great cooking, and perhaps a little irish whiskey now and then. I have, in fact, been so busy that I’ve been unable to put together a post for a while. The Hat has been picking up the slack. It’s not for lack of trying, though. I’ve been to one taqueria in particular three times trying to put together a post, but it hasn’t materialized yet.

Lila's Juevos Ahogados

I did, though, have a little time this morning to get my taco on so the Hat, his better half, and myself all converged near the Saxet Hall on Leopard this morning. Saxet is Texas spelled backwards for those who don’t know. It’s a tough little shopping center that has seen better days but is still kicking. The hall bears witness to the Hurricane Alley Roller Derby about every month. It also hosts countless quinceañeras, to which I have dropped off my stepson many times. Some of these quinces have bikers working security so there’s little to worry about in this neighborhood. Not your weekend bikers either, but bikers who couldn’t hide their colors if they wanted to, and they don’t want to.

The first thing we tasted was the coffee – which was a good deal stronger than most. The lady bringing out the coffee was Lila herself, the namesake of the restaurant. She was polite and dignified with perfect english. Hold on – before you get bent about that last bit – let me explain. I don’t assume she speaks Spanish, I know because she was cracking the whips with the other waitress and the kitchen crew in Spanish. I would guess this was her first language, and when people live in a country where they have to speak in a foreign tongue much of the time  they usually end up in one of three groups. The first is people who have a thick accent whose speech never grows closer to that of the host country (think of the governator). The second are people who assimilate perfectly into the host country so that by listening they could only be identified as non-native by a finely tuned ear. The third group are people who are able to speak as well if not better than the locals, but choose to retain a flavor of their first language out of respect for their own culture. Lila falls into the third group.

I ordered a chorizo & egg, and a carne guisada. Lila brought them out and they looked pretty typical of the taquerias in the area. The tortillas were the star of the meal, both flour and corn on a level with the best in town. The salsa, too, was distinctive: very hot, and pretty fresh. The carne guisada was subtle but good. The chorizo & egg was sharp and delicious, bringing me back to the first time I tried C&E as a child. It tastes exactly how it’s supposed to. I’ve had better, but not very often.

I asked Lila how long they’d been there, and she said 12 years – but that’s after 5 years as another location. Cesar, the co-owner was there too, dressed in a uniform shirt for another job. Do yourself a favor, like the numerous police who were eating there this morning, and drop in for a taco. You won’t be sorry. Watch the parking lot though, it’s hungry too, for cars.

Our Taco Award Winner for this week is:

Aria Giovanni

Aria Giovanni is one of the three most beautiful women in the world. Period. The other two are Salma Hayek, and my wife. I’m not going to reveal what order they’re in but you should note they all have black hair and brown skin, and they all have curves. If you look up cleavage in wikipedia, they have a picture of Ms. Giovanni. A compelling argument for blended marriage, she is Italian Yugoslavian French German Irish and Native American. Aria is a model, meaning she’s pretty much hot for a living.  She was briefly married to Marilyn Manson guitarist John 5. This makes him barely the winner of the ‘I divorced the hottest pinup girl in the world’ contest he had with Marilyn Manson himself who divorced Dita von Teese. A frequent guest at comic book conventions, she has served as a surrogate imaginary girlfriend for a generation of nerdcore fanboys. Be careful for the NSFW if you google her.

Offer includes 2 tacos, an audience with the ‘tacoteurs,’ and a free tacotopia t-shirt. Please redeem this offer at Whetstone Graphics on a Friday morning of your choice. Offer subject to cancellation by order of the wives of the tacoteurs.  Enter to win by emailing your name on the back of the September 2000 issue of Penthouse to tacos@tacotopia.net.

Taco Show Host had coffee waiting at Bandas when I showed up.  Seems to be a bit of a role reversal.  Previously I’ve always been the early bird.  But I wasn’t too late because the coffee was still hot.  We had ventured out Leopard…way out Leopard.  Past the many oilfield service companies where the blush of the 80’s oil bloom is long worn off.  I don’t get out that way much anymore and to be honest, it looked better than I expected.  Business seemed to be thriving even if not at the level of the past.  Banda’s showed some wear though.  I’d driven past the building for decades and never stopped in.  Back in the day there was a topless joint at next door.  It now has an Orkin sign on the side.  I never went in there either because the place looked scary back then…like even Orkin would have trouble getting the roaches out of the place.

There were a few patrons in the restaurant when I walked in and sat down.  The coffee cups were small, but the wait staff was thorough in its delivery of the black elixir.  I ordered two tacos, a machacado con huevos a la Mexicana on corn, and a chorizo con papas on flour.  Both tacos were good.  I was a bit worried on my first bite of the papas con chorizo.  The potato was cooked perfectly, soft, but not too soft, but I didn’t get that slap in the face I expected from the chorizo.  However, it turned out that my first bite was just a potato that had missed the chorizo boat and every subsequent bite had that deliciously greasy, vinegary chorizo flavor.  It could have only been better if the papas had had a bit of char to them.  The flour tort was very good, if just a bit doughy. It was thin and soft, though and held up to the chorizo onslaught like a trooper.  The second taco was also very good.  It had some trouble with the corn tort – a bit dry and chewy. I think the corn tarps at the Bandas uptown are exceptional and it could be that opinion is affecting my calibration.  It was good, but not exceptional.  There was plenty of carne seco in the Mexicana mix and it was done like I like it.  Not too moist.  More like the shredded jerky it is, with little attempt to rehydrate it in the cooking process.  The vegetables in the Mexicana were fresh, bright red and green, and their flavors accentuated the dried beef.  I thought at first that the tacos were a bit slender, but I now think it was because I was hungry.  There was plenty to the tacos and I was satiated completely. Bandas had a green salsa that was fresh and hot with chilis and really added a warm depth to both of the tacos.

If you find yourself out that way, and in the mood for a taco.  Take a friend.  While the atmosphere is not exhilarating and the facilities are a bit run down, the two of you can have a great, fresh breakfast for under $8.  I’m sure I’ll be going back.

Salud

Our Taco Award Winner for this week is:

Dawn Wells

Considered typecast by many as 60’s TV classic, Gilligan’s Island as the farm girl Mary Ann, she has had quite a career in film and TV.  Still appearing and working, and at 72 still looking good.  Miss Wells certainly tips the scales in her direction in answer to the age-old question:  Ginger or Mary Ann?

Offer includes 2 tacos, an audience with the ‘tacoteurs,’ and a free tacotopia t-shirt. Please redeem this offer at Whetstone Graphics on a Friday morning of your choice. Offer subject to cancellation by order of the wives of the tacoteurs.  Enter to win by emailing your name on a original copy of Winterhawk to tacos@tacotopia.net.