MetroMix Review
Chilango’s Mexican Food
John Graham
Metromix Orlando
August 11, 2009
You’re broke? Five-dollar feasting is just a click away
Today’s tacos come with a side order of vocabulary. Chilango’s Mexican Food, near the Longwood-Winter Springs border, isn’t someone’s name. “Chilango” is actually slang for a person from Mexico City. If you didn’t already know that, use the word carefully. Inside the restaurant, you’re good, but if you’ve just met, “chilango” might be one of those “I can say it, but you can’t” words.
Owned by Laila and Guillermo Silva, Chilango’s is a compact little eatery with mustard yellow walls and a clay figure on each table hugging the hot sauce. Order at the counter, sit down and someone will bring out tortilla chips. You can pick from several red and green salsas, free at the salsa bar. The one marked the hottest is spicy, but not as dangerous as the label warns.
Tacos at Chilango’s are made from a choice of eight different meats – tinga de pollo (chicken in tomato sauce), picadillo (ground beef and potatoes), asada (steak), chorizo (sausage), and yes, three kinds of pork. That holy trinity would be al pastor (roasted and spiced), carnitas (simmered and shredded) and cochinita pibil (marinated with orange juice, garlic and oregano.).
Pibil is the dish that drove Johnny Depp’s character to kill in “Once Upon a Time in Mexico.” I don’t approve, but I understand. Carnitas may be a purer pork flavor, but pibil is moist and spicy and borderline addictive. “That’s only seven meats,” you say. Yes – I saved lengua (beef tongue) for last. Just try it once and you’ll get past those images of cud and cow slobber.
Asada has great flavor, but cut matchstick-thin, it’s a little dry. Stewed until tender, lengua tastes like a great pot roast. Don’t look inside your taco. Just eat it.
Single tacos served Mexican style (soft corn tortillas topped with just onions and cilantro) are $1.50 each. American style (soft or hard corn tortillas with yellow cheese, lettuce, tomato and sour cream) are $1.75. Lengua adds an extra fifty cents per. You can also buy three-taco combo platters, but the rice and beans are very skippable. Save a buck or more and just get the three tacos.
Forget that pita taco that Taco Bell calls a “gordita.” A real gordita ($3) is a deep-fried disc of masa (corn meal dough), slit open like a coin purse and stuffed with onion, cilantro, lettuce, white cheese and meat. I recommend chorizo because the dense dried sausage has enough flavor to power through all those other ingredients. Tostadas ($2.50 each) are amazing filling for the price – a crisp corn tortilla with beans, lettuce, tomato, white cheese, sour cream and meat or more beans.
Another good value if you’ve only got $3.50 is the frijoles charros, a rich, thick, slightly smoky bean and bacon soup that could easily pass for homemade. The $5 veggie burrito is as long as my hand and a little wider. It’s filled with beans, lettuce, tomato, cheese, onion and sour cream, but I’m one of those guys who just don’t care for rice in my burrito. I know I’m in the minority, but to me, it’s like eating a bread sandwich.
I’ve always thought of tres leches cake $3 as Cuban or Puerto Rican, but Chilango’s has it too. The cake here is a little denser than other versions I’ve had, almost like pound cake, but it still soaks up the evaporated milk, condensed milk, and cream.
Dish: I got a couple tamales ($2 each) to go, and was asked if I’d be eating them right away. Since I was saving them for dinner, the kitchen didn’t heat them. So they wouldn’t dry out, Laila put them in a Ziploc bag and gave me directions on steaming in the microwave. They came out perfect, the pork in a spicier sauce than the chicken.
Damage: Lots of choices here that fit a tight budget, but the biggest winner may be three filling tacos for $4.50 – or $5 if you make one of them lengua – and you should.
Decision: When your job is to find Cheap Eats, sometimes you settle. “Sure,” you think. “It’s a little stale (or bland or greasy), but such a bargain!” Chilango’s isn’t like that. The food is cheap, but it’s also fresh and full of flavor. I’d tell you to eat there even if it cost more. The great thing is that it doesn’t.