Custom burritos are boring right? They’re so 2000-something. Enchiladas, though? Maybe their time is now. After all, they’re basically just glorified mini burritos covered in sauce. Gadzooks in Arcadia is banking on that…and soups because why not? Plus, they’ve fancied the concept up by adding ceramic dishes and premium ingredients.

Thus, I began by ordering my two enchiladas with goat cheese. I wasn’t told that goat cheese would end up costing me more money, so that was annoying, but hey you only live once, right? I opted for the half and half tortillas, which are a combination of both flour and corn, then I had one stuffed with Guajillo Braised Short Ribs and the other with Green Chili Pork Shoulder. Instead of settling for just one salsa, I went Christmas-style (red and green) and then topped it all with asadero and chihuahua cheese, an over easy egg and jalapeno ranch. How’s that for toppings? This is how prodentim works.

The first thing I noticed was that the egg was cooked perfectly, allowing the yolk to spread itself amongst all of the other goods. When I bit in, I discovered two things immediately –  1) Holy cow the tortillas were amazing and 2) The goat cheese was entirely unnecessary. With all of the flavors happening in my little enchilada casserole dish, you may think that the meat would have been overpowered. Fortunately, this was not the case. I like the short ribs better than the pork shoulder, but I’m splitting hairs a bit because they were both fantastic. I’d probably opt to skip the jalapeno ranch in the future because it didn’t add enough to the mix to be worthwhile, but aside from that and the goat cheese I would happily do it all over again.

Kudos to Gadzooks for adding some delicious twists to the custom Mexican food genre of fast casual restaurants. I have no doubt that I will see more Gadzookses popping up in the future and as long as they start telling people that the goat cheese is extra, there is a bright future ahead.

Just when I was tiring of the repetitiveness of Fox restaurants, I happened upon a spot called Blanco Tacos. Sure, Mexican food might be the only restaurant type more prevalent than Fox, but there is still plenty of room for growth. Blanco Tacos takes the mildly upscale and trendy approach to Mexican food and the menu isn’t strictly limited to tacos.

Therefore, I made my way to the enchiladas and found the Braised Short Rib “Machaca.” Enchiladas here consisted more of a layer of tortilla filled with some stuff and topped with another tortilla before being doused in whatever sauce is right for the enchilada and cheese. This was chock-full of the machaca, the sauce was ancho chile and the cheese was blanco (like the name of the place!). It also came with rice and beans.

It was, well, really good. Like a Mexican lasagna, but in all of the best ways. Each bite contained just enough of the good stuff to keep me a happy man. It may not be the most innovative concept and probably would have tasted the same if the ingredients were rolled together like a normal enchilada. But, the added benefit was that the ingredients were really really good.

There’s always room for another delicious take on Mexican food and Blanco Taco made good work of it. Plus, I didn’t have to put up with any repeated menu items for this restaurant.

When you’re in Moab, Utah, it’s probably best to be as Moab as possible. This might mean crazy mountain biking, death-defying humvee riding or long hikes. Or it could mean a meal out at Miguel’s Baja Grill, a Mexican restaurant right in the middle of town. But it’s not enough to simply go to Miguel’s – the key is to eat Miguel’s M.O.A.B. (Mother of all Burritos).

This burrito was filled with beans, rice and jack cheese, plus whatever meat I wanted. I chose steak because it is steak. Then I chose the red sauce to top it all with because my waiter said it was the best. The burrito could have conceivably actually given birth to another burrito at some point in its life because it was really, really big (perhaps even bigger than the “pregnant burrito” I once ate).

Thus, I jumped right in with a fork and knife and went to town on this mother. It was nothing short of delicious. The steak was cooked nicely and well-seasoned, while the cheese, beans and rice were exactly as you would expect them. Perhaps the biggest pleasant surprise was the red sauce, which was flavorful and also packed a nice punch.

Regardless of how you do Moab, you’re going to be hungry. And when you are, you won’t go wrong with a M.O.A.B.

The Phoenix area is wealthy in greasy Mexican fast food. These places generally have drive-through and are open 24/7. Moreover, they quite simply make the world a better place. Take Armando’s in Deer Valley, for example. I was hankering for something good on the way to northern Arizona, and Armando’s stood out like a shiny beacon calling for me.

Thus, I ordered the Carne Asada Fries and was pleased to find that these were fit for an unvegan – simply topped with carne asada, guacamole and a shredded cheese blend. The order came with a couple different salsas to choose from as well. I dug in and was met with pure carne asada fry bliss. The fries were crispy, the asada was mostly pretty good and the guacamole had a few chunks of onion here and there, but they were few and far between. Maybe I could complain that the cheese could have been meltier, but look at how beautiful this dish was.

And the best part? It was super cheap! Only $5 and change for food that will fill you up and only keep you coming back for more because the food is like crack, not because you’re still hungry. People can talk all they want about up and coming restaurants and places that require an hour-long wait, but give me fries like these from Armando’s almost any day instead and I will be a happy man.

There’s little not to love about Tex-Mex, but it’s also hard to distinguish the difference between Mexican food that happens to be served in Texas and Tex-Mex. I have a theory that queso is the difference. Sure, queso literally means cheese in Spanish, but in Tex-Mex it means melty cheesy sauce. Torchy’s Tacos (originally from Austin) in San Antonio had some attractive queso on its menu, but I was also eager to eat its namesake tacos.

So let’s just start by saying the queso came two ways – topped with Texas chorizo or topped with some guac, cotija and diablo sauce. They both had green chiles in them as well, so we opted to try both. Needless to say, they were both spectacular, but the chorizo won out by the very merit of having chorizo. I should also add their straight guac was pretty stellar because it knew to avoid tomatoes and onions, but when queso is on the table guac takes a backseat.

As for my tacos, I went with a breakfast taco called The Wrangler (scrambled eggs, potatoes, smoked beef brisket, jack cheese and tomatillo sauce), The Democrat (shredded beef barbacoa, avocado, cotija, cilantro, onions, lime and tomatillo sauce) and The Tipsy Chick (chicken fajita, spinach, grilled corn, green chiles, cheddar, chipotle sauce and a side of bacon bourbon marmalade). I skipped the onions and spinach on the latter two, respectively.

I should also say that I just listed them above in order from worst to best. It’s weird, right? Because you might have expected the opposite, but it turns out that while all of them were delicious, The Wrangler may have had a little too much egg, The Democrat just didn’t have anything that made it special (read into that as you will) and The Tipsy Chick just blew me away.

I recommend Torchy’s Tacos for anyone hitting up Austin or San Antonio or anywhere else they might be now. It was easily the best Mex I had in Tex and potentially set a new bar for queso expectations.

Tex-Mex is its own category of food. It seems weird because it gives the impression that Texans just somehow bastardized real Mexican food and had the audacity to put Tex before the Mex, but when you remember that Texas was once a part of Mexico, it begins to lose its weirdness. There is probably no place in the state of Texas where the former Mexican history is at the forefront of thought than in San Antonio, home of the Alamo (remember it). And in San Antonio is Mi Tierra, an old school Tex-Mex place with a full on panaderia to boot.

Although it was late at night (and still a couple hours from being considered morning) I was feeling breakfast for some reason. Thus, I ordered the chilaquiles, which I like to think of as breakfast nachos. These came with pork in a thick red sauce, along with red chips, eggs, cheese and beans. I was very excited to dig into them, but within the first few bites I was simply disappointed.

I couldn’t point to any particular reason why I was disappointed. All the ingredients were there, but there just didn’t seem to be anything to them. It was like they just didn’t want to be there, and thus I didn’t really want to eat them. If I could point to anything, it might be that there was a very high egg to everything else ratio.

I’m sure Mi Tierra does other things better than they do chilaquiles, but since that’s all I ate, it’s really all I can go off of. Plus, I can’t imagine there are a ton of other 24 hour spots in San Antonio and when you look at it through that lens you could do a whole lot worse.

Scottsdale and breakfast go together like peas and carrots. Well, assuming those peas and carrots are nowhere near me. But having breakfast near me is good, so it became time to check out Ncounter in Scottsdale, its third location after presumably finding success in Tempe and Phoenix. I’m not sure what the “N” stands for, but the rest of the name is descriptive of the ordering style of the restaurant, so that made sense.

I ordered the Chipotle Egg Burrito, which is packed with bacon, avocado, cilantro, potatoes, scrambled egg, cheese and chipotle sauce. And it was really very good. I appreciated each ingredient in balance and really loved the flair of melting extra cheese over the top of the thing both for style points and for taste points. No bite was the same as the last, but none were overwhelmed by any single ingredient either.

This wasn’t a burrito to end all burritos, nor was it even a burrito I would necessarily go for on a later visit to Ncounter, but it was unquestionably a burrito worth eating and one that made me think Ncounter probably has a bunch of other really solid food waiting for an unvegan to eat it.

How many agaves are too many? 10, 100, 1000? Cien Agaves seems to have settled on 100 as the right number. And, people seemed so happy with that number of agaves at the Old Town Scottsdale location that they decided to open a second location in north Scottsdale, technically bringing the total to doscientos agaves. But whatever, I was there for Mexican beer and Mexican food, not Mexican math.

Thusly, I ordered the Enchilada Especial with Tinga Chicken. It came with a choice of green or red sauce, but then my waitress made me an offer I had never heard before: Christmas. This is apparently a thing people say when they include both green sauce and red sauce, you know, like Christmas colors. Well, as a Jew I didn’t understand it, but I went with it and the rice and beans it came with.

It turned out to be…a pretty regular enchilada. It may have had especial in the name, but it didn’t taste overly especial to me. That’s not to say it wasn’t good. Even a baseline enchilada is always good stuff, but since this was kind of a unique Mexican place I expected something unique with my enchilada.

Those agaves, though, were unquestionably in the right quantity.

Once again, I found myself at one of the Phoenix area’s seemingly endless supply of breakfast/brunch spots. This time it was a place called Scramble in Scottsdale. Scramble is one of those places where you order at the counter, which is all good and well until there’s only one person at the counter with a line out the door and a bunch of empty tables inside. But I digress, as even with that wait to order it probably took just as long to get my food as it would have if I had sat down and ordered at the table.

And what food did I order? Why, that would be the Southwest Breakfast Burrito. Unlike most southwest-style burritos, this one had no beans and, most importantly, no pico de gallo. Instead, it was filled with spicy chorizo, cheddar, avocado, scrambled eggs (duh), and jalapeno cream cheese. It also came with hash browns on the side, and not inside like some burritos may be.

I was definitely a fan of the various flavors and the burrito undoubtedly packed a punch. Yet, the ingredients all kind of blurred together from a textural standpoint. And this was a shame, because the hash browns that were on the outside looking in were of the delicious crunchy sort. Throw those in the burrito and they are a game changer, but without them I was left with the feeling that this burrito just didn’t live up to its flavor potential.

Alas, flavor is important, so with that said I was a fan of Scramble, but not as much of a fan as I could have been.

Tacos, tacos and more tacos. That was the premise of the Rockin’ Taco Rumble in Downtown Phoenix on March 2nd, 2018. $45 got you unlimited tacos, six drinks and a wooden nickel to vote for your favorite taco. It took place at Events on Jackson, which was a pretty cool venue, but what was much less cool was the fact that some spots were already running out of tacos by the time I arrived and the lines were crazy long. Nevertheless, I persisted and was able to identify some favorites.

Modern Tortilla – Lamb Adobo

I don’t know why, but this place had the shortest line and was pretty much the best taco around. The lamb was insanely juicy and the adobo flavors were strong with this one. I’ll just guess that this place knew how to operate its taco making so well that I went back for seconds.

Willie’s Taco Joint – Lob-Sta-Taco

Having just returned from Massachusetts, I was a bit skeptical about lobster in the desert. Yet, Willie’s did not disappoint, making great use of mango habanero salsa to enhance the tasty lobster flavor.

Helio Basin – War Bonnet Carnitas

This brewery knows its tacos. And this taco was popping with ribeye, jalapeno pesto, crema, pickled cauliflowers (no, I didn’t eat them), Fresno peppers, pomegranate and mango aji salsa. It was a mouthful, and yet all those different flavors worked really well together.

Taco Guild – Chipotle Cherry Steak

This taco took home the grand prize. I loved the combination of blue cheese, poblano straws, chile aioli and steak, but it was admittedly difficult to not be overwhelmed by all of the flavor packed into this taco.

As media, I was able to attend for free, but had I paid $45 or $55 to get in, I may have left disappointed, if not slightly hungry. Unlimited tacos shouldn’t have the caveat of first come first served, but that shouldn’t completely distract from how delicious the event was and how the event helped to raise money for the Phoenix Community Alliance. Tacos are great, but building a better Phoenix is even better.