Mexican Restaurant Similarity

[dalej42]

@ministryman

I wish I were, but Chicago is as on par with LA for Mexican food as LA is on par with Chicago for Pizza.

Chicago has great Mexican food as well as great pizza.

[Taomist]

Sort of on topic: I’ve moved to an area that is primarily mexican, and all the mexican restaurants to me seem the same. And the food seems the same. They aren’t chains, it’s just ‘real mexican food’. And it’s not very exciting, or, to my palate, all that great. There will be notable exceptions, but yeah. Also they don’t bring free chips and salsa; that’s typically something you order. You WILL, however, usually get some neat pickled carrots and what-not. I think they’re supposed to be a relish-garnish kind of thing, but I end up just…eating them.

[pulykamell]

@Taomist

Sort of on topic: I’ve moved to an area that is primarily mexican, and all the mexican restaurants to me seem the same. And the food seems the same. They aren’t chains, it’s just ‘real mexican food’. And it’s not very exciting, or, to my palate, all that great. There will be notable exceptions, but yeah. Also they don’t bring free chips and salsa; that’s typically something you order. You WILL, however, usually get some neat pickled carrots and what-not. I think they’re supposed to be a relish-garnish kind of thing, but I end up just…eating them.

I think you do get that in pockets. In my immediate neighborhood, for whatever reason, you can’t throw a rock without hitting some form of Mexican seafood restaurants. I don’t understand why my neighborhood needs probably close to ten of these places within a square mile, all with a similar type of menu, but they’re everywhere. Luckily, is interspersed with more varied Mexican restaurants and tacquerias that focus on different house specialties.

I wonder if (assume) it has to do with the immigration make-up of the neighborhood and what specific area of Mexico they’re from. I have a friend who owns a Yucatecan restaurant, and when he had it in Cicero, he said he had trouble attracting the local Mexican population, as they were from elsewhere where that style of food wasn’t served, and when they went out, they wanted something they were more familiar with. He said it was much easier getting the non-Mexicans to try the food of his family than it was the local population. (While some Yucatecan food can be generally recognized as “Mexican” by appearance, it is quite distinct. However, you can say that about all regional Mexican. The food and influences in, say, Veracruz food is quite different than what you get in, say, Oaxaca.) He even started serving up standards like steak tacos for the lunch crowd to get some more local traffic (they’ve since moved and have an all-Yucatecan menu.)

[ralph124c]

Why is it so hard to get good chile rellenos? Very few of the Tex-Mex places around here even serve them. I found a guy (he’s from Durango) who has them on his menu, so I go there often.
It’s not hard dish to make, but few places do it well.

[Gary_T]

Kansas City is in the heart of the Midwest, yet has Mexican restaurants that defy the OP’s observations. In many of them, Mexican folks are conspicuous by their presence, not their absence. You’ve just been to the wrong cities.

[UncleRojelio]

@birdbrain

I am in Des Moines, IA and Omaha, NE. I have been to other restaurants in IL, WI, and MN..

So, what you are saying is that you have never been to a Mexican restaurant. Come on down to Austin if you want an actual Mexican food experience.

[Edgar_in_Indy]

@birdbrain

I have been consumed by an intermittent obsession for about 10 years. Every so often I MUST get to the bottom of it, then it subsides for 6 or 7 months until the next new restaurant opens. Here is the thing, I have been to dozens of Mexican restaurants in many cities all over the midwest. Most of them are different in name only and I think that about 90% of them have far too much in common for it to be mere coincidence.

I know this thread is a bit dusty, but something in the news today led me here.

I have been bothered by the same question as the OP for years, having observed that all of the seemingly-independent Mexican restaurants here in the Indianapolis area actually appear to be part of some huge, underground chain or franchise. Other than the names (which invariably start with El/La/Los/Las), you would think you are in the exact same restaurant.

I have noticed all of the items on the OP’s list (including the odd lack of female staff) except for the ceremony of the huge sombrero, but I usually just go at lunch time.

I have made discrete inquiries before with the staff regarding whether their restaurant is part of a franchise, but I was told that they were independently owned. I just found it hard to believe there wasn’t some connection, since everything was not just similar, but almost identical.

So today I was very interested when I read in the Indianapolis Star that several of these local Mexican restaurants have been seized by the Marion County (Indianapolis) Prosecutor’s Office for being part of a money laundering “empire”. :eek: In addition to several local restaurants being seized, they also seized more than $2.7 million in US currency and $1.1 million in foreign currency.

So perhaps the OP really was onto something when his Spidey sense started tingling every time he an identical chip into an identical bowl of salsa. :dubious:

Here’s a link to the story from the Indianapolis Star:

El Rodeo restaurant empire accused of money laundering

I was going to post a comment to the Star story, but I don’t have a facebook account (and don’t want one!)