Cafe El Tapatio

Cafe El Tapatio

Cafe El Tapatio is located at 3400 N Ashland Ave just North of W Roscoe street. The restaurant when walking up seemed a lot bigger than it actually was. There are only two rooms for dinning and not too many tables. It makes for a nice close environment. The walls were decorated with traditional Mexican paintings, but since it is the Holidays there were some festive lights and decorations up as well. The restaurant was filled, we had no wait and were seated right away, but I could imagine El Tapatio having a decent wait if word got out about how great their food is!

Everyone that worked there was very nice and I am guessing that it was the owner or manager who walked around to every table, a couple of times, to make sure everyone was doing well. The service was great; food came fast, and left my plate even faster!

Café El Tapatio makes their own tortilla chips as well as all of their salsas and sauces. We were given a nice size bowl of chips and a great homemade salsa with a good kick to start off.

The first course my girlfriend and I started out with was the Empanadas. If you have never had an Empanada before they are turnovers stuffed with various ingredients. The one that we had was the baby spinach and queso de cabra. It was great. The order came with four good-sized Empanadas along with a Verde salsa and sour cream in the middle of the plate. The cheese had a great taste and was melted and warm inside along with the baby spinach; it made an excellent start to dinner!

Following the Empanadas my main course came quickly after the appetizer plate was cleared. The Tacos del Mar was something that caught my eye right away. Being a huge fan of fish tacos I always think back to the great ones that I had on the beaches of San Diego. Now I can enjoy the same ones right here in the Windy City! The Tacos del Mar were described as a lightly battered tilapia topped with mixed greens and cilantro crema. Served in a warm tortilla de maiz and arroz blanco. I would describe this as DAMN, that’s good stuff! The tacos were excellent. I got three tacos with a large chunk of battered and deep fried fish along with a mound of rice and some diced tomatoes, onions and cilantro in its own little pile. The cilantro crema was something that I had never had before, but it was great. Having a similar consistency as sour cream accompanied with some lime I squeezed on them I was in heaven!

Overall Café El Tapatio is a hidden gem right in Roscoe village. This restaurant is the type of place I will bring my friends from out of town to get some fine Mexican cuisine!

Seasons Greetings!

Hello to all,

I hope everyone has had a great holiday, we have the new year coming closer with even more new possibilities to eat and places to enjoy! I wanted to reach out and post this to let everyone know that since the creation of Windy City Food Review the blog that you are now looking at now was not allowing any comments to be added. I believe a number of people tried and it did not work. That is my fault. I thought it was an error on the sites part, but all along all that needed to be done was change some things around in the settings. So please leave some comments let us know what you think and if you enjoyed our review! We are looking for new places to go to at all times!

Coming soon will be the review on the food truck Duck N Roll. Also we will be having two restaurant reviews coming out on Cafe El Tapatio and Sarks in the park.

Find us on Facebook if you haven't already and follow us on Twitter. We have recently added an Instagram page too!

@WindyCityFoodRe

As I have previously stated our website will be coming out in the next couple weeks so keep your eyes open for www.windycityfoodreview.com

I would also like to announce that there has been over 800 views on the site, and on this past Wednesday alone there were 60 views that day! Sooooo, I would like to thank everyone that keeps up with the blog and we look forward to hearing your response on the reviews!

~ Windy City Food Review ~

The Southern Mac and Cheese Truck

Comfort Food with a Twist

The Southern Mac and Cheese Truck

The Southern

The Southern Mac and Cheese Truck specializes in assorted macaroni and cheese dishes. The truck can be recognized from anywhere on the road with its distinctive colors and life like macaroni and cheese on the side of it.

The Southern Mac and Cheese Truck is a branch off of The Southern Chicago (kick ass bar and comfort food) restaurant, which can be found in Wicker Park at 1840 West North Avenue. The restaurant carries similar macaroni dishes, but since it is a restaurant they have a larger variety of options.

I was able to catch up with the truck and met, Dave who was running it . He pointed me in the direction of one of the best mac and cheese combinations that I have ever had, The Mexican Chorizo Macaroni and Cheese. This pleasant meal goes great as a lunch and I imagine would be a great side to any dinner.

Mexican Chorizo Mac and Cheese

The Mexican chorizo was amazing, it had a great flavor and a nice medium heat to it. The dish had elbow macaroni that was cooked to my preference, soft. The cheese was rich, tasty and did not flood the plate. There was what seemed to be panko breadcrumbs in the dish that added more flavoring and a light crunch. All around I really enjoyed it all and had no complaints, other than can I have some more please. Normally I have to put hot sauce in any mac and cheese I have to add a little extra flavor. I think if I had done that it would have been an insult to this great meal!

I really enjoyed this dish and I have been looking forward to trying the Southern Mac and Cheese Truck for a while. I was not disappointed at all! In fact I can’t wait to go back again! The proportions were nice sized. I ate mine for lunch and was pretty content with the amount of food that I had. I could have easily taken a nap afterwards. I want to thank the Southern Mac and Cheese Truck for providing Chicago with some great comfort food with a new twist!

December schedule

Happy Holidays to everyone!

I hope you have made a dent in your Christmas shopping list. I apologize for not have any reviews up in the last week, but have no fear Windy City Food Review is here!!!

This month we will be doing reviews on
Duck N Roll, The Southern Mac and Cheese Truck, and Wow Bao!!!

I do not have dates yet for when I will be visiting the trucks, but I ensure you they will be coming out this month!

If you haven't visited some of the past trucks that I have done reviews on then you are missing out. Check some previous posts and click the link to the trucks web page to see where they are at or you can visit Food Truck Freak to find out where they will be at!!

In other good news Windy City Food Review will be coming out with it's own website before the new year! I know the blog page that I have been using has its faults, but this new website will be more interactive and have a lot more features to use!

If you need to reach me or have any input send a message to WindyCityFoodReview@yahoo.com Follow us on Twitter @windycityfoodre and check us out on Instagram WindyCityFoodRe

Thanks!

Windy City Food Review

Falafel Brothers

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 Where’s my Falafel?!

Falafel Brothers 

Where to find them?
Track 24/365 via twitter.com@myfalafel
Call 312.359.2220

The Falafel Brothers Food Truck & Catering is a family run truck, which brings the rich flavors of Mediterranean food from the Middle East. The brothers Huthyfah and Ibrahim Abed were kind enough to allow me to come by and get some great wraps!

The Falafel Brothers Food Truck & Catering are in high demand and being that they can be found on 58^th and Ellis they have established a consistent location for their truck. The truck can be found on the University of Chicago’s campus. Not only does the Falafel Brothers Food Truck & Catering distribute food on the streets of Chicago, but they can also be utilized for any event due to their catering capabilities.

When I went to the Truck were out of a number of their products due to the high sales demand, but I was able to get two of their top sellers; the Shish Tawouk Wrap and the Original Falafel Wrap.

Shish Tawouk Wrap

All Natural Chicken, Hummus, Authentic Turnips, Pickled Cucumbers and Tahini (white) Sauce

The Chicken was beautifully seasoned and cooked. The warm juicy chicken went great with all the flavors accompanied in the wrap. The pickled cucumbers provided a nice sweet crunch along with the tasty hummus. I was a little surprised to have turnips in the wrap due to not really seeing them in wraps and not eating them very often. Thanks to the Falafel Brothers I will be eating turnips more often. The turnip accompanied the picked cucumbers with their sweet flavor and added a nice crunch too. Over all this was a great wrap. The ingredients were not lost to a large amount of bread. The wrap that they used was very nice and doughy and the wrap all together was pretty thin. I really enjoyed the size  of the wrap because it did not leave me groggy and tired from eating all the carbohydrates. This is a great lunch to have because all of the healthy ingredients and a joy for your taste buds because of all the rich flavoring that is accompanied by each bite.

 

Original Falafel Wrap

Original Falafel Bites, Signature Hummus, Authentic Turnips, Pickled Cucumbers and Tahini (white) Sauce

I know I had talked about a vegetarian option in one of my last food reviews, so here it is! The falafel bites are an amazing non-meat product that everyone can enjoy. Usually falafels are made up of spices and mashed chickpeas. These ingredients are breaded and shaped into little spheres before they are deep-fried. These bite size treats have been placed inside this wonderful wrap. The ingredients are the same as the Shish Tawouk wrap, all natural and healthy. The pickled cucumbers were sweet and crunchy accompanied by the colorful turnips.

Sauce

Tzatziki- a traditional sauce made of strained yogurt, cucumbers, garlic, salt, olive oil and sometimes lemon juice. The sauce was great! It gave me a little bit of a dry sense in the back of my throat, but it was very flavorful and went great with the chicken and falafel bites

Salsa- Great flavoring medium heat filled with tomatoes cilantro and maybe a little garlic. The salsa was fresh and went along great with both wraps.

All said and done the Falafel Brothers Food Truck & Catering do it right! Whether you are looking for some great seasoned chicken or are looking for a vegetarian option. Make sure you get down to 58^th and Ellis to check them out and get ready to see the Falafel Brothers Food Truck & Catering in Lincoln Park near the DePaul campus when school starts back up in January!

Come Visit Soon!!!