I am at a point where I prefer functional food most of all. I just want something semi-tasty to abate the hunger pangs, preferably at a reasonable price. If I want something fancy I will make it myself, at home. Unless I can’t. I think people that go out on a weekend night for an eating “experience” filled with great service, pleasing atmosphere, and notional eats are not “foodies” but maladjusted weirdos. Food serves a vital function: life, culture, community. Foodies want to have a curated breakfast experience with a Walt Disney Concert Hall backdrop just so they can have a story to tell their co-workers come Monday morning. Cuz life is otherwise so, so boring.

In Downtown Los Angeles you can find many eating experiences but its much harder to find just food.

Luckily there are still some places that haven’t been kicked out yet to make room for the next organic seasonal sandwich you can’t afford. I’ve been coming to this food shack in a parking lot for a year now, mostly for their quite decent vegetarian torta (with queso panela even!) but had yet to make it in time for the breakfast menu. Today I headed out early to score my lunch/breakfast.

$5.25 for HR’s in Downtown LA is a bargain.

Right after I ordered my food the cook threw a bunch of tortillas on the grill, I thought she was making some previous order for tacos. But no, she was heating up my extra tortillas and left two on the grill to get crispy and crunchy, which would be the base tortillas for these HR’s. Thus, no fried tortilla underneath which is the way things should be in a perfect world. But grill crisped tortillas are a decent and healthier alternative to frying, much better than the usual lukewarm and soft variant. I approve of this innovation.

It came with free coffee even. And those 5 mini corn tortillas, cuz I forgot to ask for harina. Doh!

And just as those two torts were crisping up the cook cracked two eggs onto said grill then turned them over at just the right time, aka eggs over easy, aka huevos estrellados. She then plated them over the grilled tortillas and doused them with a red salsa picante (my choice) that was flavorful with hints of chile California or New Mexico. It’s probably their basic red sauce which they use for all their red sauce purposes, a simple to make but still tasty condiment that you might not find it in most places. Over perfectly cooked runny egg yolks, this sauce did what it had to do, delivering a punch of piquant and savor to the richness of flavor that comes from your basic egg. Simple is often perfect. And this time it was.

There was some cheese on top but not so much that it detracted from the course at hand. They advertise no lard, and the beans were good enough. The rice was more in the 7 mares style but good enough as well. But the grand performer of this breakfast were the properly cooked eggs smothered in chile sauce. I felt satiated and pleased at the reasonable pricing, a working man’s breakfast. I would have it again.

The only problem with this place is that it’s in that area of Spring St. full of lofts and their corresponding yuppies, many of whom love to bring their ugly dogs out for walks and to sit at this eatery. Others will stop by with their own accoutrement canines and exchange banalities about dog breeds, years the animal has spent in captivity of this dull owner, the frivolous/whimsical name chosen for the pet, and if the conditions are just right, maybe some personal exchange about the people handlers themselves! It’s a putri dish for a world I want no part of.

But I will likely suffer the neighborhood again for a decent plate of Huevos Rancheros while I escape the tedium of work. Cya there!

Mai Mexican Kitchen  213.688.0011
633 S. Spring St  Downtown LA, 90014

At first I thought this was a lamentation, a poem of despair for the passing of some burger joint on Broadway in El Centro. But it turns out Oh! Teri Burger was the name of the place.

REST IN POWER OH! TERI BURGER!

I have eaten HR’s this year, quit regularly actually, but it seems like this is the first one I’m reviewing. I wonder why? I have eaten some good examples, like the ones from Rocio’s on Maywood, but the photos linger on my desktop while the memories of that experience begin to fade. I really should take notes. Eh.

Here is a recent outing, over at that fair city by the Bay known as Frisco.

One of our regular stops before heading down south is Boogaloos in the Mission District, cuz they make a good breakfast and a very good cup of regular coffee and its usually hard to find both in the same location. Is it too much to ask?

Nothing too fancy about the place, just your typical SF scene of young urban professionals starting their day. It’s like visiting parts of LA that I avoid on purpose. I guess I find it easier to visit these spots when I can put a few hundred miles of separation rather quickly.

While I usually stick to their excellent American style breakfast I thought it would be good to change it up a bit, stick a wrench in the dietary routine. It was Anarchy weekend after all. So yes, I deserve what I got for straying from the path: Gringo HR’s.

The eggs were good, the salsa ranchera ok but lacking much in the way of flavor or spice. The tortilla underneath? Not even a hint of being fried, basically just warmed up for a taco. Nope. Their idea of an appropriate side was some pickled cabbage salad, haha! Serio? Y para cabarla de chingar, they throw on some undercooked black beans, a staple of Whitey-Cooking-Mexican food. A properly cooked bowl of pintos is a truly satisfying and incomparable meal that is almost impossible to find outside your own kitchen. It seems strange that almost all Mexicanish food done by non-Mexicans tends to favor black beans. Are black beans gourmet? Are they a way to disassociate from pedestrian Mexican fare? Or a conscious decision to be more like those exotic-er Mexicans from the south and not that riff-raff from the north?  I’d like to know.

You can keep your cabbage salad and under cooked beans.

I like black beans – WHEN THEY ARE DONE RIGHT!  (Maybe with a little bit of epazote for flavor.) Don’t just fucking read the package instructions for cooking times, taste the damn beans and see if they are still hard or not. They are easier to eat and digest when cooked properly, aka not hard, aka soft, aka flaccid. This must be related to the American fascination with “chili”, that disgusting stew of hard beans, chiles, and sometimes meat, that seems to have taught people that undercooked beans are okay to eat. No wonder you make fun of bean eaters and their tootiness.

Whatever, I’m ranting now. But pay attention to this black/brown divide next time you find yourself at an American joint that dabbles in South of the Border.

Luckily I hedged my bets and ordered a biscuit with veggie gravy. It’s good.

Stick to the biscuits.

Boogaloos  415.824.3211
3296 22nd Street @ Valencia
Frisco, CA 94110
www.boogaloossf.com

Some people still find it funny and incongruous that a Mexican can be a vegetarian. That doesn’t seem to be the case anymore with food manufacturers. I just noticed today that now there are two soy chorizo options for vegetarians made by companies that cater to Mexican tastes. That soyrizo bullshit doesn’t count, its just not very good. I bought this new Cacique version, I expect it to be good but you never know. I’ve been a fan of Reynaldo’s for a long time now but maybe those days are numbered? We shall see.

As of now, you can officially stop “representing” Los Angeles with that one hand sign you picked up on the internet. Hopefully you didn’t get this as a tattoo. Like a chump.

Only in Frisco! Where else would you pay $10 for a slice of pizza and soda and have it be called a Lunch Special? Must be nice to be filthy rich.