Mirrey Tacos Express is the second location for this restaurant. It is
located inside of the new Dave's Express at Kuykendahl and Dowdell. I
stopped in the other day to try them out for lunch. One caveat on
service--the woman who helped me spoke no English, and my few words of
Spanish did not suffice. We did the best we could. I got three mini
tacos--beef fajita, chicken fajita, and al pastor--and a Mexican coke to
go with it.
Cheap! If you want an inexpensive hot meal this
will do the trick. With a regular fountain drink I would have been out
for about $5. And the tacos were decent--double-shell corn tortillas,
and all the meats had good flavor and were tender. I often don't like
al pastor so much, but this version was quite tasty.
There's no
defined eating area, just a couple of tables in the middle of the store.
The store itself is sparkling clean, including the restroom. It's not
destination gas-station cuisine like Tony's Street Tacos, or even
Laredo Taco Company, but if you're there and hungry it will do fine. Tres tacos pequenos por favor!
My Yelp Review
Tuesday, April 30, 2019
Monday, April 22, 2019
Fang's Cafe
My family ate there recently and we
mostly ordered off the standard Chinese menu. Fang's has a very broad
menu, covering Chinese, some Asian fusion, and sushi. They offer
combination platters in the evening, which is nice if you want some soup
and an egg roll with dinner but don't want to order them separately.
We had the Hunan Chicken, the Honey Chicken, the Assorted Vegetables,
and a Tonkatsu Ramen. Also had the crabmeat rangoons and an egg roll.
The egg roll was fine--a bit on the skinny side. The crabmeat rangoons were the usual--cream cheese filling, unlikely any crab was harmed in the process. The entrees met expectations, and were nicely colorful in the vegetable selection. The Tonkatsu Ramen was nicely presented, and the broth had great flavor. But the noodles were kind of dense and sticky, I didn't care for them.
One thing that makes Fang's stand out is that they offer a range of desserts. The ice cream desserts are not made in-house, so I didn't try them. But they also have a selection of Asian teas and sweet drinks, and a variety of smoothies. We had the Pineapple and Green Tea smoothies, and they were quite good as a finish to the meal.
Others have praised the sushi, so we may not have hit the best of the menu. But what we had was fine. The restaurant has kind of dark furniture and was dimly lit in the evening, so the visuals may be more important in better light. The bathroom was clean and ready. We've been before so we'll probably go again when we're in the mood for Chinese with dessert.
My Yelp Review
The egg roll was fine--a bit on the skinny side. The crabmeat rangoons were the usual--cream cheese filling, unlikely any crab was harmed in the process. The entrees met expectations, and were nicely colorful in the vegetable selection. The Tonkatsu Ramen was nicely presented, and the broth had great flavor. But the noodles were kind of dense and sticky, I didn't care for them.
One thing that makes Fang's stand out is that they offer a range of desserts. The ice cream desserts are not made in-house, so I didn't try them. But they also have a selection of Asian teas and sweet drinks, and a variety of smoothies. We had the Pineapple and Green Tea smoothies, and they were quite good as a finish to the meal.
Others have praised the sushi, so we may not have hit the best of the menu. But what we had was fine. The restaurant has kind of dark furniture and was dimly lit in the evening, so the visuals may be more important in better light. The bathroom was clean and ready. We've been before so we'll probably go again when we're in the mood for Chinese with dessert.
My Yelp Review
Monday, April 15, 2019
Arepas de Pilon
The food court at Harvest Natural Market is under renovation, but Arepas
de Pilon is a separate business and is still serving. I stopped in the
other day for lunch while shopping and had an empanada, an arepa, and a
passionfruit drink.
The empanada was a Mechada, filled with shredded beef. It was deep fat fried and pretty greasy, with a hard shell. Now, I don't mind grease at all--that puddle at the bottom of the container is a sign of good things to come. I very much enjoyed my empanada, the beef was tender and flavorful and I love a crunchy shell. But some may be put off.
For the arepa I chose the Venezuelan Queen. An arepa on its own is a corn pancake. These arepas are split and filled, making a sandwich, and it's kind of like eating a sandwich on an english muffin. The Venezuelan Queen is a chicken avocado salad arepa. It was generously filled with a smooth and tasty filling. Not super flavorful but just fine.
Either of those items would make a good meal. I washed them down with the passionfruit drink, which was sweet and refreshing. I tried the sugar cane lemonade and don't recommend it unless you specifically know and like sugar cane drinks.
South American food, particularly Venezuelan food, is trending now. We will see more of it as refugees from South American start businesses here. It's going to provide another facet for our very diverse restaurant scene.
My Yelp Review
The empanada was a Mechada, filled with shredded beef. It was deep fat fried and pretty greasy, with a hard shell. Now, I don't mind grease at all--that puddle at the bottom of the container is a sign of good things to come. I very much enjoyed my empanada, the beef was tender and flavorful and I love a crunchy shell. But some may be put off.
For the arepa I chose the Venezuelan Queen. An arepa on its own is a corn pancake. These arepas are split and filled, making a sandwich, and it's kind of like eating a sandwich on an english muffin. The Venezuelan Queen is a chicken avocado salad arepa. It was generously filled with a smooth and tasty filling. Not super flavorful but just fine.
Either of those items would make a good meal. I washed them down with the passionfruit drink, which was sweet and refreshing. I tried the sugar cane lemonade and don't recommend it unless you specifically know and like sugar cane drinks.
South American food, particularly Venezuelan food, is trending now. We will see more of it as refugees from South American start businesses here. It's going to provide another facet for our very diverse restaurant scene.
My Yelp Review
Monday, April 8, 2019
El Chaparro on Kuykendahl in Tomball
It's certainly not hard to find Tex-Mex in our neighborhood, and not too difficult to find competent Tex-Mex either. What's difficult is to stand out. El Chaparro does manage to differentiate itself in a couple of ways. It claims to be "Mex-Mex" rather than Tex-Mex, but that's not one of them. However we had a good time the last time we went.
We came in on a busy Saturday night with a party of eight, and lo and behold, there was an 8-top open! So off to a good start. El Chaparro covers all the bases for Tex-Mex, and does them with reasonable flair. We started off with a queso, which has nice color with the green and red chiles but is otherwise pretty normal. I had the pork carnitas, and they were tender and juicy, which doesn't happen every time. It's a different recipe, a bit more acid than I'm used to, but if they are tender they win me over. My wife had the 3 enchilada plate--a nice chicken-foot presentation and good execution. Others had tacos, quesadillas, and a taco salad. All were happy. The taco salad was as big as your head--not that unusual, and mostly lettuce, but fun anyway.
They have free ice cream for a sweet finish, and it's good. I went for the "fried" ice cream. I say "fried" because it is not fried (some places do that, but not here). It was vanilla ice cream and whipped cream in a churro shell, coated with corn flakes. The garnish was a strawberry the size of a tangerine which was beautifully ripe. I don't like strawberries much but my daughter assured me it was a good one. Maybe not the genuine article but a nice finish, I was happy I got it.
The interior is pleasant, with a nice textured wall treatment and lots of art. So for me, it stands out for presentation--the aesthetics are above average. On the downside, it got pretty noisy, it was something of a relief to get out. The place is family friendly, there were many families with young children there. We'll likely be back.
My Yelp Review
We came in on a busy Saturday night with a party of eight, and lo and behold, there was an 8-top open! So off to a good start. El Chaparro covers all the bases for Tex-Mex, and does them with reasonable flair. We started off with a queso, which has nice color with the green and red chiles but is otherwise pretty normal. I had the pork carnitas, and they were tender and juicy, which doesn't happen every time. It's a different recipe, a bit more acid than I'm used to, but if they are tender they win me over. My wife had the 3 enchilada plate--a nice chicken-foot presentation and good execution. Others had tacos, quesadillas, and a taco salad. All were happy. The taco salad was as big as your head--not that unusual, and mostly lettuce, but fun anyway.
They have free ice cream for a sweet finish, and it's good. I went for the "fried" ice cream. I say "fried" because it is not fried (some places do that, but not here). It was vanilla ice cream and whipped cream in a churro shell, coated with corn flakes. The garnish was a strawberry the size of a tangerine which was beautifully ripe. I don't like strawberries much but my daughter assured me it was a good one. Maybe not the genuine article but a nice finish, I was happy I got it.
The interior is pleasant, with a nice textured wall treatment and lots of art. So for me, it stands out for presentation--the aesthetics are above average. On the downside, it got pretty noisy, it was something of a relief to get out. The place is family friendly, there were many families with young children there. We'll likely be back.
My Yelp Review
Tuesday, April 2, 2019
Fuel Maxx #18
Some of my favorite places to eat are in convenience stores, so I'm always happy to check them out. This store is newly renovated, so I stopped in to try out the new kitchen.
Had a burger with fries, a barbacoa taco, and a drink. It took about
15 minutes to get the food because they make the hamburgers to order,
and I don't think they had done one that day because they had to heat
everything up. There were some premade items, but they looked like they
had been sitting a long time.
Fresh didn't help the burger, it was a prefab patty and ended up being overdone. The fries were soggy because they were rushed--the first time she put them in the oil wasn't up to temperature, and the second time probably just barely. I like barbacoa tacos, but this barbacoa had very little flavor to go with the squishy texture--I couldn't finish it. At least the drink was OK.
The station is very clean and neat, including the bathrooms, which is a strong plus for a convenience store. The selection is kind of minimal but covers all the convenience store bases. Maybe the breakfast selection is better. But overall I'd stick to the packaged food.
My Yelp Review
Fresh didn't help the burger, it was a prefab patty and ended up being overdone. The fries were soggy because they were rushed--the first time she put them in the oil wasn't up to temperature, and the second time probably just barely. I like barbacoa tacos, but this barbacoa had very little flavor to go with the squishy texture--I couldn't finish it. At least the drink was OK.
The station is very clean and neat, including the bathrooms, which is a strong plus for a convenience store. The selection is kind of minimal but covers all the convenience store bases. Maybe the breakfast selection is better. But overall I'd stick to the packaged food.
My Yelp Review
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)