Monday, July 22, 2019

El Chaparro at Kuykendahl and Gosling

We have been to the other El Chaparro a few times, and decided to try this one.  We went later on a Saturday evening--the place was full but we still did not have to wait.

We ordered several Tex-Mex standards.  First off, fajitas--every restaurant says they have the best ones, but these do stand out.  The beef is tender and very flavorful.  They include a serving of clarified butter, which I have seen with seafood before but never beef.  I love clarified butter with pretty much anything, so this worked for me.  I liked the standard beef fajitas better than the combination I got the last time I was there.

Next up, seafood.  We ordered Betty's Shrimp, which was a tasty combination of sauteed shrimp and vegetables.  The shrimp were nicely done.  The vegetables were more "southern style", pretty thoroughly cooked but not falling apart and well seasoned.  It came with cilantro rice, which was very good--I prefer it to the standard Tex-Mex rice.

We also got a combination enchilada plate.  The presentation was very nice, with each one well separated on the plate.  These were fine but did not stand out.

The restaurant offers free soft-serve ice cream, but we ordered a couple of desserts--sopapillas and chocolate cake.  The sopapillas had plenty of sugar and cinnamon.  They were a bit heavy for my taste but were fine--came with a nice garnish of whipped cream.  The chocolate cake is made in-house.  The taste was good, but it was a bit dry.  They serve it with a garnish of vanilla ice cream, and it actually would have been perfect with more of it.

Service was fine, particularly with the restaurant being pretty full.  The ambiance is somewhat dark inside and the decor is mostly TVs, showing a very wide variety of programming--women's golf and reality TV in addition to the usual soccer/Astros stuff.  They have a wide variety of alcohol offerings, which we did not try but heard good things about.  Overall, we were very happy with the meal and will be back.


My Yelp Review

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