Coco Miel

I'm back! I haven't blogged in a while, I have been busy with work and school. It doesn't mean that I have not eaten anywhere interesting. In the contrary, I have eaten at many new restaurants that I wish I had written about after I had eaten.

Today, my husband and I decided to go eat at Chili's, but to our delight there was a 40 minute wait and instead of waiting around we decided to go to Coco Miel. I had already heard good reviews from my co-worker about it, thus it made it easier for me to suggest it to my husband. Coco Miel is located at 1515 North Lee Trevino Drive, it is next to the Mister Car Wash.

When you walk in the vibe is fairly laid back and the place is trendy. It reminded me of a cool bar in a bigger city. My husband and I took the table right as you walk in, for those that are a bit claustophobic, this might not be the place for you. The decor is very modern one wall has exposed brick while the opposing wall has a what I would call a timeless wall paper; black flowers on a white background. The bar area is very clean and is adorned with an amusing monkey head, which made me laugh. There is a sitting area in the middle of the restaurant and you can just sit there and enjoy a drink while watching tv.

We were quickly greeted by our server and we were given enough time to look it over. There staples are pizza, calzones, and salads. There is one menu dedicated to alcoholic drinks. An array of wines, beers and other alcoholic drinks to choose from.

My husband and I decided to share a pizza and salad. We chose the Italian meat pizza, which had all the artery clogging, but very savory tasting meats. The pizza had salami, Italian sausage, pepporoni, ham and bacon. The salad that I got to choose was the Blue Walnut salad, which consisted of blue cheese crumbles, caramalized walnuts, blue berries, dried cranberries with organic mixed greens and a vinegrate.

The pizza came out first and I must admit I saw it and I didn't not think it would be good. I was wrong it was very tasty and the one thing that I loved was that the pizza sauce was not too overwhelming. The crust was thin, but not too thin. It was moist and it had some flavor it wasn't just a plain crust. The combination of meats and cheese was perfect, it was really hard to only eat one slice, well for me it was.

Next, the salad came out and it was this ginormous salad, which I seriously thought we would not be able to finish. I cannot describe the burst of flavor that rushed my taste buds when I took the first bite of the salad. It was fresh, creamy, savory and tangy all at the same time. Every ingredient in the salad was fresh and it was delicious. It had been such a long time since I had an actual blue berry and as soon as I ate one I started picking through the salad to find more. To my delight there were plenty and I was happy that they did not skimp on them or any other ingredient like the cranberries or walnuts.

My own bad remark about Coco Miel, was that our waiter seemed like he did not want to be there. He did not really care about making sure we were doing okay or if our glasses were empty. He was lucky that our food was so delicious that we didn't mind not having a second helping of our drink.

Overall, Coco Miel is a nice and wonderful restaurant to go have an early lunch or a dinner. If you are ever around that area, please stop by Coco Miel. I know you will not be disappointed.

SPEC's

You might be wondering why I am reviewing SPEC's if they sell liquor, beer and spirits, right? SPEC's is not only a liquor store, but also has a variety of food products. SPEC's also has a deli, which sells a variety of deli sandwiches and burgers. I was hesitant about eating at the deli, because when I think of a deli I think of just a deli meat counter. I never think of a deli as serving food that is good, especially if it comes from a liquor store.


I was overwhelmed by the variety of items that they have on there menu from classic burgers, to chicken salad sandwich and the not too common gyro. It took a while to comb over the menu, but the staff was super friendly and waited patiently while we decided on our items. Being the adventurous type I figured I would get the uncommon item from the menu the gyro and my husband got the reuben sandwich with french fries. I must warn you that the sides and drink all come separately, thus it makes the complete price of your meal a bit pricey.


It took no more than eight minutes for us to get our food, my gyro seemed very appetizing and my husbands reuben sandwich was ginormous. First, my gyro was nice and warm; great start. The gyro meat was a bit on the dry side, but it did pack a lot of flavor. They did however skimp on the all delicious tzatziki sauce, which was very flavorful thus my disappointment with how little came in the sandwich. Overall, the gyro was pretty average, but who am I kidding not too many people know how to make a real gyro in El Paso.


My husbands reuben sandwich was, as I said before, ginormous and being the gentleman he is he offered me a taste. When I tasted the sandwich, I quickly was disappointed that I had chosen the gyro. His sandwich was the best reuben sandwich I have ever tasted! The combination of pastrami, saurkraut, swiss cheese, thousand island dressing and rye bread was delightful. I seriously thought I had died and gone to heaven. I really did not want to give back his sandwich, but he gave me that, I want my sandwich back look, so I had to give it back. After tasting the reuben I had to continue eating my disappointing gyro sandwich, sigh. I must not forget that we also ordered a side of fries, which were good. They weren't out of this world. They were just regular french fries, but I must say they were nicely golden brown and correctly seasoned.


I recommend for anybody to go out to SPEC's and try the reuben or any other sandwich they serve on there extensive menu. And if you are not hungry I encourage you to take a look at there liquors, beers, and spirits or other food items. I must admit that I keep on dreaming about that reuben sandwich so I will be going back pretty soon!

Artisan Pizza

Okay, here I am again trying to write another blog about food. I changed the name of my blog, because I believe this suits me a little better than the other title. I am trying to find new restaurants and trying to taste what is out there. El Paso is saturated with Mexican food restaurants and I feel we need more diversity. Believe me we are getting there, but I cannot say that we are a diverse city at this very moment.

One of my co-workers brought a free magazine to work the other day and it had tons of advertisements for different restaurants around the city. I spotted one that would be good to try with my hubby.

Today we went to the Artisan Pizzeria on Thor and I must say it was the best pizza I have ever tasted. It is located in a small strip mall and I first thought it was not going to be good at all. It is a very small restaurant it easily fills up with 12 people. The waitress told us to take a seat and we sat in front of the wood burning oven. We ordered the margherita pizza first it had mozzarella, tomato sauce, and fresh basil.

It is something else to watch someone roll the dough in front of you and take the time to put on the ingredients on your pizza one by one. It was even more spectacular to see the gentleman put the pizza in the oven and see it cook up within seconds of putting in.

The crust is thin and crispy. The ingredients are top quality with such great flavors and the tomato sauce does not over power the pizza, the pizza is not overrun by sauce either. We tried the all meat pizza next which had mozzarella, pepperoni, salami, and sausage. It was as delicious as the margherita pizza.

I really recommend anybody who wants to try a good slice of pie to go to Artisan pizza and try it out for yourself. You will not be disappointed.

Food-- Maria Chuchena

What makes food good? Is it the actual food or the experience of the restaurant? Most people would say that it's the food and in all reality I agree with that. Food is the essential component why we go to eat at a restaurant. The atmosphere makes the experience, but at the end of the night, and the day after, the food is what you rave about. I am no food critique. My delicate palate consists of bland oatmeal in the morning, baked chicken with frozen/microwaved "steamed" vegetables for lunch and microwaved popcorn for dinner with a nice refreshing diet coke. What a life?

Despite my sophisticated palate, I do believe I have the inherited knowledge of distinguishing between good food and great food.

I had the pleasure at dinning at Maria Chuchena this week, located at 5860 North Mesa Street, at first glance it looks like an upscale restaurant. The decor was mediocre, trying to be too upscale I believe, but I must admit the ambience was awesome. We were seated pretty fast even though it was lunch time and we were a group of ten. The waitstaff was excellent, no qualms about that, the menu was definitely another issue. When your are given 2 separate menus to look at it and to decide what to eat, in a rush mind you, the customer is rushed even if they are not.

There are too many choices and if you do not know this it is not your typical Mexican restaurant. It's an upscale version, I believe it's heavily influenced by Puebla's typical food, because most of our food was heavily sauced. The menu has your typical Mexican food items tacos, tortas, and enchiladas. But it also has items that I do not remember tasting on my Mexican travels to the south. As you are seated you order your drinks and to my surprise
they make your salsa table side. They make it with the "molcajete" and they ask if you want it spicy or mild. We ordered both versions and none were hot, but it was good salsa.

I ordered the Malinche, a chicken stuffed with corn mushrooms with a squash blossom sauce. My imagination of what the food would taste like was running wild and it seemed like an eternity for the food to arrive.

When I got my plate it seemed simple and when I tasted it was. I was disappointed! I dissect my food and when I removed the chicken from the sauce and removed the corn mushroom; and the chicken was dry. The corn mushroom lacked salt and the squash blossom sauce was extremely bland and if that was not enough the food was cold.

Overall, I was disappointed with my food my high expectations to be blown away were squashed, no pun intended. Maria Chuchena should really concentrate on what they serve and not the ambience. The quality of the food will keep you alive in the restaurant game and like they say one bad customer or unsatisfied customer can ruin you.

Gravity

Its easy to sit and see what others are doing. Its hard to be the one someone is watching. Life isn't always easy, but it isn't always hard either. Life has many faucets many of which we will never get to experience. We tend to think that life will always be flat or one sided but really it isn't. Life is rounded and has an array of colors but again I've come to realize that I will not always experience it.

It isn't easy being a wife, a daughter, a sister or a friend. I realized today that all those labels do weigh. They weigh a ton if you ask me, but I have to carry them. Not because I have to, but because its part of my core of who I am.

I would be lost without those labels and without that weight, because they are my motivation to do better. My motivation to be better than I was yesterday and to become someone that my husband, my brother, my parents and family would be proud of.

Starting off

I woke up this morning not wanting to go to work, because I felt like I needed a day off. Then this little voice in my head said to me "You Must Go To Work!" Ugh... don't you just hate that. I hate being responsible and being a grown up, it sucks!

I went to work and I looked at all the work I had on my desk, bad idea. I had paper work up to my eyes and in a weird I was glad I went in. I know deep inside my whinny soul that if I hadn't gone in, the pile would have taken over my cubicle and would have made my week hell.

I am looking forward to the rest of the week, I just know its going to be fun!