Each week, reporter Lindsay Roberts will take a journey to find restaurants that fit her champagne taste and beer budget.
The Barrio Café is easily one the crowning jewels of the Phoenix foodie scene. Nestled among the countless taquerias and covered in colorful graffiti depicting sugar skulls on motorcycles and Dia de Los Muertos art, the Barrio is the last place you’d expect to find a four-time James Beard Award nominee.
Chef Silvana Esparza is a classically trained chef that brings classical cooking styles to authentic Mexican cuisine. Not only is the Barrio Café a restaurant, but it also doubles as an art gallery that showcases local talent on the crisp white walls of the building.
The Barrio Café is by far my favorite Phoenix restaurant, but due to my limited budget I cannot afford to go as much as I would like. However, the restaurant has a happy hour from 3 to 5 p.m. when it serves drinks and street tacos for a bargain. For the broke college student, this is the perfect time to go.
Happy hour at the Barrio Café includes a menu of $1.50 street tacos, as well as tacos of all varieties including duck, halibut, carne asada, mojo shrimp, cochinita pibil and chorizo with avocado.
My roommate accompanied me on my food journey, and we both had four tacos for about $12. We ordered a variety of the choices and were pleased the most by the cochinita pibil and halibut tacos. As we waited for our food to come out to the table we were given something very uncharacteristic of a Mexican restaurant; not the usual chips and salsa but a sliced baguette with an olive tapenade spread.
The tacos came out on a colorful plate. Each was unique in the preparation. The halibut taco had a piece of battered and lightly fried halibut with pico de gallo and a tangy chipotle sauce. The cochinita pibil taco was by far our favorite. The cochinita pibil meat is pork cooked for 12 hours in a banana leaf; it is bursting with flavor and is one of the most popular items on the menu. The taco had the pork covered in marinated onions. It was simple but had the best flavor.
My third favorite was the chorizo and avocado taco. Chorizo is one of my favorite Mexican dishes, and because of that I am very picky about my chorizo. However, I had no complaints about the tacos. The meat was spicy and flavorful and paired well with the mild flavor of the avocado on top.
Although I only mentioned my favorites, all of the tacos on the happy hour menu are delicious because of their savory toppings.
If you are looking for a restaurant that serves high quality Mexican food with a twist, the Barrio Café is the place to go.
The restaurant is located on 2814 N. 16 St. in midtown Phoenix. It is closed on Mondays, but open Tuesday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday 11 a.m. to 10:30 p.m.; and Sunday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.
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Reach the columnist at larober3@asu.edu or follow @lindsayaroberts on Twitter.
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