October 31: El Borracho

"Is it still raining?" My co-worker just came in after his lunch from Berliner Döner Kebab (see my September 28 review), and told me no, it had started to dry out. I felt up to a long trip to Mexico, so I fired up TripAdvisor and asked for the best Mexican places in Seattle. Yes, I know I had tacos off the truck on Friday. Shrug. If it had still been pouring, I'd have had some other food truck or maybe the Italian place behind our building. Today, a journey.

The site suggested that El Borracho ("the drunkard") at Pike Place is good and in my price range. And -- bonus! -- today is Halloween and El Borracho has a quasi-Día de Muertos theme going on (or maybe it's something else, and I'm culturally ignorant). Time for a walk! On the way, I decided that if it started to rain while I was there, I wasn't going to make the same mistake I did last Wednesday, and I'd take a Lyft back.

Despite hitting nearly every crosswalk red, it's still a rather quick 0.8 mile stroll. Once there, I grabbed a seat at the bar and ordered (sigh) an iced tea. Their $4 el cheapo margarita sure sounded promising/dangerous, but no, not during a work day. I ordered the pollo a la tinga burrito (shredded chicken), although I strongly considered the conejo a la tinga (shredded rabbit). I also eyed the pile of nachos the woman next to me was eating; later, she told the waitress that it was really good. 

The costumed barkeep asked how I'd like to customize by burrito: black beans, red rice, no sauce. It arrived fairly quickly, large and probably more than I should have eaten. Despite the menu describing the chicken as being in a tomato adobo sauce, there was very little tomato flavor to it. Instead, the first bite put forth a subdued heavenly earthiness, an outstanding blend of mild flavors with no spiciness at all. Visually, I expected the innards to ooze gently onto the plate, but it was unexpectedly dry enough to hold its contents but moist enough to not require gulps of iced tea after every bite.

About two-thirds of the way through, the subdued flavor shifted from being a pleasurable feature into being, well, just bland. I think I might have hit a patch of burrito heavy in rice. I suppose I should have stopped there, but I hadn't had any substantial meat since dinner Saturday, so I pushed forward. I'm so full. Despite the declining flavor through the burrito, it was still so good.

Still no rain, so I wandered back to work, stopping at Pike Place for some flowers, and hitting nearly every crosswalk green.

El Borracho

1521 1st Avenue

Chicken burrito, iced tea, $15.42