[PDX] Salvadoran

[ExtraMSG]

So, we're in town to do some shopping before our trip to Mexico and see the Chinese Garden while the weather is unseasonably nice and we haven't eaten. After the garden we head over to Ken's Bakery. I've just eaten the bread, not the pastries or anything else. My wife gets a pear almondine tart, I believe, and I get their hazelnut (espresso?) macaroon. Both were very good, I think. The tart grew on me since it's a subtle pastry. The macaroon was a lot of flavor and actually reminded me of a similar mignardis I enjoyed at the French Laundry.

So then we go take some stuff back to Cost Plus and I decide to go look at Phil's and Elephant's. Note that cheeses seem much higher than their equivalents at Whole Foods or Pasta Works and don't get anything, though the smell of some Indian-spiced bread or soup cooking in Elephant's was fabulous. Got a couple pepperoni sticks at Phil's while I looked at the meats. They had NY Prime that looked awesome -- impressively marbled, for the same price as their nice choice, about $15/lb. If I were going straight home....I noticed they had Kobe burgers, too, for I think about $9/lb.

Next we go to sell some books at Powell's, get our pittance and once again feel rejected as more than half our box must be hauled back up to our car. To make us feel better, as I trudge up the stairs with the books, my wife runs across to Mio Gelato and grabs us a couple cups of ice cream. She got tangerine and tiramisu (I know, weird combo) and got me caramel and espresso. Yum. I think their espresso is a little strong, and had some iciness this time, but all three of the others were divine.

Now it's time to head home, we think, with just a quick stop at Wal-Mart (is that possible?) to pick up some travel necessities. Across 84, down to Foster, and up to Wal-Mart. So, we're inside getting an underwater camera, mini shampoos, extra strength anti-perspirant, and Immodium AD (this is tropical Mexico afterall), and mi esposa needs snack. Uruapan's close by, I think, I would have liked to go there anyway. So we check out and head down. But I decide to go down Foster to the other location I'd heard about. We never find that, but pass by several Russian restaurants (anybody try any of these Russian restaurants popping up all over town), a couple Mexican taquerias, and a Salvadoran place.

After hitting Powell, we turn around and decide to give the Salvadoran place, La Santaneca, a try. It's somewhat of a dive, but does take credit cards. They have the menu split into Salvadoran, Mexican, and Specialty dishes, along with soups, side orders, and other smaller categories. They have some good looking items throghout, including huaraches on the Mexican side, something difficult to find even at most taquerias. The prices are a bit high for the level of cooking that it looks like we'd get. Average price is probably $9 for a plate that includes a main dish, beans, rice, and tortillas. Since we're not too hungry and I mainly want some pupusas (on the side orders), we get a soup (still $8, I think) 3 pupusas with different fillings ($1.69 each) and an empenada. They give you free chips and salsa which aren't great, but aren't bad and are made inhouse at least.

The soup was large, as expected. Probably larger than most bowls of pho. The broth was wonderful. 3rd world cultures know how to do broths. I generally don't order brothy soups. I prefer soups with big flavor and that usually comes with pureed soups. But this was great. Not very clear, but a lot of flavor. The meat (it was a beef soup) was hanging on the bone still and ultra tender. There was cabbage, zucchini, and other vegetables as well. It came with corn tortillas. The pupusas were about 5 or 6 inches each in diameter and filled with cheese, cheese and beans, and cheese and spinach. They weren't great pupusas, but they were pretty good. I love flatbreads of all kind and pupusas are an wonderful exemplar, even merely decent ones are good. The empenada, however, was something special, I think. It's greasy as all hell on the outside and looks burnt, but isn't. It's light in texture with a creamy filling with the unmistakeable flavor of plaintains (or subtle banana). I think lemon maybe, too. Very interesting flavor. It wasn't that big, but it was quite tasty. My wife loved it.

So my wife eats half the empenada, half the pupusas, and some chips and she's full after only eating a few bites of the soup. The broth is wonderful, though, and it's paid for, so I just keep eating, and eating, eating. I'm very full. We leave quite contento.

But Foster's onramp to 205 North is closed and I go past the interstate to turn around and come back and go up 82nd so I can get on the freeway at Powell. But I never get that far. About 50 yards past the light probably is a sign that says TACOS on a chain link fence and in front of someone's house in the dark is a florescent light shining down on a taco stand that looks like it just dropped out the sky, transported from DF like the tardis through time. I gotta stop. So I whip around to the next one way, go back past the interstate again, whip around again back onto Foster heading east and pull into the driveway. They were out of some other meat they had, but in Spanglish the tacodero and I finally agree on two tacos de adovada (all they had) one with green and one with red salsa for a dollar each. Everything looked made fresh. The meat was a little dry, but it tasted good and the salsas were excellent.

Pues, estoy hasta arriba y muy, muy gordo....y contento.

Any suggestions for more Salvadoran places to try would be greatly appreciated. Love to hit another before Mexico. I know on the Mexican-American thread some people mentioned that El Palmero was Salvadoran, though it's not mentioned in reviews. Anyone actually been there? Trillium, you said you were going to try some places in your hood.

[Alberts]

El Palenque in Sellwood, just south of Tacoma, is very good, and under-appreciated, although it can be a little busy on the weekends. It has a split menu Salvadoran/Mexican, as well. (Of note, next door is a bakery that supplies the cakes to New Seasons groceries, and has an incredible creme brulee ice cream [my extreme apology for not remember the name, I wanna say "A piece of cake" or something like that]).

We have enjoyed both places many times.

[ExtraMSG]

Thanks. Do they have pupusas and empenadas? What's good? I felt like I didn't really know where to begin at Santaneca.

[Alberts]

Extra

We tend to get the sampler platter which includes both, if memory serves me. I am, by no means, an expert, but I think you will enjoy it.

It would be great if someone with a working knowledge of Salvadoran cuisine logged in on this. I would like to learn more.

Also, they have someone playing guitar on weekend nights. The address, by the way, is 8324 S.E. 17th, (503) 231-5140. The bakery next door is "Piece of Cake" (503) 234-9445.

[ExtraMSG]

EL PALENQUE

It's nice having an excuse to spend way too much money on food this week since we've emptied out our refrigerator and don't want to make any messes before Mexico. Last night we just got salads at Pizzicato, but tonight I was SW Portland at a clients so we decided to try El Palenque.

There's a modest selection of dishes on the menu, and few ala carte items. I didn't look too closely at the Mexican dishes, although what I saw didn't look too bad, maybe slightly more interesting than most Mexican places. I didn't look too closely at the vegetarian options either. I did notice that nachos were included, so I don't know how hard they're trying. They do have vegetarian tamales and pupusas, though. Instead we looked at the Salvadorean choices. You can order pupusas or empenadas with beans and rice for under $8 as a dish, but for $22-something you can order a mixed platter for 2 (and for $28 you can order a mixed platter for 4 that has more stuff). Our came with:

2 pork and cheese pupusas

2 loroco and cheese pupusas

Fried plantains

Refried black beans

Spanish/Mexican rice

Beef tamal

Salvadorean cheese bread

Salsa and pickled onions

It comes out taking up an entire large pizza dish. It's really a gigantic amount of food. And by now I'd already eaten my share of some pretty tasty housemade chips and salsa. But by-golly I had a job to do, and that job was stuffing my face, and I did so happily (well not quite as happily now that I've got heartburn).

The pupusas were good, both of them. I was mistaken the other night at Santaneca when I said they were spinach and cheese pupusas. It's obvious they were the same as the loroco ones I got. Loroco, apprently, is a Salvadorean edible flower bud much like flor de calabaza for Mexicans. A similar flavor, too. Like a tangy sauteed spinach maybe. Good stuff.

My wife really enjoys fried plantains and she loved these ones. They were soft and carmelly with that nice banana flavor with some added depth. There was actually a pretty good pile of them, too, maybe 2 or 3 plantains worth.

The black beans were awesome. Excellent beans. They're made much like refried beans at most Mexican places, but with more unmashed beans than probably most Mexican restaurants. They had wondeful, flavorful creamy texture. If these weren't made with lard then the cook deserves a hell of a lot of credit for making some really great vegetarian beans. I didn't ask. I'd be interested to know.

The rice was decent. I wouldn't say it was anything special, but it had a nice flavor.

The beef tamal was a bit of a mixed bag. The masa had flavor and a surprisingly light texture, but the beef is probably too dry. It had an okay flavor, but I'm not a big fan of dry tamal innards. Masa is dry enough. It was still decent, though.

The cheese bread was weird -- and not in a good way. It was like a very light and moist corn bread or almost like a cake (I don't know what it's made with; I would guess wheat flour). On top is a very thin layer of cheese. Some people might like it; I don't know. But neither of us did at all really. To make things worse, the bread itself tasted a little off, like it had been stale and they decided to rewarm it or something.

Off to the side they provided some extra salsa and a little bowl of pickled onions. I like pickled stuff like that and it went really good with the cheesy pupusas that really are a little bland and can use a little extra flavor. There was also a little cup of cream or something in the middle of the platter. I don't know what it was good for. It seriously just tasted like cream, not sour cream or crema.

You're going to think we're crazy, but we also ordered a side order of empenadas. There were two empenadas filled with plantain and custard, I think. Though since they were sitting on the plantains they may have just been flavored by them. They also had a nice cinnamon flavor to them.

It was decent stuff. I think in some ways Santaneca is better. But Palenque is a nice little restaurant with a pleasant interior in a pleasant part of town. The family there was really nice. And the food is decent. Prices were similar at both. I think it's a toss up after one visit to each.

Thanks Alberts. I, too, would like to have someone who knows their Salvadorean food well chime in. But it is only Portland.

[Alberts]

Excellent review. I think we will make a trip back there this week.

Yes, that cheese bread...what exactly is it? Hard to say.

[ExtraMSG]

You might want to try Santaneca just as a comparison. I'd be interested to know how you think the two compare. Santaneca has a much broader menu.

[trillium]

I just wanted to add my 2 cents to this thread. We finally ate at El Palenque last weekend and from our meal I'd swear that we were eating at a different restaurant than the one described. I really wanted to like this place, it's the closest restaurant to where we live and the owners seem really nice, but I thought the food sucked.

The pupusas were ok. Not great, and tasted watery, bland and soggy from the grease. I think they had been in the freezer too long. I have nothing against pre-making them in such a small place, but they just didn't have that nice toasty masa flavor with a crisp outside and soft steamy masa scented inside. The curtido to accompany only contained cabbage (no detectable onion, no carrot and no chillies!!), but it was better than the pupusa. They were out of black beans, the pintos were perfectly good, but the rice tasted like it was made from parboiled stuff. The beef tamale was covered in cheddar and white cheese, which is just plain wrong and would have been a sin against humanity if the tamale had been any better. It was mostly masa, no detectable banana leaf fragrance, and the masa tasted like it had been made with crisco. The filling was ok, but too dry. The empanadas made of platinos and stuffed with cheese were the best part of the dinner, canela scented and with a nice cheese to platino ratio, my only complaint would be that the platinos could have been a little riper, but that may just be a personal preference.

regards,

trillium

[ExtraMSG]

I just wanted to add my 2 cents to this thread. We finally ate at El Palenque last weekend and from our meal I'd swear that we were eating at a different restaurant than the one described. I really wanted to like this place, it's the closest restaurant to where we live and the owners seem really nice, but I thought the food sucked.

The pupusas were ok. Not great, and tasted watery, bland and soggy from the grease. I think they had been in the freezer too long. I have nothing against pre-making them in such a small place, but they just didn't have that nice toasty masa flavor with a crisp outside and soft steamy masa scented inside. The curtido to accompany only contained cabbage (no detectable onion, no carrot and no chillies!!), but it was better than the pupusa. They were out of black beans, the pintos were perfectly good, but the rice tasted like it was made from parboiled stuff. The beef tamale was covered in cheddar and white cheese, which is just plain wrong and would have been a sin against humanity if the tamale had been any better. It was mostly masa, no detectable banana leaf fragrance, and the masa tasted like it had been made with crisco. The filling was ok, but too dry. The empanadas made of platinos and stuffed with cheese were the best part of the dinner, canela scented and with a nice cheese to platino ratio, my only complaint would be that the platinos could have been a little riper, but that may just be a personal preference.

regards,

trillium

Well, one thing to note is that when I say "decent" I don't mean good.

I think my stuff may have been better prepared than yours from your description. Either that or you just have finer sensibilities on such things. eg, our pupusas weren't soggy and greasy at all. We were about the only ones there and the first ones there, I think, however.

And the beans were the best thing we ate, so that sucks that they didn't have at least that.

You say it sucked, but you don't really describe anything individually as sucking, except maybe the rice, which was pretty weak, but I don't have the greatest expectations for rice, especially at a low end restaurant. I'd say it's a mediocre restaurant with appropriate prices. But at least they're a place in Portland to get pupusas. Only one of two that I know of.

I'd love to open up a place selling latin american snacks that are done ala minute, but alas, after this year's taxes (ugh, being self-employed is expensive), I don't know if I'll ever get ahead enough to do that.

[trillium]

Well, one thing to note is that when I say "decent" I don't mean good. 

What does decent mean? Doesn't give you food poisoning or cost too much?

You say it sucked, but you don't really describe anything individually as sucking, except maybe the rice, which was pretty weak, but I don't have the greatest expectations for rice, especially at a low end restaurant.  I'd say it's a mediocre restaurant with appropriate prices.  But at least they're a place in Portland to get pupusas.  Only one of two that I know of.

The rice sucked and the tamales sucked (I think it was the worst tamale I've ever eaten and I've eaten a lot of tamales from high end to trucks on the side of the road). The pupusa nearly sucked. That combined with nothing stellar counts as an over all "it sucks" in my book. Life is too short to eat bad food, I don't care how cheap or expensive it is! I loved Karam, so I don't think my sensibilities are all that much finer than yours. Maybe travel in Mexico and living in Chicago (3rd largest latino population in the US) has made me picky, I dunno.

I'd love to open up a place selling latin american snacks that are done ala minute, but alas, after this year's taxes (ugh, being self-employed is expensive), I don't know if I'll ever get ahead enough to do that.

When you do I'll be the first in line.

regards,

trillium

[ExtraMSG]

There's also the possibility that I had good luck or you had bad luck. A consistent restaurant, especially consistently good, can be rare. Thus the popularity of chains (for their consistent mediocrity).

Decent to me means that it's almost good or fair or mediocre but fair for the price and the other options available. It's worth eating, but depends on the price. eg, Applebees and Outback make a decent steak. Compared with El Gaucho or Ringside they may suck, but then again you're paying less than half the price and that does need to be taken into consideration.

It's certainly not a science, but generally it goes from bad to good: sucks, bad, crappy, mediocre, fair, decent, good, excellent, orgasmic.

Really, I'd say decent is like C+, B- food. There are fast food items that fall into this category for me.

I do think from reading your posts you have finer or stricter sensibilities on foods than I do. I don't know that that says you have better taste or anything, just that your tolerance for mediocrity is lower and that you probably have ideals that you're more strict about specific foods living up to. I'm more strict on these things than most people, though. I'm not sure that's necessarily a good thing either. That someone can truly enjoy a Taco Bell burrito may be a blessing. That someone can enjoy Britney Spears (for her music) may be a blessing. That someone can enjoy even half the movies that came out last year may be a blessing as well. I know I can't.

However, I think the difference between mediocre and good often isn't as great as we think. Let's face it, anything edible is probably historically good. And we work hard throughout our life acquiring tastes for things and calling them great that many people would want to spit out when they first taste them. Taste is a weird thing.

I think this bit from Brillat-Savarin is instructive:

Let us now look philosophically at the pleasure and pain occasioned by taste.

The first thing we become convinced of is that man is organized so as to be far more sensible of pain than of pleasure.

In fact the imbibing of acid or bitter substances subjects us to sensations more or less painful, according to their degree. It is said that the cause of the rapid effects of hydrocyanic acid is that the pain is so great as to be unbearable by the powers of vitality.

The scale of agreeable sensations on the other hand is very limited, and if there, be a sensible difference between the insipid and that which flatters the taste, the interval is not so great between the good and the excellent. The following example proves this:—FIRST TERM a Bouilli dry and hard. SECOND TERM a piece of veal. THIRD TERM a pheasant done to a turn.

Of all the senses though with which we have been endowed by nature, the taste is the one, which all things considered, procures us the most enjoyments.

Sorry for that pseudo-philosphical tangent.

[trillium]

Decent to me means that it's almost good or fair or mediocre but fair for the price and the other options available.  It's worth eating, but depends on the price.  eg, Applebees and Outback make a decent steak.  Compared with El Gaucho or Ringside they may suck, but then again you're paying less than half the price and that does need to be taken into consideration. 

I think we nearly agree on what's decent, but for the prices at El Palenque you can eat much better Mexican food at other spots. Of course, non of them are in Sellwood, and there isn't much Salvadorean food around period, but I'd rather just not eat something than eat a mediocre version. I give Palenque a C- based on how bad the food was and how nice the owner was. If he hadn't been so nice, it'd probably be a D+. Instant rice in a restaurant is not ok! I'll give you that I was there on a bad night and you were there on a good night. My bad night was bad enough that I probably won't try again unless something really provides motivation.

I do think from reading your posts you have finer or stricter sensibilities on foods than I do. I don't know that that says you have better taste or anything, just that your tolerance for mediocrity is lower and that you probably have ideals that you're more strict about specific foods living up to.  I'm more strict on these things than most people, though.  I'm not sure that's necessarily a good thing either.  That someone can truly enjoy a Taco Bell burrito may be a blessing.  That someone can enjoy Britney Spears (for her music) may be a blessing. That someone can enjoy even half the movies that came out last year may be a blessing as well.  I know I can't.

I ate at Taco Hell all through college is and if I can't find anything else in a place/situation, it'd be my first choice of many chains. Those burritos got me through my senior year! I am probably stricter about my sensibilities, though, food is serious with me, just chalk it up to the Sicilian side of the family. You know, you talk about what to make for dinner at lunch, whether the food was better at last year's family reunion or the one 10 years ago, etc. etc. But yeah, my friends can sometimes find me a pain in the ass when we're deciding where to eat. Of course, they jump at a chance to come over and eat and drink at my house, so they tolerate me.

Taste certainly has a major subjective component to it, no arguments there.

regards,

trillium

[ExtraMSG]

There is one thing worse, though: the person who has very strict tastes for what is mediocre. I have a friend who won't go out to eat anywhere but Elmer's or Shari's or truck stops. Ugh! I have family who prefer Olive Garden and similar places -- on taste -- than any other Italian (including all the top places in Portland I keep trying to take them to). And I have a friend who actually likes Taco Bell's Mexican better than any of the taquerias I've taken him to or any of the sit down Mexican-American restaurants I've taken him to (except maybe Esparza's for their pork nachos) and it doesn't even matter if I'm paying.

So at least I can respect your type of strict standards. The friend I travel for food with the most (Scott -- DFW here on eGullet), is the same way -- at least on the stuff he knows best, like Tex-Mex, BBQ, Southwest food, Indian, and fine dining.

Edited February 23, 2004 by ExtraMSG (log)