Who Else Wants Mexican?

I have been saying this for years. I was just talking a bout this yesterday. There is NO authentic Mexican restaurant in the entire WNY area. Why not. If you go to any other city even half Buffalo's size they are a dime a dozen. Cinco de MAyos, El Canelo, (Gramma Morras - Absolutely Brutal), Arribas, and Coyote Cafe are some pathetic choices. I cant believe someone else has posted this idea. We need a real Mexican restaurant both in Buffalo and in the surrounding suburbs. PLEASE!

Bring back Chi Chi's! Nothing says authentic Mexican like a Hepatitis A outbreak.

Having moved back from 'Out West' a few months back, both my wife and I have been craving 'real' Mexican. So, why can't it be found here? One theory is that food that lands here, no matter what ethnic derivative it might be, gets Buffaloized! If you look at a place like the Falafel Bar, there seems to be a need to familiarize the menu for the locals. We ate there and found it heavy and unsatisfying. Best Med food in the area Byblos. But I digress. I'd like to see a place that has Chili Colorado, Chili Verde, true carnitas, Shrimp Diablo, etc, etc. The key, I believe, is to NOT Buffaloize it (like that place out on Sheridan seems to do), but let it speak for itself. There were a couple of decent chains in Cali like El Torito. If they could be coaxed into coming here EVERYONE would benefit.

I have been saying this for years too! I was in a better Mexican restaurant in Ashland, Ohio forchistsakes than exists in Western New York!! Ashland, Ohio!!!

I recall chef Andrzejewski saying Mexican would be his next restaurant - either I was dreaming or he was quoted in Spree.

I'm for kidnapping a good local chef, bringing them to South Tucson (I think I had wonderful food at the El Dorado) so they start with a better reference than they have locally, and not letting them return until they understand great Mexican food.

Even when I lived down south the real authentic Mexican restaurants were only patronized by people who were of Mexican decent. The authentic stuff is surprisingly bland and lacked what most Americans consider staples of Mexican food (ie. chips, salsa, and cheese). Also most of the food is made from parts of animals no one in America would touch. What we need is a real good Tex-Mex joint. There are a couple that are close, but not as good as places in the south or west. If I'm opening up a Tex-Mex place in Buffalo, fresh homemade salsa and chips would be a good start.

Swanson makes a delightful chimichanga

THANKYOU! I never understand how Grandma Moras wins best mexican when you use Chicken Wing Sauce as your hot sauce. Gimmie a lil Mole please!

As an ex-Texan, I feel compelled to mention that there's a whole lot of amazing Tex-Mex that's not represented. Lone Star is ok, for what it is. The rest of the 'Mexican' restaurants locally range from acceptable to horrific. Gramma Mora's, I'm looking at you for the horrific end of the scale. I've never recommended anything other than Lone Star to out-of-towners and even that with reservations.

When people ask me where they can get good, authentic Mexican food around Buffalo, my answer is always 'around here? Chicago!' There is NO decent place for authentic Mexican around here. It bothers me that Gramma Moras continues to be in business-they were good back in the day when they were on Niagara Street. The Mexican population is growing in the area, but mostly due to the migrant field workers in the south towns - Springville area. Mole, pozole, and menudo are not easy dishes to make, and very time consuming, and you'd almost need Mexican Grandmothers to make them right, b/c that's the only best makers of mole, and pozole I've ever had when living in Mexico.

Esto listo para Buffalo un poco tacos des tripitas, un poco tacos des sesos, un poco poc chuc, de mole negro????

How bout that lionel messi? He's from Argentina.

Along with a real Mexican restaurant, I'd like to see a real Polish restaurant, the kind that has Polish women cooking from memory in it, like in New York or Chicago.

The state of Polish restaurant offerings in Buffalo is similar to the state of Mexican restaurants or worse, except for there being 2 high priced restaurants that serve Polish food.

And if I hear one more time "these pierogi/kielbasa/etc. are good because they're my grandmother's recipe..." I'd like to say "Maybe your grandmother wasn't a good cook."

Polish food is so much more than oversized, thick-doughed fried from the freezer to the pan pierogi, duck blood soup, mushroom soup with a gooey flour base, etc. I'm talking pickle soup, bigos, small thin doughed pierogi with meat, blueberry, "twarog" cheese filling, naleśniki (crepes), żurek (sour-rye soup), potato pancakes, borscht, yeast pastries, black currant juice, etc. at a price affordable enough that I can eat there regularly for lunch and at least once a week for dinner.

Andrzej - if you're looking for good Polish, you should stop in to Bistro Europa on Elmwood for some pierogies, golabki & bigos. They're not strictly Polish, lots of european food, but you will not be disappointed.

As for Mexican in Buffalo, we are in dire need. I personally want to be able to experience this mole I hear so much about but haven't tried before, and I know there's a wide spectrum of moles out there. We could use both a small authentic Mexican joint similar to the stands and trucks you see on tv specials in Mexico and Mexi-cali as well as some nicer Tex-Mex type of places. I've been to Phoenix quite a bit and in Tempe and old town Scottsdale they have some amazing Mexican and Tex-Mex to choose from. Even in Denver there's a ton to pick from. & yes I do think it has a lot to do with the Mexican work force you see in the south and pretty much anywhere else besides Buffalo.

Clearly we're not going to get a bunch to choose from here in Buffalo, but 2 or 3 would be nice and I think they would be VERY successful. As Christa pointed out, the Japanese and others like Thai, Vietnamese & Korean are gaining popularity here and are even what you'd call trendy in Buffalo now, I think Mexican would outshine that trendiness in Buffalo and do so very quickly. So how do we get them here?

my husband and i had the pleasure of spending a short time in mexico city. we ate in one fine dining restaurant where we were served an amazing cream of cilantro soup. we also ate at cafe tacuba which is a more traditional mexican restaurant (and i later learned a favorit of rick bayliss) there we had a delicious pescado a la plancha. the fish and vegetables wer incredibly fresh and no melted cheese or corn chips in sight. anything along those lines would be most welcome.

Of all metro regions of about 500,000 or larger in the US, I really think Buffalo has the least Latin flavor of anyplace in the country. Sure, there's a Puerto Rican community on the West Side, but their cultural influence doesn't extend much beyond the neighborhood's boundaries.

There's no Spanish-language radio in Buffalo. No Spanish-language channels on cable outside of expensive digital tiers. (I think Telemundo may be available in the city, but not the 'burbs.) Almost no media coverage of events in the Hispanic community. No good Mexican restaurants in the region. Mexican food selection in grocery stores is limited to Goya -- which really isn't even Mexican -- even at Wegman's. The selection of salsa in supermarkets is even very limited. I never hear Spanish spoken in public outside of the West Side. When I see a Hispanic name here, it really doesn't register as Hispanic.

Also, the entirety of Buffalo's Mexican-American population can fit in a one Metro Rail train. From the 2000 Census: Mexican-American population in the top 50 metropolitan areas.

1. Los Angeles 2,395,570
2. Chicago 602,188
3. San Francisco Bay 463,991
4. Dallas-Ft Worth 456,962
5. Houston 455,854
6. Phoenix 297,632
7. San Diego 292,749
8. New York City 225,897
9. Denver 140,497
10. Las Vegas 124,161
11. Atlanta 120,328
12. San Antonio 113,089
13. Portland 85,976
14. Austin 84,213
15. Sacramento 74,634
16. Salt Lake City 46,802
17. Seattle 46,299
18. Raleigh-Durham 37,458
19. Washington-Baltimore 36,700
20. Greensboro-Winston Salem-High Point 34,357
21. Charlotte 34,277
22. West Palm Beach-Boca Raton 32,599
23. Miami 31,759
24. Minneapolis-St. Paul 29,554
25. Philadelphia 28,115
26. Detroit 27,804
27. Milwaukee 27,640
28. Kansas City 27,086
29. Tampa-St. Petersburg 26,791
30. Oklahoma City 23,862
31. Grand Rapids 18,341
32. Orlando 16,936
33. Nashville 15,874
34. Indianapolis 15,253
35. Memphis 11,513
36. Boston 8,161
37. St. Louis 6,780
38. Columbus 6,265
39. Cleveland 4,405
40. Cincinnati 3,700
41. Louisville 3,185
42. Hartford 3,137
43 New Orleans 3,085
44. Providence 2,742
45. Richmond 2,742
46. Norfolk-Virginia Beach 2,143
47. Jacksonville 1,991
48. Rochester 1,070
49. Pittsburgh 1,010
50. Buffalo 451

You can listen to 100.7 chin Fm from Toronto the station comes in to Buffalo really well. The have Portuguese and Spanish language in the morning and Italian in the afternoon. If your looking for real Spanish food go to corso italia St. Clair in Toronto there is huge Spanish,Portuguese Italian population that live together and great foods. The speak all 3 languages in the stores and restaurants,bars. I know Im there all the time my family is living there from Italy. Also there is is the real Little Italy unlike the fake one on Hertel you know where the Italian Americans dont speak Italian. Also there are more other foreign restaurants opening up then Italian ones on Hertel

ToTheTable asked: where do all the Mexicans eat? Well...we eat at home! I am Mexican, I feel the same kind of regret about a good Mexican food eatery that most folks who post here do. I don't miss Mexican food because I prepare it at home. I've been teaching real Mexican cooking classes for years now for those who have the actual desire of not only eating, but also learning. Mexican food is far from bland and it doesn't include nachos, burritos and things of the sort. I've been pondering on the idea of opening a REAL Mexican top of the line restaurant for years, but have decided against it because when I asked a pseudo-Mex place in the area why they didn't actually serve real Mexican fare they said: because it is NOT what sells here. However...through the years I've had many, many students who have gone from thinking tex-Mex is Mexican to actually enjoying down to earth Mexican food, so pretty soon, and maybe with some additional encouragement from other locals, I might just reconsider it!

Al- Such a sweetheart as always! And...I can also feel your Italian food disappointment...we never got together to exchange eating experiences.

JSmith- I have no idea why they say that...why one is not opened I believe has nothing to do with competition. I've been in the food business for what seems like a life time, I teach cooking, I'm an author, and I produce my own gourmet sauces locally; and let me tell you, it is soooooooo difficult to begain a new food 'trend' (a big risk) and not only that, also consider how expensive it is to establish a restaurant in a good area. I think that's what they mean at the pseudo-Mex place, they want to play it safe with what people here consider Mexican to be...just a wild guess.

Good night to both!