Category: Ann Arbor

Sabor Latino (Ann Arbor, MI)
I’m always looking for good Mexican restaurants in my area, so I get pretty excited when I can find one that is both authentic, and well reviewed. This was the case for Sabor Latino, in Ann Arbor. Everything I had heard said it offered delicious, authentic Mexican, Colombian and Puerto Rican dishes for a very affordable price. Morale was high.

I’m a believer that it is fairly easy to make average Mexican food by throwing different peppers and spices together, but extremely difficult to make great Mexican food using fresh ingredients and family recipes. It’s always disappointing to me when I come into a Mexican restaurant and see that their menu consists of unoriginal items like wet burritos, quesadillas and simple burritos. This just happened to be the case for Sabor Latino.

As I saw down, this restaurant seemed to fit all of my criteria for a great Mexican joint.
1. The salsa seemed to be freshly made, the chips were warm and there was no charge.
2. The building was not free standing.
3. Our chips and salsa were brought by someone other than our server.
4. The menus were slightly dirty.
5. No yellow cheese
6. The walls seemed to have been painted several times
7. There were several sombreros hanging from the wall
8. The menu was up front and simple.
My hopes were extremely high. Things began to go down hill from there. The temperature outside that day was around 75 degrees, and as we walked in I realized that the restaurant was warmer than it was outside.

The chips and salsa were a good start. The salsa was served in a small jug and tasted pretty good. It was a little over pureed, but the taste was pretty good and spicy. We decided to start with a bean and chorizo dip. What we got was one of the saltiest things I have ever eaten in my life. I know chorizo adds a lot of salt to any dish, but this was absolutely ridiculous. We found ourselves pouring salsa on top of the dish to attempt to cut the saltiness. Also, the chorizo was somehow ground and combined into a huge pile of refried beans. I expected somewhat of a layered dip with chorizo and cheese, but instead we got this over salted pile of beans. The worst part? Our waitress abandoned our table for ten minutes, leaving us dying for refills on our drinks. We couldn’t get get through half of the appetizer because of the saltiness.

The menu was extremely limited, and I attempted to order from the specials menu which apparently is only available on Fridays. I ended up settling on the fajitas with chicken, steak, and shrimp because the waitress said they were very good there. I’m always very hesitant to order fajitas at restaurants because I like to think that my family has the best fajita recipe in the world. My girlfriend, Stephanie, was more observant than I and saw that there was a daily special for chicken mole. I was immediately jealous.

When my fajitas arrived, and I was extremely disappointed before even trying them. The platter contained more large cuts of bell pepper than any of the meats. The peppers were only slightly roasted, and a large amount of liquid had formed under the toppings. The next thing I noticed was that in my small plate of fajita accessories, there was no sign of any cheese. No cheese on fajitas? I was assuming it was some sort of mistake, but found out when I asked for a small side of cheese that it was a dollar extra. Party foul. The fajitas were extremely bland, and when I finished the meat I was left with a heaping pile of peppers and onions. Not impressive at all.

Surely, the mole would be better. Nope! The shredded chicken was smothered in a mole sauce that had a little kick to it, but no real notable flavor. I can’t even begin to write a detailed review because of the blandness of the taste. You will have to settle for a picture of this one. I will note that when I asked for some form of hot sauce or green salsa, the waitress gave me a confused look and stated there was none.

We ended up leaving most of the food we ordered because of the heat in the restaurant, and the lack of any impressive food on our table. I would have to say this is the second least impressive Mexican restaurant I have ever visited, aside from the always terrible Tios in Ypsilanti. I’m not sure if it was simply the selection of food we chose, the lack of quality service, or the heat, but I left extremely frustrated and unhappy with the experience. I tried to write this review as nicely as possible, but if you want normal ranting John’s opinion.. It sucked. Terrible. Don’t ever eat there.
June 12, 2009
Epic Portions Attempts 30″ Pizza

Bella Italia began advertising a pizza challenge a few weeks ago which seemed crazy, but doable. The challenge required a team of two to eat a 30″ meat lovers pizza in under 60 minutes. If we could take it out, 200 big ones would be ours. I’m sure that $200 would go towards future medical bills for some sort of cardiac disease, but it seemed like a good idea for some reason.

The problem with this was I remembered the contest during work the same day and had no time to prepare. I simply tried to drink as much water as possible and didn’t eat for the entire day. For the team, I recruited Mackenzie, a fellow eating machine, to help me out.

They got out the giant pizza shovel and stared started making the pizza. It didn’t really look all that bad. We were relieved to see that the pizza crust wasn’t as thick as we thought it would be. The thing I was worried about were the rubix cube size chunks of ham being added. Morale was high, but concern definitely existed.

They brought out the biggest pizza box I have ever seen in my life and decided to put a large pizza box inside just to show us what we were getting ourselves into. If you can’t tell from the visual, the 30″ pizza is the equivalent of four larges. Oh yeah, and don’t forget the 2 pounds of meat on top. This wasn’t looking good.

We were actually pretty damn confident when the pizza finally came out. This was definitely something we thought we could pull off. We were in for one hell of a surprise. I thought the stack method would be the best way to go. This was supposed to consist of me cutting my half into different sections and stacking the pieces on top of each other and eating them together. The problem was that the crust was so thin the pieces kept breaking and falling apart. We then began rolling the pieces and eating them that way but ended up reverting to just grabbing up piles of cheese and meat with our hands and eating as quickly as possible.

We started off good, taking out about half the pizza in about 8 minutes. We hit the wall after that though. The combination of all the grease, meat, and huge pieces of crust at the ends of the slices makes this a pretty ridiculous challenge. I was sweating like a fat man, and felt drunk on pizza.

After about the 25 minutes, we completely hit the wall. Our heads were telling us to keep going but our stomachs were threatening to eject. We decided to give up with a little more than 3/4 of the pizza digested.

I really think with a little more prep this challenge could be completed. I think I need to detox for a month or two before I try and attempt this again. Oh, and if you were wondering If I as exaggerating about the ham, look in the bottom left corner of the picture above. Those chunks are ridiculous.

Bella Italia Pizza & Pasta
895 W Eisenhower Pkwy
Ann Arbor, MI 48103
(734) 222-9994
http://www.bellaitaliapizzaandpasta.com/

May 25, 2009
Zingerman’s Roadhouse – Ann Arbor, MI

My darling of a girlfriend, Stephanie, took me to Zingerman’s Roadhouse in Ann Arbor on Sunday for my birthday and it was damn delicious. I have been meaning to visit this place since it opened because of the huge variety of food it offers. The menu features “old-time American classics” but gives you a lot more than just simple comfort food. You are given the option of creating your own cheese plate, a large oyster menu, a great domestic beer list, and reading materials giving you detailed information of pretty much everything on the menu. The wait staff is readily available to answer any questions you may have, and is well informed on all things food.

I started off with an oyster. I had never had the privilege, mainly because I was a bit weary of raw foods until a few years ago. The oysters offered raw or smoked, and I went with the raw Steamhouse oyster, which was recommended by our waitress. I can not even explain how delicious it was, and I regret ever being afraid of them. With a bit of the house made horse radish sauce, this was a delicious beginning to he meal.

After the oyster, we moved on to the appetizer menu which boasts a great variety of starters. We decided to go with the fried calamari and chili & cheddar fries. The calamari was good, but not great. I have had calamari many times, and this falls right in the middle of those experiences. It was not over fried, but the taste of the calamari didn’t completely shine through. I could give it a solid C+ as far as calamari goes. As for the chili & cheddar fries, I have never had anything like it. The twice-cooked fries were good, but the chili was complete with large tender pieces of beef. It was topped with 2-year raw-milk Vermont cheddar.

For our entrees, I had to go with the Texas cabrito with mashed potatoes and mac & cheese. The cabrito is pulled free-range goat that is smoked over wood and served with barbecue sauce. Wow, never had goat but it was absolutely delicious. I have to say that if you are not an adventurous eater, goat may not be for you. I can’t really explain what goat tastes like, but if you’re interested I would highly recommend it. The mashed potatoes were good, but the mac & cheese was very average. Stephanie ordered the New Mexico black bean and hominy burger. It was served with green chiles, avocado salad, lettuce, tomato, onion and pickles, on a fresh onion roll. It was an interesting burger because the patty was not completely formed. It acted as more of a spread.

All in all, I would give Roadhouse a solid B. The appetizers and starters are the real star of the meal, while the entrees seemed pretty average. If you visit there, I would stick to the oysters, cheese plate, and appetizers.

March 17, 2009