Mi Ranchito, U City - Visited July 2013


It was time for another departmental birthday lunch, and today's birthday girl selected Mi Ranchito in University City, just a few blocks north of the Delmar Loop on Kingsland. I had never been there and so I was pretty excited, especially knowing I had a periodontist appointment later in the afternoon and the poor folks there would have to deal with my Mexican breath after lunch! The parking lot there was roomy but already had a bit of a crowd at 11:45 when we arrived. The restaurant is pretty large and has some huge, really gaudy paintings on the walls, which were quite entertaining. Speedy Gonzales? Really? Some of my coworkers thought other paintings looked like the cover of romance novels. Definitely unique!

Our first group already had a table there since the other driver was known to drive like a maniac, and they had a table for nine set up for us (there were several other large groups there too.) There were already multiple baskets of chips and bottles of salsa for our consumption, and they were both very good. The chips were heartier than your average store bought "Tostitos" type chips, and the salsa was not too watery and not too chunky, with just a little hotness to it. It was nice that they had little bowls for everyone to serve their own personal salsa so "double dipping" was never a problem. When our chip basket started to get empty a waiter magically appeared with a new one and more salsa too. The service was incredible and very fast.

The menu had a lot of choices and I was having a difficult time deciding so I thought I would pick a "number" and went with lunch #7, two chicken enchiladas with rice and guacamole salad. Bob, sitting across from me went with the Chile Poblano, Chris selected the lunch Pollo Yucatan and the birthday girl, Margo, went with the fish tacos. I am not sure what the rest of the table selected, but everybody seemed to like their food. It came out quickly and the portion sizes were quite generous. They were very good at keeping everyone's drinks filled and we were in and out of there in about an hour, pretty good timing for a group of nine. The food was not extraordinary, but it was high quality and solid "Tex Mex" as a very reasonable price and with tip top service. You cannot complain about that! I almost never get to eat out Mexican so I thought it was wonderful.

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