La Salvadorena - McKinney, TX

I have hit the holy grail of Mexican/San Salvadorian food.  I'm almost afraid to tell people about it because I don't want a whole bunch of people to flood the place and make me wait for a table... but then, since I have about 5 readers (love you, Mom) I figure I'm safe.
La Salvadorena (I don't know how to make the little ~ sign...) specializes in pupusas.  While I wouldn't recommend you using this term in polite conversation, at a San Salvadorian restaurant, this will get you a corn meal pancake with different fillings.  They also serve traditional Mexican food so, for the benefit of my readers, I ordered a ton of food so I could give you a good report on several menu items.
Signage is lacking at the front door but usually the hostess/waitress/cashier is there to greet you and tell you to sit where you want.  The walls are decorated with very bright colors and tapestries no doubt made by village women in San Salvador or 12 year olds in China.  Either way, I got the impression they were hung partially for ambiance and partly to cover stains on the wall.  This place is a dive but well worth it.
I don't know what a pupusa SHOULD taste like but these were both comforting and tantalizing.  By comforting, think of a bowl of mashed potatoes and by tantalizing, think of the seared edge of a steak. The pupusas come with a red salsa of moderate heat and a giant heap of fermented cabbage.  The salsa was light enough in the heat that the tomato flavor came through.  The cabbage hit my tongue in a completely different place than the filling of the pupusa so there was no competition for flavor, just accompanying or dare I say, friendship?  I asked my waitress (in nearly perfect Spanish) which one I should try.  She told me (in perfect English) to get the traditional pupusa with pork, potato, and spices.  I also tried one with cheese and one with carne asada.  All were delicious and perfectly browned.
I ordered a torta as well.  This Latin twist on a sandwich isn't usually layered with delicate flavors.  It should be served warm, bread soft and easy to chew, and some kind of mayo traditionally accompanies the filling.  The problem with most tortas is that it's over laden with lettuce and the mayo covers up any flavor the meat may give.  Depending on the quality of the meat, this might be preferable.  This torta was warm, soft, had more meat than veggies, and just enough mayo to give it that signature taste.  I'm not a fan of mayo, usually, but this was well balanced and did not offend my taste buds.
The gorditas were out of this world.  Gorditas are little pockets of tortilla stuffed with meat, lettuce, some times tomato, and queso fresco.  Most gorditas I've had were mostly tortilla.  This was all about the filling.  The meat was a bit salty and the queso fresco is, by nature, salty but when I added the red salsa from the pupusas, it cut the salt and the heat provided seemed to mask the salt.  But, again, I am more sensitive to salt than most so I'm going to guess that most other people would think it's perfection.
Finally, the horchata.  Again, not a word to use in polite conversation but this was amazing.  Not homemade but still mixed well.  Rice milk with cinnamon and other ingredients make this little liquid treat worth ordering.  It reminds me of drinking the milk after you've eaten a couple bowls of cinnamon toast crunch.  Ahhhh, child hood and possible diabetes.  I've since had several of their agua frescas and they are all terrific.
I made a quick pit stop in the bathroom... yikes.  You should probably go before you leave.  It was an afterthought.  And it has a certain, how do you say, Norman Bates quality.  The choice of dish soap as hand soap is fun, I guess.  Some may say quaint.  I just want to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, or at least be tricked beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the bathroom is clean.
Last item of note... I snapped a photo of the kitchen.  This is the reason the food is so good.  Small, unassuming cook top and these ladies are making everything from scratch and by hand.  I'm a fan of this food.  No fuss here.  Just good, honest, food.  Next time you go out to eat, tell your significant other that you would like to eat pupusas.  If they don't slap your face and leave, take them here.  You won't be sorry.


I give La Salvadorena an 8 out of 10.  Clean the bathroom and wipe the tables down but don't mess with the food.











Happy eating, y'all.

Rye - Mckinney, TX

Rye is a little, tucked away restaurant on the downtown McKinney square.  It's easy to miss but make sure you don't.  It is a new gem that needs to stick around.
I'll start with the negative... The ambiance.  It's not bad. It's not good.  It's just nice.  (Into the Woods fans can start humming now) The front station where you wait to be seated is clearly marked and so close to the doorway, you are likely to run into it if you aren't careful.  The inside is a reclaimed wood/exposed brick theme.  It looks like HGTV barfed in the room.  I really liked look for a few years then everyone started doing it.  Now, national chains have picked up the trend and it's time to find something else.
All that aside, our waiter was very cordial if not a bit talkative.  He sat me and my friend, Red, at a table right next to another patron.  A bit awkward but it's better than Paris, France where you sit in your neighbor's lap.
I ordered a McKinney Mule to start the evening.  Rye brews their own ginger beer and they make a Moscow Mule with this ginger beer.  A good ginger beer should embrace the ginger, shun the sugar, and leave you a little breathless from the burn.  A good Moscow Mule should make you forget most of your evening and influence you to make bad life choices.  This one did both.  I'll not go into detail on the latter but the former had all the pungency of a great ginger beer and the lime/mint undertones were perfectly balanced.  Kudos to the mixologist for using copper instead of mason jars.  You can go either way in the "barn chic" atmosphere but the mason jars are hard to drink out of. Plus, my mom canned a lot when I was a child and every time I see a mason jar, I taste tomato.
Appetizer was a corn bread with white cheddar, green chiles, and a honey butter.  The texture was outstanding: fluffy without being crumbly.  A lot of corn breads are too dry or too wet.  If you're dumping a can of creamed corn in your mix, that's cheating.  this had a great crunchy outer layer and the honey butter was delightful except for the layer of salt.  As I've mentioned before, I'm sensitive to salt so the littlest bit makes me grimace.  I imagine most people would think it's fine.  The cheese in the corn bread is salty as is the corn bread itself.  The extra layer on the butter was not needed.  I would also like to have more green chiles in the bread.  I was expecting more heat.  It's like taking a gulp of ice cold water only to find out it's luke warm prune juice.

For entree, the waiter talked me into the Bucatini Carbonara. If you ever want to impress people or just be pretentious (*raises hand) make a dish of spaghetti with an eggy cream sauce, add bacon and peas and call it Bucatini Carbonara.  However, if you want a mind blowing version of this dish, get to Rye.  Their version comes with peas, bacon, egg, and grated grana padana... I'm not sure what a grana padana is but it is: 1. Fun to say and 2. Delicious.  The bucatini was cooked to perfection.  Since bucatini is basically a thick spaghetti with a hole in the middle, you run the risk of carrying lots of extra liquid from the pot to the dish.  This was not so.  The noodles had a firm bite to them and were evenly coated with the Carbonara mixture was perfection as well.  The bacon and peas were appropriately crisp and plump adding a fun texture to the dish.  The sauce was evenly coated and had such a delicate flavor to it, I almost forgot it was there.  It seemed to add a fantastic neutral background to the stronger flavors of the dish but also heightened the egginess of the pasta.  Perhaps that was the egg heightening the egginess of the pasta... whatever heightened the egginess, it was noticed and I give them points.  I also give them points for their grana padana.  In a world filled with pepper jack and Five Cheese blend, a good grana padana was appreciated.  I will need to ask a cheese person about this if I'm ever in a cheese shop and not hurling from the stench.  I hope a Latin song writer makes a great Samba from the words Grana Padana.

It's a tiny place with standard decore.  The waiter was nice and appropriately attentive.  He assumed we liked the food (and he was right).  The food and drink was outstanding.  I will be definitely be back to try some more menu items.  If you come here, get ready to pay.  It's a tad expensive.

I give Rye a 9 out of 10.

Happy Eating, y'all.