There is simply too much delicious food in Mexico City. During the week when I am by myself at the apartment, I don't eat out. I go to the supermarket and buy ingredients to make some simple, relatively low-calorie meals at my place. I have also been trying to do a lot of walking.
Last Thursday, after visiting the Anthropology Museum, I decided to walk back to the apartment. It's approximately a 3.5-mile walk. I was almost home, just five minutes away from the apartment, when I had this urge to stop and have something to eat. Even though I had something planned to fix for dinner, I stopped at this little restaurant.
I had passed by the place a number of times. From the paintings on the exterior wall and its name, "El Tong", I had always assumed that it was an Asian restaurant. But when I looked at the menu board on the sidewalk, I realized that it was another one of those little restaurants that is only open in the afternoon, and which serves a set "menu of the day". The mid-afternoon meal or "comida" is the main meal, and these places provide an inexpensive "comida" for working people. They serve a three-course meal... first a soup, then a rice or pasta dish, and then a main course. For each course you usually have a few choices. A beverage and a very small dessert are also included.
I decided to sit down at one of the tables on the sidewalk. A very pleasant, older gentleman waited on me. He brought me a pitcher of guava-flavored water. I had a soup with bow-tie macaroni, and a small plate of Mexican rice. For the main course, my waiter recommended the "enchiladas morelianas", a specialty of Morelia, the capital of the state of Michoacán.
The enchiladas were filled with chicken and were topped with crumbled "chorizo" sausage, cheese, shredded lettuce and cubes of potato. They were quite tasty, and the entire meal cost only 110 pesos... $5.85 in U.S. dollars.
I figured that after all the walking that I did that day, my restaurant meal was not a serious transgression against my diet.
Are doggie bags available in restaurants?
ReplyDeleteYes, some restaurants have containers for carry-out now. However, the portions at these inexpensive "meal of the day" restaurants are usually not that large.
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