Pacos

I had a nice leisurely lunch at Pacos. A nice place to go for a Tex-Mex meal. The Green Chili Enchilada was excellent as usual, the chicken taco juicy and good.



1801 W Fairbanks Ave
Winter Park, FL 32789
407.629.0149

Amigos Restaurant & Cantina - dj

494 N Semoran Blvd
Winter Park, FL 32792
407.657.8111
www.amigostex-mex.com

I eat at the Altamonte Springs location on the first week Amigos was open in the Orlando area in 1988. The old Mr. Gatti’s Pizza on Westmonte Drive was the first location. That first week not much had changed except for the makeshift sign out front. It didn’t take long for the Texas license plates to start going up. Nell was there to greet you on every visit and make sure you felt at home. I still have her cook book from 1995 with illustrations by Jake Vest. The name was "If Ya Ain't a Little Fat, Ya Momma Didn't Love Ya!" it is a little corny but it has some good recipes. The competition was fierce for Mexican food on that corner in Altamonte Springs. There were 3 other big Mexican chain restaurants within a stones through (Casa Gallardo, El Torito, and Taco Bell) only Amigos is left.

Over the years my love for Amigos has come and gone. They expanded out to as many as seven restaurants I would guess. There are now 5 listed on their web site of which I think only 3 are currently open. Maybe this is a more manageable number as the food on this visit to the Winter Park outlet seemed to be better than on my last visit to the East Colonial store that is now closed. On that last visit to East Colonial the food was just bad. Today is was not bad.

I have fond memories of the Altamonte Springs store. This was the first restaurant my son went to when he was 2 weeks old. He is a senior in high school now. Where has all the time gone? Marisole “our waitress” use to treat us special when our little family came in. We always sat at the same table around the corner from the cash register. We finished our meal with Texas Pralines purchased at the cash register for a dollar (sadly no longer available). They can be ordered from www.lammes.com . I happen to have one at my desk back at work and this was the perfect finish to my meal.

Today I had the Texas Special from the lunch menu. It was an adequate serving not the giant plate they may have had in the past few years. It consisted of one cheese enchilada and one chicken taco, with rice and beans topped with a sprinkling of cheese. This was not a heavy lunch in fact it was just right. The food was very good today. I hope this signals a turnaround for Amigos. I will definitely give them another visit.



Rating: ***
Service: ***

PR’s Mexican Restaurant - DJ

499 W. Fairbanks Ave.
Winter Park, Florida
407.645.2225

We went to PR’s today because I thought they could handle a big crowd (14) for lunch. We got everybody at the table, but two they set at the bar right next to our table. PR’s has been a Winter Park tradition for at least 25 years. It is the place to go for lunch on Fridays if you are in the mood for fajitas. The restaurant looks just the same as I remember it when I moved to Florida in 1982. It just has more graffiti and the bike made from copper tubing is missing from the wall there are TV’s in its place. The building still rattles when trains go by on the track a few feet from the corner of the building.

The food at PR’s has been pretty consistent since those early days. PR’s is Tex-Mex with lots of cheddar cheese. Today I had one of the combination lunch specials. I choose one Enchiladas, one taco and rice. I had chicken on both the enchilada and the hard taco. The chicken was all white meat which had been shredded. The enchilada was topped with a savory ranchero sauce and then capped with cheddar cheese that was melted under the salamander. A bed of lettuce was placed under the taco which kept it from becoming soggy with the juicy from the enchilada. The other end of the plate had rice which was topped with a red sauce as well. The presentation was nice. The meal was very good.


Vegetarians can eat well here too, as the list of filling include spinach, mushrooms, veggies, and guacamole.

The thing you have to remember at PR’s is don’t fill up on the chips and endless soda before your meal arrives. I’ve learned over the years to sit at the bar because your meal will arrive sooner and you aren’t as tempted to eat the whole bowl of chips.

Rating: ***
Service ***
Price: Combo/Soda $8.50

Aztex Mexican Restaurant - DT

Aztex Mexican Restaurant at 745 Bennett Road just north of Colonial is “Mexican food with heritage and pride”. The best part about being an amateur food critic has to be trying a new restaurant and liking it. I try to have no expectations before a visit to minimize any bias. The neat thing about Aztex…the décor actually lowers your expectations. I’d call it “Post naval station watering hole goes mexican”. While we waited for our meal, the chips and salsa kept coming. While I prefer my salsa chunky, they offered a tasty red pureé. After trying the red, our waitress offered us something a little more spicy. The green. You have to watch this stuff pour out of the pitcher to again, achieve the proper expectation for minimal bias. Don’t get me wrong. For lunch, this place rocks. The service was great. They treated us like we were the only ones there. OK maybe we were close to the only ones there but hey it’s Monday and they were very nice to us. I ordered the Chicken Chimi. This fried burrito contained chicken, refried beans and cheese, topped with the red sauce, more cheese and served with sour cream and chopped lettuce, tomato and onion. I always eat everything, except today. I thought it tasted great but the portion was big enough for me to take some home. In summary, the taste, portions, cook time service and value are all good. As far as the atmosphere, if you have been looking for that perfect combination of Freddie Fender, poker night and cervesa, I give Aztex a big thumbs up!

Service: Rocks
Fresh ingredients: Yes
Atmosphere: Plenty
Chips and a Chimi big enough for two: $8.49