Tacos, Tacos, Tacos!

 

Tacos, tacos, tacos!!!  Betsy here. What a joy it was to be back in the Twin Cities with my dear friends with discriminating tastes!  We had lots to celebrate (the soon-to-be arrival of Baby Cameron, Ameigh's birthday!, and my all-too-quick visit home), and what better way to do so than by STUFFING ourselves with Tacos!  We seriously ate a LOT.

To get you in the right mindset for our taco tasting, I recommend you watch this video from Peelander Z - because this is EXACTLY how our evening felt: http://youtu.be/9EvhRaqzMPY.

(OK - for those of you that watched that video - A: you're awesome. B: Peelander Z is amazing, C: all those taco places are in Austin, TX!  Which is where I live now. And also, yes we had human-sized squid bowling at our tasting too... the photos just didn't quite turn out.)

AHEM! Back to business.  We each picked up a chicken taco (the simplest house special) from a local Twin Cities eatery. Obviously, we couldn't represent ALL the delicious tacos available in the TC and there are many renowned tacos left off this list, but I think overall, we had a really good sampling of styles. Here's where our eatins came from:

• El Toro- St. Paul (Plato & Robert)
• El Taco Riendo - Northeast Minneapolis
• Adelita's Mexican Restaurant - Northeast Minneapolis
• Rusty Taco (inappropriate giggling!) - St. Paul (Lexington/Randolph)... we tried both the fried and fajita
• La Loma - Minneapolis (South Minneapolis and Midtown Global Market)
• Los Ocampo - Minneapolis and St. Paul locations
• Chipotle - Across the U.S.!
  

Disclaimer - I know there are east-side St. Paul taco shops we missed here... leave your favorites in the comments!  Admittedly, we picked up our tacos based on convenience, primarily. On to the tasting!

We soon discovered that we all had strong opinions on the style (chunky or shredded?) of the chicken, the overall flavor/spices, and the amount and quality of the toppings. Turns out that Shalee will actually get hostile with you if you try to serve her chunky chicken in her taco, Amanda's spice-o-meter is set inarguably on the green side of mild, and Vanessa is surprisingly generous in her scoring if your establishment happens to have a hilarious name.  We also rated on price, tortilla, and appearance.

Let's start with the disappointments and work up to the winners.  Adelita's, Rusty's, and La Loma were pretty lame compared to the other four joints.  Adelita's had greasy little chicken chunks with very little flavor and no toppings, Rusty's had great design but the taste didn't pack a punch (though we did all agree that Rusty's might have been tastier if eaten right after serving), and La Loma suffered from a similar weird greasy/boring chicken disorder as Adelita's and took FOREVER for the shop to make. Seriously - like 30 minutes for two tacos and some black beans.


El Toro did pretty well... the chicken was shredded and it came with lots of yummy toppings (+ cheese, although for the record, Ameigh and Amanda weren't impressed with the topping quality) and an agreeable four tortilla.  Plus, these puppies were affordable--only $1.70 each! A solid 4th place finish.

Our top three were El Taco Riendo, Los Ocampo and Chipotle.  El Taco Riendo was beautifully served (so colorful!), and though the chicken was chunky - it was mega-flavorful.  These tacos were loaded with toppings and served in a double-corn-tortilla shell which held together really nicely. Although Amanda's lips were burning and Ameigh thought the flavor was good but a bit overpowered by the spice, El Taco Riendo earned PERFECT SCORES in flavor from the other three tasters (wow!) and top marks overall from Ameigh and Vanessa.

Los Ocampo was also a beauty (pictured above) - bright orange shredded chicken, which really stood out from the pack. This one was WAY too spicy for a couple folks on the team and could've used more toppings, but earned top marks overall from Shalee and me!

Everyone loves Chipotle, and I'm a HUGE fan of their chicken tacos (although I'm sure when she read this, Shalee puked in her mouth a little)... and they did really well in our taste test (maybe the first of our corporate entries to grace the top 3?).  Their strength is definitely in the toppings (no duh) and they earned Amanda's top score by a long shot.  Plus, these tacos were ENORMOUS and quite affordable (breaks down to $2.05/taco), though I don't love that you have to order 3.  Why can't I just get one taco, Chipotle? 

After a lot of math, we discovered that the overall winner is..... El Taco Riendo!  The City Pages named them as best Taco in the Twin Cities, and the Twin Cities Taste Buds agree... these tacos are delicious!  Ameigh - please give Pat his Corona back.

BUT the real winner on taco tasting night was the five of us.  It was SO FUN to be together, to talk excitedly about what an amazing Mom Ameigh is about to be, to laugh at Shalee laughing at Vanessa, and to share a couple more hours  appreciating how full and wonderful life is when it's filled with good friends.  I'm back in Austin as I write this, but my heart is and always will be with y'all. AND - I have to say - Austin has KILLER tacos and I'm sure this city needs SOMEONE to tell them which are the best. Whaddya say?

See you again soon, friends! (Next up: CHEESECAKE)

FINALLY!!!!

By Amelia Cameron

We had our tomato soup tasting all planned out, (it was going to be a good one, mothers and all) but then people started realizing they double booked.  When you're working with 5-8 women, scheduling can get a bit hairy.  So the Taste Buds decided to post-pone the Mothers Edition until later this summer after I had officially become a mother myself. 
In the mean time, with our beloved Betsy in town for a wedding and my baby shower, we decided it was only logical to put together a tasting for the original 5.  Last night Amanda, Besty, Shalee, Vanessa and I gathered together at my house to taste chicken tacos.  Boy was it fun!  Shalee got taco drunk, Vanna got motherly, Manda got her tongue burnt, Betsy got blue arms and I got a house full of beautiful, thoughtful and fun friends!  Manda should be posting the photos for the blog soon and Betsy will be posting the commentary after traveling back to Texas.  We'll miss you terribly Betsy!!!
We are planning on our next tasting to be cheesecake in July.  We might use this tasting for our Mothers Edition or we might go for our second honorary taster, we're still working on the details.  Keep posted for lots of fun to come!

Tomato Soup Suggestions?

Our next tasting will be tomato soup on April 30th.  Shalee, Vanessa, Amanda and I will all be bringing our mothers to act as our "guest tasters."  We're going to do this tasting a little different... we are going to take suggestions on where to get our tomato soup from and we are going to making this a blind tasting.  Both are going to be enacted to help prevent preconceived notions and biases.  Please comment below to make your suggestions for where to get good tomato soup.  As always, we want all local establishments and one corporate entry.  Get suggestions from friends and family and post them below.

Thank you sooo much for reading!!!

Heart,
Amelia Cameron

How turned on are you?

By: Amelia Cameron


Let's get to the brass taxes here...what is an aphrodisiac?  Well according to all the smarty pants out there, an aphrodisiac is a substance that increases sexual desire.  The name comes from Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of sexuality and love. Throughout history, many foods, drinks, and behaviors have had a reputation for making sex more attainable and/or pleasurable.
This is the Taste Buds here though, so lets focus on the food and drink aspect of aphrodisiacs.  What are some of the more common food and drink aphrodisiacs?  Among them are: asparagus, coffee, grapes, honey, ginger, oysters, avocado, libations, figs, chiles, basil, strawberries, black beans, rosemary, pine nuts and chocolate.
Since this tasting was being held February 12th, we thought we'd honor Valentine's day and taste one of these tongue tickling tantalizers.  We went with chocolate brownies.  This was a no brainer though, since every year in preparation for every Valentine's day over one billion dollars is spent on chocolate alone.  Our infatuation with combining chocolate and love began over 2,000 years ago when Aztec ruler Montezuma would routinely drink a cocoa bean mixture before entering his harem, thus increasing chocolate's popularity with romance.

We decided the brownies we tasted had to be in the simplest chocolaty form possible.  No peanut butters, cherries or cream cheeses allowed.  Who was pure enough to make the cut?  Bread & Chocolate, Sara Jane's, Wuollet's, Good Earth, Bars, Mississippi Market and Starbucks were our contenders.

With Betsy moved to Texas, we brought in our first "guest taster" Jessica (Johnson) Larson.

  

Jess attended high school with the Taste Buds and hangs in our friend circles, but it's not that easy to qualify as a possible "guest taster."  You also have to an immense love and enthusiasm for food and food conversation, which Jess possesses.  Jess' perfect brownie? A dense, dark chocolaty morsel that is a little crunchy and a little chewy.  Let's see if any met her standards.

Let's start with Good Earth.  (***Disclaimer: after purchasing my brownie at Good Earth, I found out their baked goods are NOT made on site.  Although there are only two Good Earths in existence, they are owned by Minnesota parent company Parasole Family of Restaurants.  Parasole owns a string of local restaurants such as Chino Latino, Salute and Burger Joe's.  Although all local, Parasole has one bakery that makes the goodies these restaurants serve.)  Good Earth's brownie was frosted with no nuts.  It got high marks on its visual appeal, but medium to low on value, texture, aphrodisiac qualities, flavor and overall from everyone but Amanda.  This was one of her favorites!  

Next up, Wuollet's who got mixed reviews.  It was on the completely opposite end of the spectrum from Good Earth's style.  Unfrosted and filled with walnuts and chocolate chunks it earned high texture scores from most.  It's visual appeal, aphrodisiac qualities and flavor were all over the board.  It's value was scored lower due to it's smaller size and higher price.  Shalee and Jess both were fans of it's crispy outside and moist inside.  It seemed to be a "love it or hate it" kind of brownie.  

Sara Jane's definitely had the cheapest brownies at an amazing $0.75 per brownie, but they also had the smallest brownie at about half to 1/4 of the size to everyone else.  Maybe a three biter...  Sara Jane's ran the median for the majority of categories and for the majority of tasters.  I really liked the fudgey frosting and small bits of nuts, but they were reminiscent of Little Debbie's Fudge Brownies.

Starbucks's was our corporate entry and it didn't disappoint!  With it's simple but elegant chocolate chunk style it received rave reviews for it's visual appeal and texture.  It ranked medium to low on it's flavor and aphrodisiac qualities, which was unexpected because it incorporated a second aphrodisiac, coffee.

Next was Bread & Chocolate.  It was drenched with chocolate frosting and stuffed with chocolate chunks.  A full brownie would have earned a "two glasses of milk" rating.  It's soft cakeiness hit both high and low ranking as did it's flavor.  It ranked high on it's visual appeal and value.  Bread & Chocolate's overall brownie experience received solid ratings as well.

  

Mississippi Market had a hard time winning over hearts right from the start.  Although packaged the day of the tasting, it looked dried out.  Then when we cut into the bar, it's chocolate "frosting" crumbled and fell off.  It received mixed reviews on its crunchy outside and chewy middle texture, but it won back some hearts with it's deep chocolaty flavor.  We all agree though, overall we could find something better somewhere else.

Last but not least, was Bars.  Its plan brownie with light frosting received medium to low scores in visual appeal, as did it's aphrodisiac qualities (except for Jess).  It's texture ran the gamut of really low to really high.  It's flavor rated pretty average.  This brownie received Jess' highest ranking.  She said she found her ideal brownie.

Who won you ask?  Bread & Chocolate.  They didn't completely win anyone over, but they played a solid game.  The other shops had lovers and haters, but Bread & Chocolate pleased everyone's palate and stayed right on course.  Go get a gallon of milk, two brownies from Bread & Chocolate for you and your love and your sure to have a pleasurable evening!  

With Chocolaty Love, 

The Taste Buds (and Linus the dog)

Maaaarinara, where the noodles always lead to stains!

M-A-R-I-N-A-R-A!

We meet again, www, to explore all that is...red sauce.  

The Tastebuds were sooooo happy to be together again!

Since our last gathering our dear Besty has moved to Austin

(Texas, that is)!  We miss her all the time.

There was some concern that now that she has been living in Texas she wouldn't know what marinara is.

I'm pretty sure they only have BBQ down there.

I could be wrong...

But Betsy is not only pretty - she is smart too; and she remembered what marinara is supposed to taste like!  So we begin:

Each of us* brought a tub of red sauce from a local eatery and we made some noodles and chicken at the house.  The entries were as follows:

Betsy - Fat Lorenzo's

Amanda - Olive Garden (corporate entry)

Aims -  Vescio's

Vanna -  Mama's

*Shalee - I failed.  I was to bring Cossetta's, but there was a hockey game and that line gets out of control!  I'm sorry.

We judged these ruby reds by the color, texture, and taste.

Some of us like the thick heavy sauce

and others prefer theirs a little runny.

It was up to the score-er to determine the texture points on that.

 

Olive Garden was off to a lead as soon as Amanda walked in the door

FREE BREAD STICKS! 

The corporate entry was so generous when they heard of our blog they shared what we all know is the best thing about the O.G!

Although the O.G. started off strong they just couldn't pull it off!

Mama's (from St. Paul) came through with the W. 

Their sauce was ridiculously flavorful

and had a near perfect consistency! 

Oh  Mama!

Although the food is always our primary dealing,

I feel that this gathering was less about the sauce and a little more about our group as a meeting of people

who have shared the high school experience, multiple moves across the county, marriages, and much, much more.

We are gals who genuinely enjoy the company of one another. 

This was our first Taste Buds holiday gathering and I think the sauce, no matter how delicious, could not help but take a backseat to what we truly love ~

which is each other. 

I'm puking now.  And again, it's not about the food...

 

Could there be a better way to share our lives than eating together?  Nope!