Crispy tacos and a pastry: Andi’s best bites this week
This week, I tucked into a plate of crispy mashed potato tacos next to a bus stop on McDowell Road. I sipped a steamy broth of butter and white wine at a laid-back Caribbean restaurant in Scottsdale. And I wandered around Roosevelt Row, ending up at a politically aware coffee shop with an incredible selection of food art magazines and a smart mix of French pastries from a local baker.
As I continued down the block with my plastic cup of cold brew emblazoned with the message “dethrone racism,” I thought back on my favorite meals of the week, and how they reflect the city’s diverse culinary landscape.
Different as they may be, the one thing every dish on this list had in common was that they were too good not to share. Here are the best things I ate this week.
Tacos dorados at Nogales Hot Dogs #1
In my search for the city’s best Sonoran hot dogs, this name kept coming up in conversation. However, as I sat in the air conditioned tent next to a Tufesa bus station, I found myself far more impressed by the tacos dorados ($7) — fried tacos covered with shredded lettuce and crema and topped with a smattering of pickled red onions and snowy cotija cheese.
Tacos dorados, or hard-shell tacos, are a signature item in border cities like Nogales. There you’ll often see them presented with a pile of chopped tomatoes and sold under the name “tacos de perro,” a description that’s not to be taken literally.
They’re typically made with beef and mashed potatoes, which is how they’re served at Nogales Hot Dogs, though the night I enjoyed them, they also came with a cup of thin consomme on the side. The broth felt like an afterthought. To be fair, compared with the tacos, even the namesake hot dogs felt like an afterthought. These tacos were so good, they had me imagining someone saddling up to this perfectly simple meal after a seven-hour bus ride from Hermosillo and feeling right at home again.
Details: 2718 W. McDowell Road, Phoenix. 602-301-8843.
Camarones Brazilian at Little Cay
Basically a shot of white wine and butter served in a fried green plantain, this classic Caribbean dish is still lingering in my mind almost a week later. At the Latin fusion restaurant Little Cay, it goes by the name camarones Brazilian after the country in which owner Ben Sinon’s partner discovered it.
The dish, which is sometimes called tostones rellenos de camarones at Caribbean restaurants, features garlicky shrimp that’s tucked into a molded fried plantain. At Little Cay, the shrimp come bathed in a lustrous wine butter sauce similar to the kind you’d find dressing a plate of mussels. I ate the shrimp first, and then sipped from the hot plantain cups in the same way I’d carefully slurp a soup dumpling.
The night I visited, I feasted on a small plates menu of sweet plantain latkes and heavenly veggie empanadas that exploded with soft cheese. And though Little Cay didn’t hit it out of the park with every dish, I haven’t stopped thinking about the shrimp and butterfilled tostones cups ($11) ever since.
Details: 4912 E. Shea Blvd., suite 108, Scottsdale. 480-534-4110, littlecayaz.com.
Friand pastry at Futuro Coffee
Meeting new friands at Futuro was the highlight of my weekend. Seriously. The Roosevelt-area coffee shop is a minimalist chic space that you might accurately describe as a cross between a contemporary art museum and a hair salon. So, it tends to attract all kinds of cool people, two of whom I chatted up and ran into later that same evening at Gracie’s Tax Bar. But I was paying just as much attention to the phenomenal French cake muffins that Futuro had on display behind the glass counter.
As big as a 50-cent bouncy ball, the hazelnut dough of The friand ($5.50) was packed with toasty brown butter flavor. This is a pastry that needs to be on menus everywhere. Mark Chacón, a Tartine alum and the pastry chef for Chris Bianco’s restaurants, brilliantly tops the mini muffins with a chocolatey cognac ganache, and hits it with candied and fried hazelnuts for some sweet salty crunch. You’ll have to coordinate your schedule to meet up with this friand, as the pastry shows up at Futuro on weekends (the coffee shop is open Friday through Sunday), at Pane Bianco most days, and makes an appearance at Bones Bodega on Sundays. (It’s even been known to popup in the First Place Coffee truck). But, trust me, it’s worth the effort.
Details: 909 N. First St., Phoenix, 602-730-3227, instagram.com/futurocoffee.