Bipolar

I arrived in Mexico City yesterday (Wednesday July 7) and reaped the consequences of my eventful week in Austin. I was half jet lagged, half still inebriated from the inordinate amount of consumption that took place in New Orleans and Austin. But I came to Mexico City to study food and eat, and gosh darn it, I wasn’t going to miss any opportunity that was put in front of me.

So my buddy Emilio picked me up from the airport, gave me a minute to relax in the house I would be staying in, and then introduced me to my first tacos in D.F. (Mexico City). We went to Bipolar, a trendy hipster bar in the Coyocan* neighborhood. I walked into a restaurant that was painted dark red and had wooden benches on both sides where there were some trendy young adults** eating and hanging out. The walls were adorned with kitsch lucha libre (wrestling, Hogan style) decorations like actions figures and old posters.

The lucha libre theme continued on the T.V. where a movie starring El Santo*** was being shown. I don’t plan to write about service too much, because I don’t want to be that guy, but service here was great. Our server was friendly, but unobtrusive, and kept our bench/table extremely clean without making a big deal of it. But back to the food.

Tacos al pastor was my inaugural dinner in D.F. and it was pretty good. The corn tortillas were the first things I noticed. They were a darker brown than any of the ones I’d had (white, blue, red, yellow) in Texas, save for a few places that make them in house (Manuels in Austin). The al pastor meat was like a lot I’ve had in my day, a little over sauced, but in the end still extremely tasty.

I want to point out that I absolutely love tacos al pastor. It’s kind of my “go-to dish,” with which to compare different establishments. Al pastor, is sort of a style that many believe was brought over by the Lebenese (for some info on this check out Que vivan los tamales by Jeffrey Pilcher sorry forgot page number). The Lebanese that immigrated to Mexico (1920sish) brought their style of cooking meat on a trompo (spit) which became the way to cook tacos al pastor. What I’ve read on this subject is hazy about the history, but no doubt this food was introduced from an outside source. Despite being a foreign food, many chilangos (residents of Mexico City) consider al pastor the food of the city dish.****

A little about the style al pastor, the meat is typically pork, and a piece of pineapple is put at the top of the spit where the juice can run down the meat and cause a reaction (I guess from the citrus) that makes the meat tender.*****

I did not bring my camera to this meal, and while the food was just o.k. I would have liked to get a picture of the bar. It’s the kind of place that hipsters in east Austin would drool over. I can just see that kid in a flannel shirt, tight jeans and some 80s sunglasses, telling his friends about how they should bike over to this cool bar called Bipolar. I kid, I kid, I love the hipsters. Next up the Mercado.

* Coyocan is the neighborhood where Frida Kahlo lived.

** Emilio was trying to explain to me the type of peeps that go to Coyocan. He said they were a little “hippie,” but his definition of hippie was obviously different than mine, because I expected to see dreds and tie-dye shirts. This was not the case. I thought they looked pretty trendy, but he assured me I would see the trendy kids in La Condesa.

*** El Santo is apparently equivalent to Hulk Hogan in the U.S. but way more popular. I’m currently learning about him, but apart from wrestling, El Santo had a lot of movies where he fought everything from battles against Zombies in the movie Santo contra los zombies to bouts with Frankenstein’s daughter in Santo contra la hija de Frankenstein.

**** I should just note that this is part hearsay from other friends from Mexico City, Emilio and this author David Lida. Maybe some would disagree with this.

**** This is similar the old Fajita style where ranchers would use lime to make the skirt steak more tender.