All tagged sinaloense

Cenaduría Sinaloense La Espiguita

If there were one rule to remember while eating in San José, it's this: if a restaurant says "Sinaloa," it probably has really good food. As the nearest land mass across the Mar de Cortez, Sinaloa is the neighboring state to Baja California Sur. This explains why a large portion of San José's residents are Sinaloan: they moved west during Baja California Sur's massive development thirty years ago. With them they brought the tastes of Sinaloan cuisine.

Cenaduría Sinaloense la Espiguita is the restaurant of Sinaloa native chef Sandra Luz Zepeda. It's a local place visited by residents who live in the adjacent Colonia Chamizal. Here, a tabletop stereo plays Sinaloan banda while Señora Zepeda takes orders and returns to the kitchen to prepare them. The outdoor restaurant serves a variety of antojitos, meats, and soups including red pozole. But what the restaurant lacks in fancy decor it makes up for in flavor. I find myself visiting "La Espiguita" pretty often.

Mariscos el Sinaloense

Off Highway 1, halfway between San José Centro and the airport, is a humble concrete blue-roofed restaurant teeming with incredibly fresh seafood. The restaurant, named Mariscos el Sinaloense ("Seafood by the guy from Sinaloa"), is just to the side of a dirt parking lot with iron bars protecting open-air windows. What the restaurant lacks in appearance it makes up for in flavor. At the back of the simple restaurant -- open only for lunch -- is a magical red Igloo cooler filled with a colorful palette of the morning's fresh catch. Sr. Olegario Yañez, chef/owner of Mariscos el Sinaloense, originally came from Culiacán, Sinaloa nearly twenty five years ago. The original restaurant, just a fraction of the current size, was located in San José. Overflowing with customers, Mariscos el Sinaloense moved a few miles north on Highway 1 to expand six years ago. Since then it's been relatively quiet, a pit stop for locals travelling along the highway.