IV. The Perpendicular Universe of Avenida Juarez
In Siena, Italy, every night around 9 o'clock, the citizens leave their homes en masse and wander up and down the main street, the Via di Cittą, saying hi to neighbors and sipping coffee and shooting the breeze. This doesn't sound extraordinary, but it's a remarkable sensation when an entire town pours out into car-less streets at night, turning the darkened city into a social center. It's a strangely unnerving feeling-- you are, after all, surrounded by strangers in the dark-- and yet at the same time welcoming, like the whole city has become a backyard party.
It's a feeling you don't get much in America, because even when you're on a street at night with lots of strangers it's one (like Michigan Ave.) where cars set the atmosphere; it's their street, we're just walking along it. But it's what it's like to walk up and down Avenida Quinta, day or night, cars almost completely banned (though trucks abuse the privilege here and there) and, most noticeably, the sounds all human-based, not car-based. And that constant human vitality, day and night, is why that main tourist strip keeps drawing you back, even if your first glance (which is almost certain to be near the ferry dock, the McDonald's and all the street hawkers) makes it look more like one of those invented plastic environments, like Citywalk in L.A., than a real street.
However, there's one thing you notice is missing from Avenida Quinta after a while-- Mexicans. They're there selling things, but they're not strolling around looking for a chance to pay tourist prices, that's for sure. In fact, the locals have their own main drag, one might call it a parallel main street except for the fact that it is actually perpendicular to Avenida Quinta. Especially at night, it comes alive with the local population, strolling and shopping and eating and talking, the same way Quinta comes alive with the visitors. It's Avenida Juarez, marking the south end of downtown, and though most tourists will travel it in a car or bus to get from the highway to the beach at some point, it is not an exaggeration to say that one night as I walked it, a few blocks in I saw more drag queens than gringos out and about.
That's a disco along Juarez, still displaying in late January the traditional Mexican idea of "Navidad." All along Juarez there are clothing shops (both conventional and, notably, service uniforms), little groceries, repair shops, a squat, cinder block Policia station, and, it will come as no surprise, places to eat. Lots of places to eat.
During the day carnitas and barbacoa are a big draw-- order some tacos from the counter, then sit down at the plastic patio furniture inevitably bearing Coke or Pepsi logos and eat.
These were pretty good, unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of the signage so who knows which stand it was. After I took his picture he picked up a chunk of something and offered it to me to try. "Buche," he said. I knew I was being tested with something he thought would gross me out, so I ate it unhesitatingly. Salty, roasted, actually better than my pork taco. Later I looked 'buche" up. It was maw. Best I ever had!
Here's another pork taco I had, actually liked this better, green salsa was scaldingly hot. This place has a painted sign on the front of the glass that says "Estilo de Michoacan," and it would be well worth seeking out. Here's a rare photo of rather than by me while eating:
I really liked that they chopped the meat on this hunk of tree. Now that's atmosphere.
Roasted chicken is a big thing here too, and a more convenient takeout food than many. I didn't actually eat at this one, just liked its decorations.
Instead we tried a place just off Juarez and just east of the Chedraui, in a strip mall and advertising Sinaloa style chicken with a secret recipe. I took that as a recommendation, not realizing that half the Pollo Asado places in town claim Sinaloa style. If the secret recipe had anything other than salt, I didn't taste it, but it wasn't bad. (The bottled horchata, however, was bad. Learned to only go places where they made it themselves.)
The best Pollo Asado I've had there was still at a place called Pollo Rojo, maybe around Calle 4 and Avenida 20 or so, two years ago. Anyway, remember the industrial sized grill full of cold ashes I saw, just east of the highway in the lot of a repair place? I finally got back to it one evening (they're only open at night) and picked up a bunch of taco de res and pork tacos hot off the grill to take home. Here's the grillman at work:
For toppings they set out literally a dozen or more tubs, I would have liked to have had RST there to tell me what they all were, or maybe just another couple of dozen tacos to try some of each. I especially liked a creamy guacamole and this stuff at the front, which was sort of like Guatemalan or Salvadoran cortida, but with more green and less vinegar mixed in. I never saw it anywhere else, so I'm not sure if it's from another region or what.
Another big thing you can only get at night along Juarez is tacos al pastor. Indeed any place that makes them has the meat roasting right out front, to attract the evening stroller. This place, El Sarape, looks like it might be a chain, but if so it seems to be a chain built on outstanding tacos al pastor, because it really was-- good smoke flavor, nice hint of pineapple sweetness (some cones of meat have a pineapple half that sits on top as it roasts):
I tried another one that same night-- this was, by the way, after already eating dinner with the family-- returning to my spot by the highway for the pastor I'd seen just beginning to roast with real coals when I'd gotten the tacos. If El Sarape's was sweet and gringo-friendly, this was primitive pastor, as red as Tandoori and as chili-hot as Arthur Bryant's sauce. Here, much more than the tacos from the other night, was something that needed a topping from those tubs to balance it out, cool it down. Which was better? I wouldn't have missed either one.