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The food columnist for the Sunday paper wrote an article extolling this new hole in the wall Mexican restaurant in Hattiesburg, called Mama Alma's Kitchen. The writer prides himself on having a refined palate, so I thought I'd trust his opinion and make a trip up there and try it out.
Mama Alma, whom I had pictured to be a plump elderly Mexican woman turned out to be a 30 something woman who called her customers "sweetie." First came the ubiquitous chips and salsa. Big disappointment. Chips stale and mybloggers; salsa tasted like canned tomatoes with Tabasco, black pepper and lemon juice added. I can make better myself. I lived 10 years in San Antonio, the heart of Tex-Mex cookery, and my mother in law was born and raised in Monterrey Mexico.
She was a great cook and I ate many fine meals at her table. I know excellent Tex-Mex when I taste it. One of my favorite dishes is Caldo de res. It's a soup served on weekends at the San Antonio true Mexican dives. It's a beef shank cooked till it's falling off the bone. A shank is placed in the bottom of a big soup bowl, the rich beefy broth loaded with chunks of carrot, cabbage, a little celery, onion, and garlic is ladeled on top and a bowl of Spanish rice is served alongside with hand made flour tortillas. I believe a bowl of that would cure cancer; it's that sumptious.
Okay, supposedly Alma makes everything from scratch and it's authentic stuff. So I go in and order fajitas and they bring out the regular fajita sizzling skillet--I don't think there's much a cook could do to improve on fajitas, and they were okay. I asked if they serve caldo and Alma said yes--but it's not on the menu. And I said to her, these tortillas are not home made--they came from a package. She said, "well I make everything else myself." No an authentic place makes their own--there's a world of difference.
There was one thing that made the trip worthwile. Her husband, who works in the kitchen is knockout beautifully handsome. OMG! I said just let me look at him for a minute. He smiled--pearly white teeth, goodlooking guy, Antonio Banderas looks homely next to that. For a look at that it was worth the trip, but I'm still without caldo!
susil
