Whenever I go on a fishing trip, I find nothing quite fills my belly at the end of the day like the combination of slightly salty protein, rice, beans, and cheese… with some hot sauce and usually a beer mixed in there for good measure. Mexican food, or some reasonable facsimile thereof, is by far the best remedy. It’s a scientifically proven fact. I swear.
So, I’ve got favorite Mexican restaurants in all of my North Carolina fishing haunts. In Bryson City, it’s 4 Queens. In Brevard it’s Casa Mexicana. In Cherokee it’s El Cajelito. I happened to be passing through Cherokee last night on my slow meander back to Florida from Pennsylvania, so El Cajelito it was.
When I sit down to eat at a Mexican restaurant, I struggle with ordering. No, not the basket of chips and salsa, those usually come out without asking. Mexican restaurant menus can just be overwhelming for someone with a mild case of OCD. There are always so many options that are just variants of each other… what’s the ideal combination? But at El Cajelito, I usually get some sort of steak dish.
The other reason why I struggle with ordering is that I don’t want to be that guy. I want to order something that I have at least a shot of pronouncing somewhat correctly, trying not to sound too much like a “gringo”. ¿Comprende?
Anyway, scanning the menu, I settled on bistec encebollado, which is just steak and cooked onions, which they serve here with rice, beans, and tortillas. (By the way, it’s evidently a Puerto Rican dish, not Mexican.)
Recalling high school Spanish, two “L”s sound like a “Y”. So it’s “bees-tek en-say-bo-yah-doh“… well, I think. That’s what I said anyway, and didn’t get an awkward glare from my server.
Instead, that side-eye was reserved for when I asked for an unsweetened iced tea. Damn Yankee…
Anyway, the meal was delicious. And my waitress was quite lovely. 4.5 out of 5.