Viva La Food King!
"Food is good"
--the Food
King
The FOOD KING manifesto:
We're out to eat all the food that's fit
to be et.
Howdy folks and welcome
to the Food King, your handy dandy Oxford
Town guide to eating, drinking, and culinary
carousing. Those of you who are recent arrivals
to our little burg may not realize it yet,
but Oxford is home to some of the best vittles
around, with more variety per capita than
any comparable hamlet between Memphis and
New Orleans. Folks here are also better about
supporting local eateries than in some of
our neighboring, sister communities (that
just a nice way of saying we ALL eat out
a lot here,) so let The Food King set you
straight. He'll tell you what's up, what's
not, and where you ought to be eating, if
you don't know already. He'll try to point
you in the right direction, and generally
keep you up to snuff on local restauranteering
and such. Just remember, we ain't out to
be pernicious, we just out to eat. It ain't
our fault if it ain't no good.
Since this week's OT is
the "Arriba" issue, we thought we'd take
a peek into two of Oxford's most welcome
and outstanding Spanish/and/or/Caribbean
eateries, El Charro and Don Pancho's.
What can you say about El
Charro? Plenty that's good. Located on West
Jackson Avenue between Wendy's and Rainbow
Cleaners, they have been one of Oxford's
top lunch and dinner spots for several years
now, and offer consistently well-prepared
Mexican food at very fair prices. The full
menu with lots of variety can be daunting
to neophytes, but just dive in; it's all
bueno. Try an appetizer of queso fundido,
(a cheese dip mixed with Mexican chorizo
sausage, I know, your arteries might holler,
but your taste buds will mambo), snag some
gooey, cheesy shrimp quesadillas with onions
and peppers, or go for the fried chimichanga,
it's really hard to go wrong here. Personally,
the Food King is so addicted to their excellent
and sizable lunch fajitas, he won't order
much else.
I must admit I liked their
old location better, bad parking and all.
The walls are a little too green for me,
and the margaritas are just a little too
pre-mixed for the Food King's palette, but
that lunch is so great who cares. Bring me
a Dos Equis with salt and lime and extra
tortillas and we're rollin!
El Charro is perfect for
a large group looking for a great meal, and
as long as you're not in any rush, you should
enjoy yourself immensely.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
If you haven't eaten at
Don Pancho's yet, well, lets just say the
Food King'll give you a few weeks before
he actively seeks you out and beats you with
his "What are you thinking?" stick. In other
words, this place has fantastic food, some
of the best in town and you really owe it
to yourself to check it out. The menu changes
frequently, but trust me, there are no bad
choices, from golden, moist fried catfish
(sooo good it made me wiggle my big ol' butt
in my chair, certainly a rarity) to delicious
seared pork chops (fantastic) to pollo a
la creme (that's chicken in creme sauce to
you & me.) The dinners are deceptively
simple, served only with rice and either
black or red beans but that's all they need.
If possible, try to save room for their excellent
flan, which is so creamy, smooth, and yummy,
the Food King had to fight his dinner companion
for the right to lick the plate. (I let her
win; what can I say, I'm such a gentleman.)
All of the food has a wonderful, savory, "Wow,
this tastes like it came out of my grandmother's
kitchen even though she wasn't Caribbean" quality
that is distinctly Southern, yet still true
to its own ethnic roots.
I only wish that there was
a smaller, more affordable lunch menu, so
I could eat there more often. But the bottom
line is that Don Pancho's serves up one of
the most satiating, satisfying meals in town,
and has never failed to deliver when he Food
King is around.
FK on the wall…
Rumor on the Square is that
Café N'Orleans (which recently experienced
a well-deserved and long-overdue mercy killing)
will soon reopen under new management. Look
for sizable improvements in food and (hopefully)
decor. All the Food King hopes for is a killer
bowl of etoufee. Go get 'em, John.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
P.S. -- Allright, let's
get one thing straight; the Food King is
a place of opinion about eating and drinking
in restaurants, NOT a recipe column. But
due to the nature of this week's Latino issue,
as well as persistent, incessant and maddening
whinings from certain O-Town editors, the
Food King will crack open his own personal
recipe vault and share one of his genre-blending,
cross-regional creations with his readers.
You'll thank me later.
The Food King's
Grilled Catfish Burrito
You
need: