MeXscape

My Parents were here for a visit. It was way too short - only one week. It is the first time I have seen them since we moved down here. The day we took them to the airport to see them off was a very maudlin kind of day, with all of us struggling not to cry. We got them checked in, and then delayed until the last possible minute to finally escort them up the escalator and to the security gate. I was dragging my feet through the last-chance-to-buy-authentic-one-of-a-kind-mass-produced-Mexican-souvenirs section when I looked to the left and spotted a Carl's Jr and perked right up.

For the first two thirds of my life, I hated tamales. Despised them. Would actually avert my eyes if someone was eating them in front of me. This probably has something to do with the fact that my mother bought canned tamales. That's right; tamales in a can. I can't think of many food things that are more gross. Thankfully, one Christmas Eve, I had an epiphany.

The first time I went to Chicago, I was lucky enough to stumble into a Giordano's on my very first day. I was in love. Giordano's does a stuffed deep-dish pizza. What's that, you ask? It's a deep-dish pizza with another layer. They take a deep dish pizza pan, line it with dough, fill it with cheese and ingredients, and then top it with another layer of dough. Then the whole thing is topped with tomato sauce and Parmesan. It's awesome squared.

Over the past year, La Cueva del Leon has changed quite a bit: new furniture, new décor, new menu. The new décor is cooly pleasing to the eye with it's clean blue and white theme and comfortably pleasing to the buttocks. They have done away with all of the hard seats and replaced them with padded chairs and benches with a decent hiney quotient, even outside. I love the new padded chairs, which invite you to linger and enjoy the ocean view rather than finish your meal and hurry on to some other more amenable location.

Newcomers to Mazatlan often bemoan the lack of "authentic" Mexican food in Mazatlan. And I can understand it. When most people think of Mexican food, they envision tamales, enchiladas, beautiful moles, and slow-roasted barbacoa. And while all of that food is authentically Mexican, it does not encompass all Mexican food. We live on the coast here. There isn't a lot of grazing room for cows and sheep and goats. We have delicious fish and shrimp. And the most Mexican food of all – hot dogs.