Ana Rosa’s occupies the space previously occupied by El Novillo, also a Mexican restaurant. It’s only a few yards away from my house, so I was hoping it’d be great – or at least good. Alas, I’d qualify it as simply “OK”.
I went last night, with Mika and Camila, to “celebrate” Cinco de Mayo. I was too lazy to walk all the way to Los Pericos, my favorite taquería in town and too unprepared to make something at home either. So Ana Rosa’s it was.
I ordered a beef quesadilla ($7), while Mika had a regular chicken burrito ($5) and Camila had a small plain cheese quesadilla ($5). The menu did list the plain quesadilla at $5 – but when the waitress asked me if I wanted a large or small quesadilla, I assumed that the small one would be less. My bad, I paid $5 for a tiny tortilla filled with a little bit of cheese. Outrageous.
My beef quesadilla was larger – it consisted of an oversize flour tortilla, filled with cheese and diced beef, folded in half and toasted. It was served with a scoop of guacamole (the thin, runny type), sour cream, lettuce and a slice of tomato. Personally, I don’t really like toasted tortillas. I much prefer the method used at Los Pericos in which a large flour tortilla is steamed, filled with the beef, cheese, salsa, guacamole and sour cream (and lettuce, if you want), and then rolled as a burrito – but that’s why Los Pericos is my favorite taqueria. This quesadilla tasted just fine, the flavor of the meat was overwhelmed by the toastiness of the tortilla, but there wasn’t anything disagreeable – or particularly agreeable – about it. I just didn’t dig it.
Finally, Mika’s burrito was quite large, filled mostly with rice. Mika didn’t like it, or at least didn’t eat it, so Mike had it for dinner later on. He found it to be completely bland, he says that he’s liked every other burrito he’s had more – there was just nothing to this one.
As for the restaurant, Ana Rosa’s has a very small dining room – but it was full when we went on a Tuesday around 5:30 PM. They have sit-down service, and the lone waitress amazingly managed to serve the whole dining room and calculate the checks by herself. She was very pleasant and the service was good. As for the place, there is no atmosphere to it – just a place to go and have a quick bite to eat, not to linger.
All in all, I’m sad to repeat that Ana Rosa’s fails as a taqueria that I would frequent. I can imagine I’ll go again, but just because it’s so close to my house. But even then, I can’t imagine it’ll be anytime soon. I’ll get off my butt and go to Los Perico’s.
Ana Rosa’s Mexican Restaurant
2089 E 14th St # C @ Estabrook
San Leandro, CA
(510) 357-3022
San Leandro Restaurant Reviews
Author: admin (Page 39 of 51)
Update: This restaurant is now closed.
The following is a message I got about a restaurant on the road between SF & LA. I haven’t been there – but after that recommendation, I’ll definitely try it.
My wife and I stop at the Planeta Rojas Café in Button Willow each time we travel to L.A. and return.…it is down the way from the Taste of India…in back of the Shell Gas Station.
While you have to push past that they prepare their food out in front in a portable “Taco Coach” and you order inside the red building…the food is excellent. I am a Mexican Food lover and connoisseur…I grew up in L.A….spend a lot of time in Mexico..and know the best places in the Bay Area. Nobody, not any restaurant from Mexico City to any place in the Bay area….touches their Chile Relleno…it is all made fresh…this is not fast food…but, they serve it quickly. Try the Chicken Tostada if you’re on a diet. The prices are cheap…and a complete lunch for 2 is $13 to $20…including a soda.
One other thing…you might think the owners are just arrived from Mexico…a married couple…they’re not, both hard working & very friendly and proud parents of a new U.S. Marine stationed in San Diego…just joined and doing his boot camp. He joined for 6 years to become an Military Police. You won’t be disappointed.
Mike Emley
Last night I made a heart clogging pasta carbonara from this Fettucini Carbonara recipe at allrecipes.com. I’ve made other pasta carbonara recipes, and I’d been disappointed with them. This one, on the other hand, was absolutely delicious, beyond restaurant quality, by far the best carbonara recipe I’ve ever made. What’s interesting it’s that it didn’t differ much from other carbonaras, so I’m not sure what made it that good. It might have been the center-cut bacon, which was an unknown-to-me brand from Grocery Outlet – but who knows?
Here is the recipe:
Pasta Carbonara
Ingredients
Instructions
Heat olive oil in a heavy sauce pan over medium heat. Saute the shallots until soft. Add the onion and bacon and saute until the bacon is almost browned. Add the garlic, saute until the bacon is nice and crispy and keep warm over very low heat.
Meanwhile make pasta in lightly salted water.
Also meanwhile, whisk the egg yolks, cream and cheese together.
Drain the pasta, put in a large serving bowl, add the bacon mixture, then the egg mixture, mix well and serve.
I’d bought some frozen mahi mahi at Trader Joe’s, and I wanted a child-friendly recipe to use them up. I found one for Mahi Cutlet with Meyer Lemons and Capers at the Food Network, which got very good reviews. I, of course, made it with regular lemons (you can read my rant about lemons here). The results were mixed. I liked the fish itself, the breading was crispy and stayed on the fish, but it was bland. Next time I’ll add salt to the eggs.
The sauce, OTOH, was a complete waste of expensive ingredients. It was bitter, too sour, and had a weird off-taste. I think the fish would be better with just lemon juice added.
Camila really liked the fish – and this is a child that has a “it’s yucky” attitude to everything I make. She called it fish nuggets, and I guess that was enough for her to eat it. Mika wasn’t hear for that dinner, but I think she may try it next time.
Of course, fried fish is not ideal for anyone, but I’m hoping that if they start eating fish this way, they’ll accept it in other permutations later.
Today was the (unofficial) opening of the new Grocery Outlet “supermarket”, located a stone throw away from my house. I was a little dubious at first about what the store would do for the neighborhood (and clearly, this is not a posh neighborhood by any stretch of the imagination), but once I looked at it from the point of view of how this would ease my grocery shopping, I welcomed it with open arms. Indeed, I think I may have been responsible for suggesting this location. I remember distinctively talking to the manager-to-be of Grocery Outlet a couple of years ago, when they wanted to place it in the old-Albertsons building downtown (which we fought), and suggesting that the lot by my house would be a better location.
Of course, being that it opened today, we had to check it out today – and we were pretty impressed. Bear in mind that the store is brand-new (well, the building itself was vacated by the Salvation Army, but it’s been cleaned and painted so that it’s now unrecognizable), so you would expect it to look nice – and it did, the aisles were wide, the light, functional, and the colors, soothing. It wasn’t as faux-quaint as Trader Joe’s, but not as austere as your regular supermarket either. Everything was nice and neat (again, as you would expect), I can only hope it stays like that.
Now, for what matters, what does Grocery Outlet carry? Well, clearly they are attempting to be like a real supermarket and they carry a little bit of everything, specially vis a vis packaged stuff. Most of their products seem to be overstock – things that didn’t sell that well at other markets. I think that will mean that what’s available will change frequently. Today, for example, they had Haagen Daz sticky toffee pudding ice cream – a flavor introduced in 2006, that seems to no longer be on the market (at least it’s not listed in their website). No choice, but it was just $1.50 – about half the supermarket on-sale price. They also had off-brand stuff, but much less than what they use to sell when I frequented the Berkeley location. I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing, some of that off-brand stuff (I remember the frozen baked Alaskas) was pretty good. As you can expect there are lots of canned stuff.
Prices are generally low, but not everything is a bargain. Haas avocados were $1.50 – three times as much as what Smart & Final and Mi Tierra supermarket has them for this week. Suave shampoo was $1.50, about the same price as the Safeway’s. But Nestcafe coffee was about $3 less than it’s at Safeway.
They had a surprisingly large wine selection – mostly of cheap wines, of course. I’m thrilled, as this will mean that when I need wine for a dish and don’t have any 2-buck-chuck at home, I can just go across the street and get something.
In all, I don’t anticipate doing my shopping per se at Grocery Outlet, but rather use it as a place where to either get specific things that I know they have them for less – or to go and get something I realize at the last minute I’m out of (darn! I didn’t check if they had flour).
I will, however, write from time to time about special bargains that they have, or interesting items. This time I bought a slice of cheese that I plan to serve blind to my guests on Saturday. Let’s see if anyone can identify it 🙂
Next Day. I went to Grocery Outlet to see if I could get something for dinner. The answer is, unfortunately, no. They have Tyson chicken, but I think that was the company investigated for disgusting chicken practices. They had a few different cuts of pork and very little beef. But I feel uneasy about the quality and origin of the meat they sell. I did notice that they do have a small produce section, I didn’t study it, though.
One thing they don’t have are enough carts or any baskets – making buying just a few things a hassle.
As for dinner, I decided to make spaghetti carbonara and thought I had everything I needed at home. Of course, once I got here I realized I didn’t have enough bacon 🙁
Finally, Grocery Outlet is having its Ribbon Cutting on Thursday, May 7th at 5:30 PM. They’ll have sandwiches or something like that. The Grand Opening is on Saturday, May 9th, starting with Coffee and Treats at 8 AM. They’ll have raffles, samples, etc. – kind of like the BBQ they had a couple of years ago, when they wanted to get public support for converting the downtown Albertson’s building into a Grocery Outlet.
In all, one of my favorite cookbooks.
How can lemons cost $1-$1.25 at Safeway, and only 30 cents at the Mexican market a couple of blocks away? How can Safeway get away with fleecing people that way? I really wish there were alternatives to Safeway. Well, Grocery Outlet is opening in a couple of days – hopefully they’ll sell lemons at a reasonable price.
Last night I forgot to cook. Really. Earlier in the day I baked a cake to eat after dinner – but the thought of actually cooking dinner did not occur to me until it was too late. I had bought the ingredients to make lime and coriander chicken, but I had to marinate it for 3 hours and had not done so.
Safeway had advertised meatloaf for $5 for Friday only, so I thought I’d give it a try. Lord, was that the wrong decision – the meatloaf was horrible. It has no flavor of meat, actually, it had no flavor a all, and it had an unpleasant, gritty texture. The sauce on top was disgustingly sweet – but you had to mix it in with the meatloaf, to make it edible at all. In other words, don’t buy it.
Harvest time is approaching (and in some cases, it never goes away), and we often have more veggies and fruits that we know what to do with. Why not exchange them with neighbors for their surplus veggies & fruits?
If you are interested, please join the blog at http://growinggroup.posterous.com/
These are some postable items:
– What you have to giveaway or barter
– If you have seeds, compost or plants to giveaway or swap
– If you need help harvesting
– If you need help in caring for or identifying your fruits, vegetables, hens, etc… (We might be able to help you!)
– If you’re interested hosting a harvesting party (i.e. marmalade, ketchup, jam-making party)
– Need to borrow gardening tools
– Would like food donations for a local charity
Personally, I’m interested in getting lemons (so expensive at the market), herbs of all kinds, and flowers that you can use for cosmetics. I’ll have persimmons and green figs to give away in the fall. I also have roses – but I haven’t pruned them yet, so I don’t have very many.
Finally, if someone is willing to help me set up a vegetable garden in our backyard (I know NOTHING about gardening), I’d be more than willing to share the produce with them.
Note: My complete review of the Golden Tea Garden is now available here.
I’m planning to write a full review of the Golden Tea Garden, a new and fabulous tea house in Hayward. But as the editing of my restaurant reviews is soooooooooooooooo slow, I figured I’d write about it here first.
I went there last Sunday with my friends Charlotte and Vienna and we had the best time. The little place is darling and very relaxing – they have harp music & a running fountain. The food (mostly sweets) was delicious and moderately priced and the service was out of this world. Indeed, at this point I’d say it’s one of the two best tea houses in the Bay Area (the other one being Lovejoy’s). I am planning to return this weekend with my daughter (they don’t have teas for children, but Mika likes fruit teas) – and then in May with another group of friends.
Golden Tea Garden
22630 Main Street,
Hayward, CA
(510) 538-4832
Tea Houses Reviews
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