Casselberry – The Saboscrivner

Wa Sushi

Wa Sushi (https://www.facebook.com/WaSushiCasselberry/) is a real treasure in the Seminole County suburb of Casselberry, 20 minutes north of downtown Orlando. The small, serene location is located in a nondescript shopping plaza between an Ollie’s Bargain Outlet and a store called Sports & Pokemon (the two genders?), but it boasts some of the finest sushi and Japanese food in the Orlando area.

Wa Sushi used to be in another, even less auspicious location elsewhere in Casselberry, pretty far out of the way and hard to find, and our very cool next-door neighbors invited us there once. It was good, but for whatever reason, we didn’t return until recently — our first visit in years, and the first to this new location.

You can find Wa Sushi’s menu on the Facebook page above, but they had a menu of specials when I took my wife there recently, for our first real date night in a while:

This was one of the last evenings of 2022, and we saw Wa was offering another special of toshikoshi soba, or “year-crossing noodles,” traditionally meant to be eaten on New Year’s Eve to let go of the hardships of the past year (since soba noodles are so soft and easily cut). Well, we figured we could both use some of that.

Rather than try the version in broth, we ordered the toshikoshi ten zaru soba ($16), cold soba noodles served with a dashi soy dipping sauce and a side order of tempura-battered and fried shrimp and vegetables. It was beautifully plated, and really good too, although I probably would not have ordered it if the dish wasn’t associated with the tradition of letting go of the hard times of the past year.

Close-up of the tempura shrimp and vegetables. My wife ate the tempura sweet potato, and I had the onion and shishito peppers.

Here are the cold soba noodles, made from buckwheat and topped with some fine shreds of nori (seaweed). They didn’t have much flavor at all, kind of like eating plain, cold spaghetti, but earthier. The dashi dipping sauce helped immensely, as did the finely-diced scallions that also came on the side.

Something we ordered came with the obligatory wee house salad with sesame dressing and miso soup, which I enjoyed:

This was ika geso ($11), a small plate of deep-fried squid legs from the Hot Tasting section of the menu. After how tender and fried to perfection the shrimp were, we thought we would double down on the tempura shellfish. These were chewier than a lot of fried calamari we have ordered around town, but I have a feeling this squid was a lot fresher, as opposed to some restaurants that may use frozen calamari. They definitely tasted fresh.

My wife always loves a good selection of sashimi, or in this case, a beautiful portion of chirashi ($33) — select cuts of raw fish, selected by the chef. There was salmon in here, ebi (shrimp), tako (octopus, one of her favorites, whether raw or cooked), ikura (orange globes of salmon roe), tamago (perfectly cooked and sliced egg), and unagi (eel). I always love eel in sushi, but this was her first time trying it, and she liked it. I’m always impressed by her willingness to try almost anything.

And we ordered three beautiful rolls to share:

In the foreground, you can see the ultimate tuna roll ($16): spicy tuna and cucumber inside the rice, topped with tuna, wasabi-infused tobiko (fish eggs), and sweet chili sauce. This one was awesome, but I’m always a fan of spicy tuna in any form.

Here you can see the inferno roll ($14) in the front, and the mango tango roll ($13) in the back. In the very front are slices of escolar sashimi ($2.50), just for her — a big fan of the butterfish. The inferno roll features spicy salmon and cucumber topped with yellowtail, spicy mayo, and paper-thin slices of fresh jalapeño pepper. Awesome combination.
The mango tango roll in the back features tempura-battered and fried shrimp, mango, and cucumber, topped with crab salad. I believe this was real crabmeat and not surimi (processed fish sometimes called “krab,” even though I like that stuff too).

I was really impressed by Wa Sushi, once again, all these years later, in a much more convenient location. Last summer I wrote a review of Kabuto Sushi & Grill, another friendly neighborhood sushi spot close to our home, just on the Winter Springs side rather than the Casselberry side. I even listed one of Kabuto’s dishes in my Top Ten Tastes of 2022, which came out in the last Orlando Weekly issue of the year. Sadly, that very week, the last week of 2022, Kabuto announced it was closing permanently. That’s when I resolved to get us back to Wa, to support them as much as we could moving forward, to help spare it a similar fate. I know lots of local foodies already know how fine Wa Sushi is, and common consensus is that it is one of the best sushi establishments in the greater Orlando area. It absolutely is, and to have it so close to home, a true treasure in Casselberry, of all places, means we have to protect it, support it, and shout our praise from the rooftops, both real and virtual. So here’s my praise and my protection. Let’s support all of our favorite restaurants as much as we can this year, especially those friendly neighborhood favorites we are lucky to have so near and dear to us.

Kabuto Sushi & Grill

EDITOR’S NOTE: Kabuto Sushi & Grill announced it would be permanently closing after December 26th, 2022.

Kabuto Sushi & Grill (https://www.kabuto-sushi.com) is the closest sushi restaurant to our house, but it took us a while to try it. It used to be a different sushi restaurant years ago, which we only ever went to once. Once was enough. It was really expensive and just okay, but Kabuto has a completely different menu, different management, different décor, different everything. I ordered takeout, but the dining room was gorgeous — very modern and sexy, especially for a sushi restaurant in uber-suburban Winter Springs, next door to our regular Publix where everyone knows me.

I ordered takeout for that first visit to Kabuto, starting with a pretty typical eel roll ($10), with baked eel and cucumber inside the sushi rice and a little dipping cup of sticky, sweet eel sauce on the side:

My wife thought the Kabuto’s summer roll ($16) sounded interesting, with tuna, salmon, a krab stick, avocado, and mango, wrapped in spring mix leaves and rice paper, with house-made raspberry wine sauce on the side. It was an interesting combination, especially with the sauce, that was like a sweet and sticky vinaigrette dressing, and no rice to speak of.

I ended up using the sauce as dressing on a homemade salad a few days later, since she isn’t into sauces and dips anyway. It was perfectly fine, but I like my sushi rolls with rice, so I probably wouldn’t order this one again.

I’m glad I ordered a spicy tuna crunch roll and a spicy salmon crunch roll ($8 each; below left and center), both with tempura flakes inside to give them that gentle crunch, and we really enjoyed both of those.
But there were two highlights, even though these other rolls were solid. One was the mango passion roll that my wife chose ($16; on the right side in the above photo), with yellowtail, salmon, and avocado inside, topped with more yellowtail and salmon, plus mango salsa. It was AWESOME. What a great combination. I always order mango in my poke bowls with tuna and/or salmon when it is available, and it worked so well here.

My personal favorite wasn’t a roll at all, but a selection from the “cold small plates” part of the menu: spicy tuna crispy rice ($12), with cubes of deep-fried rice topped with spicy tuna, avocado, masago, scallions, sesame seeds, and a sweet glaze. It came with four pieces, which we split evenly, but I could have eaten two hundred of them, seriously.

I love ramen almost as much as I love sushi, but my wife doesn’t always share my love of ramen (aside from the instant stuff). I was surprised when she suggested we order a bowl of the tonkotsu ramen ($13) to split, since I figured she wouldn’t be interested, but I was half-considering ordering one just for myself. In the end, I liked it more than she did and ended up eating most of it, which was fine with me, but I was relieved she suggested it in the first place.

I really liked how rich and creamy the pork bone broth was, how tender the thin slices of chashu pork and bamboo shoots were, and how springy and chewy the noodles were. I always think I’m going to hate the bamboo in tonkotsu ramen, expecting it to be tough and fibrous like a cross between chewing on celery sticks and saxophone reeds, but it is more like al dente lasagna noodle sheets. The soft-boiled egg halves were cooked to gooey perfection as well, although I chomped them both rather than letting the yolks mix into the tonkotsu broth. The broth was served on the side in our takeout order, which was the ideal way to do it, to keep those great noodles from getting soggy.

I had no idea Kabuto also has a happy hour menu, since it wasn’t on the website. If you dine in between 4:30 and 7:00 PM, you could get much cheaper sushi rolls, and if I had known, we might have done that instead of ordering takeout. Here’s a photo, because the people need to know about this great deal!
In fact, we returned two weeks later to dine in and take advantage of happy hour, since the food was so good.

My wife started out with two pieces of escolar sashimi ($4) and two pieces of tako (octopus) sashimi ($4):

Then we went hard on those happy hour rolls! I got the same spicy tuna crunch roll and spicy salmon crunch roll we liked so much at home ($5 each; right center and bottom), as well as the full-priced mango passion roll we loved (top left):

We also got the Philly roll ($4; top right), the fire dragon roll ($5, bottom left), and the lobster sensation roll ($5, center). I always gravitate toward “Japanese bagel” rolls, with smoked salmon and cream cheese (the food of my people!), but the Philly roll was regular (non-smoked) salmon with cream cheese. Still very pleasing. This was my first fire dragon roll, with salmon, asparagus, and avocado inside, and topped with yellowtail, thin-sliced serrano peppers, and dollops of “house-made kobachi sauce,” as the menu said. It looked and tasted more like sriracha to me.

Finally, the lobster sensation roll isn’t listed on the regular menu, but it contained lobster mixed with cream cheese and was lightly fried in tempura batter. Really good stuff. I’m sorry I didn’t take more close-ups of this beautiful sushi tray.

There are also daily specials at Kabuto that we didn’t order, but I snapped a photo of the menu from the day we went, since they aren’t on the website either:

There is no shortage of good sushi restaurants in and around Orlando, but Kabuto Sushi & Grill is definitely the closest to us. It may not be super-upscale, but that isn’t The Saboscrivner’s style anyway, and it is still a really nice place with fresh, delicious, unpretentious sushi and ramen, tucked away in Winter Springs, where foodies rarely dare to venture. Please dare. In the meantime, we will keep enjoying this friendly neighborhood restaurant moments from our home.

Cubans on the Run

Cubans on the Run (https://www.cubansontherun.com/) is a small, casual Cuban restaurant located in Casselberry, but practically on the edge of Longwood. Yesid Saavedra opened it as a small sandwich shop with his late father-in-law Jose Torres in 1993, but it was destroyed by Hurricane Charlie in 2004. Undaunted, they rebuilt and reopened it as a larger space, with an expanded kitchen and a fuller menu to match, adding Cuban entrees beyond sandwiches.

My wife and I have enjoyed Cubans on the Run for years, but because it is closed on Sundays, sometimes we don’t make it there when we get the bright idea to go. I’ve never eaten in the dining room, even in all the years before the pandemic, but it’s a fantastic restaurant to pick up takeout. They have one of the best Cuban sandwiches in town — not as large as College Park Cafe‘s Cubano, but definitely one of the better ones in the Orlando area. Those two are my Top Two, for sure.

My wife doesn’t share my obsession with sandwiches, but she likes steak much more than I do, believe it or not. At Cuban restaurants, she almost always orders a thin grilled steak, like this one here ($10.99), served with chimichurri sauce on the side, and topped with a mound of thin-sliced grilled onions she hates, but I love. I am always glad to scoop up her onions. She requested white rice with it but got yellow rice, which she was fine with. Those are tostones on top — savory, starchy, salty, crunchy fried plantains, and a cup of red beans underneath that I would end up eating. The steak is very thin, but it was a huge portion. There was a second entire piece of steak underneath that one, almost the same size!

I am making a conscious effort to eat a little healthier in 2021, so on this visit, I ordered chicken fricasee for the first time. This herculean portion was only $7.50. I requested dark meat, so I got a huge chicken thigh with the bone still in and the skin still on, a huge leg, a couple of chunks of potato from the stew, a bed of rich yellow rice, a cup of red beans, and four maduros — sweet fried plantains, definitely a Top Ten favorite food of mine. Sometimes you order chicken and it’s disappointingly dry, which is one reason I tend to prefer dark meat, especially thighs. This was perfect chicken — so moist, juicy, tender, rich, flavorful. It was prepared so well, I feel inspired to try to recreate my own version at home. Loved this chicken. One of the best chicken dishes I’ve eaten in the Orlando area, without a doubt!

But for the purposes of this review, I couldn’t go to Cubans on the Run and not order one of their signature sandwiches. But instead of the traditional Cuban sandwich that Cubans on the Run is acclaimed for, I switched it up and got my childhood favorite from Miami, the medianoche (midnight) sandwich ($5.99). It has all the same ingredients as the Cubano: roast pork, sweet ham, Swiss cheese, yellow mustard, and pickles, only it is served on a sweet, egg-based yellow bread, rather than Cuban bread. But I’ve had the Cubano before too, and like I said, both are among the finest in Orlando.

This is a chicharron ($3.75), crispy fried pork with the crunchy skin attached. This one was harder, drier, and crunchier than I like, but we caught them late on a weekday evening on this particular visit, and usually I go earlier on Saturdays when the chicharrones are fresher and more tender.

My wife and I both love arepas ($3.75), sort of a sandwich made with two sweet corn patties fried on a grill, with melty mozzarella cheese in between them. Growing up in Miami, you got an arepa from a cart whenever there was an outdoor event, like a fair or festival. I have recently learned these are often referred to as arepas con choclo, or cachapas, since there are other kinds of arepas (Colombian, Venezuelan, etc.) that aren’t the sweet corn cakes.

These are two perfect churros ($3.25 for the pair), which are doughnut-like pastries that are fried and dusted with cinnamon sugar. They should be crispy on the outside and moist and cake-like on the inside. These churros are made fresh, and you can get them with or without cream down their long hollow centers. I like the cream, but my wife prefers them without. Guess how we got these!*
*We got them without cream, the way my wife likes. Fellas, consider this a teaching moment.

I have a hard time going to any Cuban restaurant and not trying my old Miami standards of a beef empanada ($1.85) and one or two croquetas de jamon (75 cents each).

Empanadas are savory pastries, usually filled with some kind of meat wrapped in a half moon-shaped crust, then baked or fried. Cuban empanadas are wrapped in a flour dough crust, then fried until crispy, flaky, and soft. I like them the best, especially when they’re stuffed with picadillo, a dish of seasoned ground beef. This was a nice light empanada, crispy yet soft and yielding, barely greasy, although I wish the ground beef was a little more tomatoey. (Everyone seasons it a little different, and sometimes you find olives in there, stewed with the picadillo.)

Croquetas are small fritters of diced ham mixed with a rich, creamy bechamel sauce, dipped in bread crumbs, and then fried until crispy and solid, but soft and creamy inside. I love them, but nobody loves them more than my best friend since childhood, a lifelong Miami resident who is currently blogging about his quest to discover and review Miami’s finest croquetas, in The Croqueta Diaries. I’m a dabbling dilletante, but consider my dude Captain Croqueta.

And even though Cuban food is not known as spicy food, Cubans on the Run is well-known for their housemade hot sauce. Usually they will give you one or two tiny plastic cups, even with a big order like this, but this time I remembered to ask to purchase a bottle (I believe it was $5).

I’ve tried several other Cuban restaurants around Orlando, but Cubans on the Run is definitely one of my favorites, and one of the best. It isn’t far from home, but much too far from work to dash off to for a quick lunch. Since it is closed on Sundays, that means we can pretty much only ever go on Saturdays or rare mornings after dental appointments nearby. But as you can see from the hearty, unpretentious, delicious food here, it never disappoints. Run, don’t walk, to Cubans on the Run!

Beyti Mediterranean Grill

UPDATE: I am heartbroken to report that Beyti Mediterranean Grill closed down in February 2022.

***

I love Mediterranean and Middle Eastern food, and my absolute favorite among those might be Turkish food. Two of my favorite restaurants in Orlando are Turkish, and I’ve written glowing reviews of both of them here on The Saboscrivner blog: Bosphorous and Cappadocia. But when I found out a Turkish restaurant was opening near where we live in Casselberry, my wife and I were excited, overwhelmed with hope it would be awesome. Well, Beyti Mediterranean Grill (https://www.beytifl.com/) opened its doors this week, in the old location of Rolando’s Cuban Cuisine on Semoran Boulevard, just north of the busy Red Bug Lake Road intersection. The restaurant is located right beyond where the overpass lets out, so it is easy to get to if you’re driving north on Semoran, but you’ll need to make a u-turn at the light if you’re heading south. They don’t have a sign up yet, so be on the lookout.

The owners used to own Turkish Bar and Grill in Altamonte Springs, but I’m sad to say we never discovered that restaurant, and it closed in February 2019. Well, they’re back in business at Beyti, and I am so happy to report that it is awesome. Even better than we expected, in fact, and our expectations were high. As usual, on a Friday night after a busy week, I ordered a lot of food, but the two of us will end up with multiple meals from this massive menu.

Turkish appetizers often include a lot of rich, savory dips, and my favorite is sauteed eggplant ($4.99), sometimes known as soslu patlican. In this dish, the eggplant is cooked with tomatoes, bell peppers, onions, and garlic, and it is probably my favorite thing you can do with an eggplant. I’ve had and enjoyed the Bosphorous and Cappadocia versions, and this was as good or better than both. It was definitely a larger portion for a smaller price.

My wife requested babaganoush ($4.99), which is a creamy and smoky eggplant dip, blended with tahini, yogurt, mayonnaise, lemon juice, and garlic. We both like babaganoush a lot, and this was a real winner — not too chunky, but not blended so smooth that it loses any texture. The smoky flavor came through very well. We were in babaganoush bliss.

Even though the dips both came with soft pita wedges, we couldn’t resist ordering the lavash bread ($3.99) to tear apart and dip into the dips. It usually comes to your table inflated to the size of a football, but this one deflated in the ten minutes it took me to drive this bounty home. Still, the bread was warm, soft, and fluffy, if no longer puffy. I give it props over Bosphorous and Cappadocia for being dusted with regular and black sesame seeds, a very nice touch.

This is lahmacun, which is a soft, thin Turkish flatbread topped with seasoned ground beef in a rich tomatoey sauce. The order ($9.99) came with three of these, and they are one of my favorite Turkish dishes anywhere. I only ate one tonight, so these are my most eagerly awaited leftovers. It is even thinner than a typical pita bread, maybe about as thin as a thin crust pizza, but very soft — not like the crispy, crackery crust of most thin crust pizzas, and even softer than the pita and lavash breads.

This is a gyro plate with double the meat ($13.99). The garlicky gyro meat, a mixture of seasoned lamb and beef, was fantastic — so savory and not greasy at all, like so many gyros from so many other places. This was my wife’s choice, and clearly she has good taste. But this way I got to have some too, without feeling guilty for tasting too much of her food. What you can’t see in this photo is that the gyro meat completely covers a large portion of fluffy, buttery rice pilaf, with the meat juices dripping down and seasoning the rice even further. Note the crispy, vinegary pickled cabbage, lettuce and tomato in a very light vinaigrette, half a charred jalapeno pepper, and four more soft pita wedges.

I was very curious about the restaurant’s namesake dish, the Beyti ($10.99). The menu describes it as chopped lamb, garlic, hot peppers, and parsley, wrapped in pita bread and topped with tomato and yogurt sauces. It reminded us of a Turkish enchilada with the yogurt sauce filling in for a crema or sour cream on top, and the thin pita wrap reminiscent of a tortilla. The luscious lamb inside was formed and shaped into a long, dense meatloaf, so after being sliced, it was like there was a thick lamb meatball inside every segment. I was happy to see more cabbage and another hot pepper with this dish, as well as marinated red onions.

We ended up with even more vegetable accompaniments, enough to keep me in salads for a few more days!

The owner included two of their stuffed grape leaves, which he assured me were made fresh by hand, not served straight out of a can. I’ve had canned dolmades, and I have to admit that I love them, but there’s nothing like the real deal. They were served chilled, with seasoned rice inside, but no meat for you vegetarians to worry about. I was torn about ordering these, because I’m such a fan of stuffed grape leaves, but I had already ordered so much food. As a result, this was a really special surprise touch, and he assured I’ll order the grape leaves every time I return.

Finally, here’s a photo of an additional large container of the great buttery rice pilaf (I’m not even sure what that came with), along with an order of the most delicious pistachio baklava that the owner was also kind enough to include for free. It was such a generous gesture, and one we’ll never forget. I love baklava, and I’m not exaggerating when I say this is some of the best baklava I’ve ever had. It was still warm, extremely fresh, chewy (some baklava is flaky and dry), and perfect in every way.

I just want to say that I brought this delicious food home the evening before our anniversary. In this pandemic year, we haven’t gone out to eat at a restaurant together since the first days of March, and don’t intend to resume that old habit anytime soon. So all of my restaurant reviews since March have been of takeout food. I already warned my wife that this isn’t going to feel like a festive anniversary, but she’s perfectly content eating at home. Tonight’s dinner felt extra special, being home together, still thankfully safe and healthy, and eating one of the tastiest meals we’ve shared in a while from a wonderful new restaurant right in our neighborhood. While we enjoyed our first of several Turkish feasts over the next few days, for a little while it felt like nothing was wrong in the country or the world. We had each other (eleven years married!), and we had Beyti Mediterranean Grill, a welcome new addition to the Casselberry culinary scene, one that is well worth the drive from anywhere in the greater Orlando area, easily as good or better than our other established Turkish restaurants, and considerably cheaper. We wish them all the best and look forward to becoming regulars in the months and years to come. Seriously, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos — RUN, don’t walk to this one.

Francisco’s Taco Madness

I think we can all agree that 2020 is one of the worst years ever, but on a personal level, I had a pretty rotten 2017 too. That summer, I was hospitalized with the worst pain of my life that turned out to be kidney stones (thanks for nothing, keto diet!). Then two weeks later I got what was probably the second-worst pain of my life, which turned out to be pneumonia, which I almost certainly caught in the hospital the first time. I missed two weeks of work recovering, and it all really shook me up and made me realize I’m getting old, and things are going to keep breaking. (And back then, even after that one-two punch, I didn’t know the half of it!)

Toward the end of those two weeks, I was out running errands, feeling sorry for myself, and also feeling hungry. What else is new, am I right? Driving down State Road 17-92, I passed the Lowe’s home improvement store and saw a familiar white trailer with a red and white striped awning, a sight I had seen countless times over the years. But this day, I was curious enough to stop, and I had all the time in the world to linger. It smelled so good, and as I perused the handwritten menu, I knew I had chosen wisely. The Mexican food was some of the best I’d ever tasted, and it was incredibly cheap and so satisfying. It helped lift me out of a deep existential depression, and made me feel physically better, too. This was a real treasure, and I felt like I had discovered it, despite them always being busy and having long lines.

I would later learn that taco trailer was called Francisco’s Taco Madness (https://www.facebook.com/Franciscos-Taco-Madness-Pinedo-rental-173063512788695/), and it became one of my favorite sights to see in Casselberry, whenever I drove by the Fern Park Lowe’s on State Road 17-92, just south of Semoran Boulevard. You have to follow their Facebook page to know when they’re going to be serving, but it’s usually between Wednesday and Saturday, afternoons only, usually just between 1 PM and 6 PM. I’ve been back many times over the last few years, but Saturdays are typically my only opportunity to visit. And since the lines really do get long, my recommendation is to be there close to the beginning, when they’re still putting up that striped awning.

Most recently, after a few weeks of being shut down, Francisco’s Taco Madness announced their triumphant return starting this past Tuesday, June 30th. They wouldn’t be at Lowe’s anymore, but at a new location literally two minutes away:

Anderson Motors – Good Cars 4 Good People
704 Prairie Lake Dr.
Fern Park, FL 32730

They are also asking diners to text their pickup orders to 407.865.4697, to cut down on crowds and help with social distancing. NOW’S YOUR CHANCE, PEOPLE!

Here is the menu:

I ordered my wife her favorite: two carne asada tacos, with cilantro, guacamole, and a splash of hot sauce, hold the onions ($2 each):

I got myself one chorizo taco with all of that, plus onions ($2):

Here are some lovely tacos from an earlier visit:

And I got my favorite burrito in all of Orlando, Francisco’s al pastor burrito ($8). It is huge and perfect in every way, the archetypal burrito of your dreams and mine:

It is so good that I included it in my list of Top Five Dishes of 2017, published in the Orlando Weekly‘s end of the year issue.

Here’s a cross-section so you can see the deliciousness wrapped inside that grilled 12″ flour tortilla: the perfectly marinated and slightly sweet al pastor pork, rice, beans, cheese, onions, peppers, guacamole, and a piquant sauce. It’s truly unparalleled.

This time I treated myself to a fresh-squeezed lemonade (something I have a hard time turning down), and I got the large for $4, which just comes in a styrofoam cup. It was really refreshing, especially after waiting outside in the early summer heat for my order to come up — probably the longest sustained period I’ve been outdoors since the quarantine started in March. They also offer regular canned sodas and bottled Jarritos Mexican sodas, made with cane sugar, which I love and recommend.

You can see that Francisco’s Taco Madness also offers quesadillas (which my wife loves), hamburgers, hot dogs, a kielbasa sausage sandwich, a barbecue pulled pork sandwich, a Philly cheesesteak, and even chicken salad. I’ve been tempted in the past by the kielbasa, which I’m imagining comes on a nice, lightly-griddled roll and covered with onions and peppers, but I always return to that al pastor burrito and one or more tacos.

Orlando is lucky to have so many outstanding Mexican options, especially for tacos. I’ve already reviewed my other favorites, which I think are synonymous with the best in town (Tortas El Rey, Hunger Street Tacos, MX Taco), but no list of my favorites or the best would be complete without Francisco’s Taco Madness. If you’re also driving through Fern Park and see that red and white striped awning over their white decorated trailer, stop whatever you’re doing, pull into Anderson Motors – Good Cars 4 Good People, and text your order to 407.865.4697. You will be so happy you did, and you’ll wonder what took you so long.

Bagel King

“You come at the king, you best not miss.”
–Omar Little, from The Wire (the greatest show of all time)

It’s no secret your friendly neighborhood Saboscrivner loves bagels. They are, after all, the food of my people. I grew up eating bagels with my family on Sunday mornings in Kendall (one of Miami’s more staid suburbs) from a series of bagel shops and delis that are all decades gone. On this very blog, I’ve waxed poetic about some of New York City’s best bagels, from the extraordinary Ess-A-Bagel and the rapturous Russ & Daughters Cafe. I’ve sung the praises of Pickles Delicatessen in nearby Longwood, where their bagels are shipped frozen from New York, and they are almost as good as the real things, hot and fresh when you’re right there.

But if you want freshly baked bagels in the Orlando area, your best option is Casselberry’s Bagel King (https://www.bagelking.net/). I’ve been going to Bagel King since I moved here in 2004, first with one of my good friends and former roommates, and then with my wife, ever since we started dating in 2006. It’s a “friendly neighborhood” place too, with a wide open dining room and plenty of natural light streaming in, a gleaming glass case full of pastries baked in house, and a floor-to-ceiling rack of different freshly baked bagels behind the front counter. You can order takeout at the counter (as everyone has to do these days), but in happier, safer times, it was a great place to grab a table for a leisurely breakfast or lunch.

This was the bagel selection on a recent busy weekend after the takeout lunch crowd came and went, but they still had everything I wanted:

I can’t tell you how many times I ordered the “Fresh Fish Fantasy” ($10.99) over the last 15 years, where you can choose a bagel with cold-smoked nova salmon (what most people think of as “lox”) or much saltier belly lox, along with cream cheese, tomatoes, onions, and capers on the side. Almost as many times as I would belt out “Well it’s just a fresh fish fantasy, baby!” in my head over that bouncy Tom Tom Club sample, to the tune of Mariah Carey’s “Well it’s just a sweet, sweet fantasy, baby!” I would always opt for an everything bagel, thick and fluffy with that shiny exterior that only comes from boiling, dusted with onion, garlic, sesame seeds, and poppy seeds, or a crustier, non-boiled bialy roll with its oniony center.

Close-up of a bialy, for the uninitiated:

Sometimes I’d switch up the Fresh Fish Fantasy formula and instead opt for smoked whitefish salad on a toasted everything bagel or bialy ($10.99), or sometimes I’d indulge and get Tinamarie’s stuffed potato knish ($8.99): pastrami, corned beef, roast beef, or turkey (I would NEVER get turkey) with provolone, caramelized onions, and dusseldorf mustard, served on a homemade potato knish, split open like a sandwich. For those of you who have been deprived, a knish is a pastry made of a thin layer of dough wrapped around seasoned mashed potatoes. You can buy delicious Gabila’s brand knishes in the frozen case at Publix (they are fried and made in New York), but a lot of bagel shops and delis bake theirs, including Bagel King. You can buy a mini-knish for 99 cents or a full-sized one for $2, and your life will be so much better if you do.

However, my wife never deviates from her formula: a toasted, buttered everything bagel ($1.99) with a side order of pastrami ($4.49), always sliced into strips and cooked on the grill until it was slightly crispy, like bacon. Bagel King isn’t a kosher restaurant, by the way — you can get applewood-smoked bacon with your eggs, cheddar cheese on your burger (on a pretzel roll), or provolone on any number of thick, meaty, overstuffed sandwiches. But they also offer turkey sausage and turkey ham.

Most bagels are $1 each, or you can get a baker’s dozen (13) for $10. Bagels freeze exceptionally well, especially if you slice them first, seal them in plastic bags, squeeze all the air out, and freeze them immediately. Then they warm up perfectly in a toaster oven… or you can microwave them for 30 seconds before the toaster oven, if you always forget to slice them before freezing, like I usually do.

On this most recent trip, I stocked up with bagels to freeze: nine everything bagels and nine bialys.

They were even kind enough to throw in these sweet treats: a raspberry danish pastry and a huge, dense cinnamon roll.

Bagel King also makes their own flavored cream cheeses, which you can order on your bagel or get to-go tubs. The savory veggie, bruschetta, chunky nova, and smooth lox cream cheeses are all outstanding, but they have sweet ones too, like strawberry, Nutella, and almond amaretto. I just wouldn’t recommend those sweet ones on an everything bagel or a bialy!

So that’s Bagel King, another old stalwart, and your source for the best fresh bagels in Orlando. I’m so lucky to live near the one in Casselberry, but there are also locations in Winter Park, Lake Mary, Debary, and a wholesale location in Orlando. Now more than ever, I know we’re all seeking comfort food. To me, few meals are as comfortable as a good bagel with smoked salmon and cream cheese. If that sounds the least bit good to you, come at the king, and don’t miss.

Alex’s Fresh Kitchen

I’m sure my regular readers are all doing their part to keep themselves and others safe by staying home, and so is your friendly neighborhood Saboscrivner. But we still have to eat, and I feel obligated to help our local restaurants by ordering takeout when I can (pretty much limited to weekends, on my way home from the pharmacy or grocery store) and spreading the good word about them, to encourage others to keep ordering too.

I’m much less likely to drive all around the Orlando area on food missions like I used to, so I have a renewed focus on what’s good in the neighborhood. (Sorry.) Late in 2019, my quiet and unassuming suburb of Casselberry got a new little restaurant: Alex’s Fresh Kitchen (https://www.alexsfreshkitchenfl.com/). It opened in a space on Semoran Boulevard just south of Red Bug Lake Road once held by Five Boroughs Pizzeria. Who? Exactly. I visited the pizzeria once and thought it was perfectly okay, but it closed before I could write a review. Alex’s Fresh Kitchen, on the other hand, is a welcome addition to this side of town, and a place I intend to become a regular at.

Alex Diaz is the chef-owner of this small, quaint restaurant with an open kitchen. He cooks, and his mother, Deborah McDowell, who I didn’t get to meet, provides the baked goods. Alex was a convivial guy, definitely proud of his place despite suffering from the slowdown all restaurants are dealing with. But he had other locals, clearly regulars, coming in for takeout before and after me, so I’m glad people are finding out about his Fresh Kitchen.

I used to not be a big chicken sandwich guy, but the last year has led to me appreciating the humble fried chicken sandwich more, as you might have seen in my reviews of Popeye’s, Swine & Sons (which I named one of my favorite dishes of 2019 in Orlando Weekly), and Chicken Fire (which I tried and loved even before they introduced a chicken sandwich of their own). I had heard from multiple trusted foodies that Alex’s offers a worthy chicken sandwich, so of course I had to try it.
Their version ($12) is a fried or grilled chicken breast (I chose fried because when we’re under a stay-at-home order, we all deserve a little treat), served on a brioche bun with garlic aioli, cabbage slaw, and pickles that were made in house. I always prefer chicken thighs, especially when the chicken is being fried, but even with white meat, it was still a large and tasty sandwich.

I also ordered the burger special ($13), and I’m so glad I did, because it was one of the tastiest burgers I’ve eaten in a really long time, and not just because we’ve been quarantined at home. It was an eight-ounce burger cooked medium rare, exactly how I requested, served on the same kind of lightly-griddled brioche bun, and topped with fried onion strings, barbecue sauce, pulled bacon, and the most delicious roasted tomato aioli — a pretty perfect burger. I can’t rave about this burger enough. Alex told me he runs a different burger special almost every week, so this was a passing thing, but I hope he brings it back or maybe makes it the regular burger, in addition to rotating specials.

I placed my takeout order over the phone, and Alex offered me the choice of fries, home fries, or salad. I had a hard time deciding between fries and home fries, especially because I make and eat salads all the time, but usually leave deep-frying to the professionals. Luckily, with ordering the chicken sandwich and the burger, I got an order of fries and an order of home fries. Even though I live ten minutes from Alex’s, the fries were lukewarm and a little soggy by the time I got home and started eating, but I devoured them anyway. They were good fries, and I suspect they’d be great fries when we’re able to eat in restaurants again.

What was great, however, were the little plastic cups of roasted tomato aioli and roasted onion aioli that Alex included for me. Longtime readers know what a fan I am of condiments, dips, and sauces, and these were mind-blowing. I wish he sold these two house-made aiolis in jars, because I’d buy multiple jars and give them to friends and colleagues as gifts. Ask my wife, who was eating something else while I had this food — I kept exclaiming how good the fries were dipped in these two aiolis, especially the roasted onion one. I was even cursing with enthusiastic disbelief, and I’m sure I pumped my fist more than once. They were that good.

The home fries were even better than the fries. The fried potato chunks were a little soft, but I’m sure they would have been crispier if eaten immediately. They were very well-seasoned, and there were strips of onion and bell pepper tossed in with them. I don’t order home fries very often, but I’m so glad I got these. They were more flavorful than the regular fries so they didn’t benefit as much from the aioli duo, but you bet I tried every different combination and permutation anyway.

Alex’s mother, Deborah McDowell, makes the desserts at the Fresh Kitchen. I saw a beautiful chocolate peanut butter cake, as well as a beguiling ube cake:

But maybe my favorite dessert in the world is an Atlantic Beach Pie that I make. This is the recipe, except I make the crust out of Ritz crackers (the best crackers) instead of the traditional Saltines, You end up with a pie that is sweet, rich, creamy, sticky, buttery, tart, salty, and crunchy, and perfect year-round (but especially as a summer dessert). So when I saw Deborah also makes a lemon pie for Alex’s Fresh Kitchen, I had to try her version. She didn’t opt for the buttery, salty, cracker crust, instead going for a thick, moist graham cracker crust. Her lemon filling was more custardy than mine, much less tart, and also firmer, while mine comes out more runny. I was so happy I tried it. Creamy, citrusy pies are the best.

Well, after this first visit, I was already a fan of Alex’s, so I returned this past weekend for more takeout. I got myself one of his weekly specials, an 8″ Philly cheesesteak sandwich ($12), with a side of those terrific home fries. It was tasty, but not as juicy or greasy as cheesesteaks I’m used to from places like LaSpada’s. I feel like it could have used more melty cheese, but it still hit the spot.

After my week of raving about Alex’s, and my dear wife not being able to escape my raving, she asked me to order her the mini chicken and waffles ($11). By the time I got it home and unpacked it for her, there didn’t seem to be anything “mini” about it. It was a large Belgian-style waffle, already cut into quarters, and served with two medium-sized pieces of fried chicken breast. Some parts of the fried chicken were burnt, but she ate it anyway, scorched spots and all. I’m sure this was an anomaly, because my chicken sandwich from the previous visit was fried to perfection.
The chicken and waffles came with four little cups of various accompaniments. From left to right: maple syrup (maybe “pancake syrup,” which I honestly prefer sometimes due to growing up with it), a sweet, caramelized, almost toffee-like topping that she loved on the waffles, what I think was cinnamon sugar (we didn’t try this, and it’s still in our fridge), and her favorite, a sweet and sticky vanilla sauce.

And because nobody deserves a treat more than my poor wife, who has been cooped up at home for weeks, I brought her back a slice of the chocolate peanut butter cake ($7), which happens to be gluten-free. She absolutely loved it, chocolate lover that she is. Just like last week’s burger was my favorite thing I’ve tried from Alex’s, this cake was definitely her favorite.

It’s great to have one more good restaurant offering comfort and consistency close to home, especially because we’re hardly going anywhere these days. Alex’s Fresh Kitchen is a relatively new addition to Casselberry’s limited dining options, but I’m so glad Alex and his mom are here, now more than ever. Ironically, their restaurant is across the street from my gym, but they’re open and the gym is closed. I can’t go there three times a week like I was going to the gym, but I’ll keep going when I can, especially now that I’m following their Facebook page for updates on the new burgers and other weekly specials. Welcome to the neighborhood, Alex and Deborah! Constant readers, make them feel welcome.

Tomasino’s New York Pizzeria

Sometimes you never know the wonders in your own neighborhood, and you can live in a place for years before you discover them. My wife and I were neighbors for two years — me living with one of my good friends and her living with her parents, five minutes away — before we met on OKCupid. And in our very neighborhood was a pizzeria I’ve been driving past for over 15 years, that we finally took a chance on trying in recent weeks. It turned out to be another pleasant surprise moments from our driveway. This is Tomasino’s New York Pizzeria (http://www.tomasinospizza.com/), with three locations in Orlando (along East Colonial between Primrose and Bumby, in the “Milk District”), Winter Springs (near us), and Lake Mary (I never go up there, so I have no idea what it’s near).

For our first visit, we decided to dine in, because pizza is always better hot and fresh out of the oven. The Winter Springs Tomasino’s is a very small space, but we are early birds whenever possible and got seated immediately. Later on, as you will find out, they get slammed. We started out with an order of fresh-baked garlicky cheese knots ($3.99), drenched in thick, melty garlic butter, dusted with Romano cheese, and served with the most delicious marinara sauce for dipping. Deez knots were very soft and fluffy, which we always like. Sometimes garlic knots can be too dense and chewy, like little softballs, but not these!

This was the 14″ Arthur Avenue-style pizza ($18.99), named after the famous old street of Italian restaurants, delis, and grocery stores in the Bronx. This pizza sounded perfect for me, topped with spicy soppressata salami, caramelized onions, and goat cheese — these are a few of my favorite things! They finish it off with a drizzle of their “spicy marinade” that definitely contains crushed red pepper, that pizzeria tabletop standard. However, I couldn’t shake the fact (no pun intended) that it tasted like the Frank’s Red Hot sauce you put on Buffalo-style hot wings.

Here’s a slice of the Arthur Avenue pie. I love vinegar and spice, but I’m not the biggest fan of hot Buffalo wings, and that was the overwhelming flavor on this particular pizza, due to that “spicy marinade.” I would have tried it no matter what, but next time I’ll just stick to plain cheese or splurge on meatballs, onions, and peppers as toppings.

My wife opted for two slices: a Don Tomasino slice ($4) and a regular cheese slice ($2.50), both cut from larger 18″ pizzas. The Don Tomasino is their regular bianca pizza (mozzarella, ricotta, parmigiana and fresh garlic, with no red sauce), topped with thin-sliced breaded eggplant, spinach, fresh tomatoes, and drizzled with their “special pink sauce” (like a vodka sauce).
She didn’t even come close to finishing these, but as usual, I greatly preferred the crispy texture of these large slices to my 14″ pie. When I return (AND I DID), I’m going to stick to slices, like I usually do at my other local favorite pizzerias Del Dio and Paradiso.

We shared a slice of strawberry cheesecake for dessert, since Tomasino’s gets cheesecake from the legendary Junior’s restaurant in Brooklyn. This past summer, my wife and I went to New York and ate at two different Junior’s locations in the theater district. I argue Junior’s bakes the best cheesecake anywhere — far better than your jiggly Japanese cheesecakes, the Publix bakery, and especially the Cheesecake Factory. It’s nice to know we can get Junior’s slices at Pickles Deli in Longwood as well.

More recently, I brought home takeout from Tomasino’s, so we had a second round of trying stuff.

We got the garlicky cheese knots again:

My wife got another slices of the Don Tomasino pizza:

I got my own slice of plain cheese this time (topped with her tomatoes that I dutifully plucked off the Don Tomasino, since she doesn’t like raw tomatoes:

And a very good meatball sub ($7.99), with onions and peppers added. Don’t worry, I only ate a few bites after two knots and the slice of pizza. It heated up perfectly well in the toaster oven the next day.

And for dessert, my wife wanted to try the chocolate mousse, which was very rich. She barely made it through half of the decadent domelike dessert, and I only had a few bites, so she had plenty left to enjoy the next day.

A cross-section, showing the layers of lusciousness:

But I placed this pickup order on a Friday evening, just before leaving work at 6:00, and let me tell you, Tomasino’s was a standing room only crowd by the time I got there. The only thing harder than getting a table was getting a parking space, especially with the even larger and busier Gators Dockside restaurant next door. So keep in mind Tomasino’s delivers too, for peak times like that. But also keep in mind that our pizza slices were cold by the time I got home, ten minutes away. Pizza — especially thin and crispy New York-style slices like they serve here — is always better eaten at the restaurant, hot and fresh out of the oven, like I warned at the beginning of this review. We knew better, but don’t get me wrong — the food was still good. I’m glad we finally gave our friendly neighborhood Tomasino’s a chance, and after two visits, we have every intention of becoming regulars.

Rey’s Cuban Cafe

My wife and I love Cuban food, and I’m from Miami, so I grew up eating some of the best Cuban food in the world. My parents definitely weren’t into exploring new cuisines, but we often feasted on Cuban delicacies, and as a result, I feel like my standards are high. I’m always on a quest for the best Cuban food in Orlando, and my latest discovery has been Rey’s Cuban Cafe (https://www.reyscubancafe.com/), a small and unassuming restaurant in Fern Park, not too far from where we live. Rey’s has about eight indoor tables and a few more on an outdoor patio, but I’ve only ever brought home takeout from there. It’s ten minutes away, so the food is always nice and hot by the time I get it home. I went three times before writing this review.

My wife’s favorite dish from any Cuban restaurant is bistec empanado (which I’ve seen as empanizado on other restaurants’ menus): tender steak pounded flat, breaded, and deep-fried ($9). This is served over white rice with fried yuca.

Here’s her bistec empanado from our second visit. This time it came with garlicky boiled yuca, which she prefers:

I am a sucker for liver dishes, which are rare enough on most menus, but Rey’s has two different versions. This is higado Italiano ($10.99), strips of tender beef liver sauteed with onions and green and red bell peppers in a tangy tomato sauce. I usually order yellow rice instead of white when there is a choice, and I can never refuse maduros, sweet fried plantains, which are one of my favorite foods in the whole world. The onions are from my wife’s steak, since I love them and she most definitely does not.

This past weekend, my wife was craving bistec empanado again, and I had just donated blood, as I try to do every eight weeks. Liver sounded awesome, probably to help replace some of the iron I had just gladly given up, so I ordered the regular bistec de higado, liver steak ($9.99). It was very thin and tender — a perfect consistency. I wish they had really slathered it in onions, like gone to town with cebollas.

I always like to get red beans when I have a choice between black and red. Rey’s red beans are served like a stew, with chunks of potatoes and little bits of onions and pork. I wish they had a little more smoky flavor and spice, but I’ve always gotten takeout, so I add my own hot sauce at home. I realize Cuban food is rarely spicy.

I am a huge fan of Jon Favreau’s wonderful movie Chef, about an L.A. chef who finds new inspiration for cooking after a trip to Miami. He buys a food truck and drives back home with his buddy and his son, selling Cuban sandwiches and bonding as they drive cross-country. I can’t believe I never saw it until this past summer, so I was a little obsessed with Cuban sandwiches that particular weekend in July. I remember stopping by Rey’s for the first time for my own inspiration as I prepared to marinate and roast my own pork shoulder for homemade Cubanos. (That ended up being the best thing I ever cooked.)

But before I made my own, I enjoyed Rey’s Cuban Deluxe ($7.99), with the usual sliced roast pork, ham, and Swiss cheese, plus the additions of salami, Spanish sausage, lettuce, tomatoes and mayo. Did I add one of the many mustards from my collection when I got this sandwich home? Long-time Saboscrivnerinos will know the answer is YES. (My homemade Cuban sandwich was better, but this wasn’t bad at all. I’d skip the lettuce and tomato next time, for sure.)

You can’t go wrong with buttery Cuban toast on the side of any meal:

One of these times I brought home takeout, I was in the mood for good empanadas (although as comedian Jim Gaffigan once said, there’s no such thing as a bad empanada). I ate them too quickly to take pictures of their fillings, but two of them were stuffed with picadillo, or seasoned ground beef, and the other was a pizza empanada, stuffed with hearty tomato sauce and melty mozzarella cheese.

There are many kinds of empanadas, with many Latin-American countries specializing in their own versions. However, Cuban empanadas, with their flaky fried flour crusts, have always been my favorites.

And on our last visit, pastelitos (pastries) were two for the price of one, so I brought home a quesito filled with sweet cream cheese and a pastelito with guava and cream cheese. These were perfectly fine, but not on the level of Versailles and La Carreta from back home in Miami (also known as “The 3-0-5”). I was also craving croquetas de jamon, crispy fried croquettes stuffed with a soft, yielding filling of diced ham and bechamel sauce. Those always hit the spot!

I don’t think Rey’s Cuban Cafe is elevating Cuban food to new levels or putting gourmet twists on anything. It’s comfort food, pure and simple — hearty food that reminds me of home (even though the food was one of the only things I liked about growing up in Miami). My quest for the best Cuban food in Orlando certainly continues, but you could do a lot worse than Rey’s. You can see the generous portion sizes and extremely reasonable prices. Everything is fresh and tasty, and they accomplish everything they set out to do.

The Hindu Society of Central Florida Cafeteria

One of the new foodie friends I’ve made in Orlando is Isha Shah, the influencer who runs the Will Fly For Chai Facebook and Instagram accounts. She is an excellent photographer, a top-notch writer with exquisite taste, and a genuinely kind and good person. She is originally from India, but she and her husband have lived in Orlando for 17 years, and they are vegetarians who love to eat, cook, and travel. (Like and follow Will Fly For Chai, by the way! I bestow the Saboscrivner Seal of Sublimeness upon it, and upon her.)

Once a month, Isha will organize a meet-up of local foodies at a vegetarian-friendly restaurant, but I had never been able to attend these gatherings before… until this past weekend, when we met at the Hindu Society of Central Florida (https://www.orlandohindutemple.org/), a beautiful temple nestled in the suburbs of Casselberry, ten minutes from where I’ve been living for a decade! It opened in 2005, four years before we moved into our home, and I had no idea it was so close. My regular readers will know I love discovering new things, places, and experiences, and nothing amazes and astonishes me more than finding hidden treasures close to home. This is a perfect example of one of those.

There is a cafeteria on the premises that specializes in South Indian food, and she recommended it highly. Now, I like almost all the Indian food I’ve ever tried, but I’m definitely not an expert. I’ve been to a certain Indian lunch buffet near my work countless times, and I like all the standard, familiar dishes, but I knew this was going to be different. Here I’d have Isha to guide me, explain things, and make recommendations. Because I’m not well-versed in Indian cuisine, I also wanted to test my limits with spices, since most of the food on the lunch buffet is very mild (which is probably for the best, considering they expect us to return to work and continue to be productive). I figured the dishes served at the temple cafeteria might be a little hotter. I looked forward to this lunch all week.

I had met Isha once before, at a lunch at the East End Market (see my Hinckley’s Fancy Meats review), but this time I also met her cool husband and her delightful mom, as well as several old and new friends and acquaintances from the Orlando Foodie Forum presented by Tasty Chomps. The cafeteria was a standard setup where you order and pay at a window, then wait for your number to be called and bring your tray of food to one of the many tables. They had a handwritten menu on a large dry-erase board, offering most of the options listed on the website. Everything was vegetarian, and most of it was new and unfamiliar to me. In typical Saboscrivner fashion, I over-ordered, expecting I’d share everything with the lunch bunch:

An order of vada ($5), which had the texture of good cake doughnuts — battered and deep-fried with the slightest crispy exterior but a soft, dense interior, only savory instead of sweet. These three vada came with a bowl of sambhar, a thick, lentil-based vegetable stew, meant to either soak or dip pieces in. They also came with coconut chutney (top right).

A samosa plate ($4), featuring three pyramid-shaped deep-fried pastries stuffed with spiced potatoes, onions, and peas. I’ve had samosas before, but these were the best ones I’ve ever had. They were such a great blend of textures, with the outer pastry shell very close to the Cuban empanadas of my childhood, fried to perfection but not greasy at all.

The show-stopper was the dosa ($6), an absolutely huge South Indian crispy crepe. The batter is made from fermented rice and black lentil flour, then fried in a skillet and folded or rolled into a very thin, delicate, crispy wrap, perfect for stuffing with fillings or breaking off pieces to dip into things. This took the longest to cook, but it was worth the wait. The dosas are so big, everyone was taken by surprise by them.
I ordered my dosa with masala, a slightly spicy blend of potatoes, fried onions, and peas seasoned with curry spices. I thought the dosa might come stuffed with the masala, but instead it was served on the side, which was perfectly fine. It also came with coconut chutney that was nice for cutting a bit of the spice. Whenever I return, I will be brave and order the mysore dosa, which came stuffed with a spicy chili paste. The kind and concerned man taking the orders warned me it would be too spicy, so I deferred to his judgment this time, but Isha shared a piece of hers, and I could totally handle it! Next time.

Expecting heat, I ordered a cup of mango lassi ($1.50), a sweet and cooling yogurt drink that is my go-to beverage at Indian restaurants — not just for cutting the heat, but because I love anything with mangoes. This was a very small plastic cup, so I sipped to make it last, but I was glad to have it near at hand.

My friend ordered idli, which are softer, fluffier discs that are similar to the vada, but not deep-fried, so I suspect not as flavorful or as interesting, texture-wise. More experienced people advised him to rip them into chunks and soak them in the sambhar. I didn’t try these, but I wondered if they might be similar to the consistency of bao buns.

He also ordered chole poori, which was fried, leavened flatbread (which looked similar to puffy flour tortillas) served with a bowl of chole, a spicy curry made out of chickpeas. I didn’t try this either, but I will next time!

Finally, as the group wrapped up our meals and started gathering to take a tour of the serene and welcoming Hindu temple, I got talked into ordering a mango kulfi dessert ($3) — smooth and creamy mango ice cream with real chunks of fruit on a wooden popsicle stick. I would have been fine with the cool sweetness of my wee cup of mango lassi, but I was glad I succumbed to the peer pressure, because it was a hot day, and the kulfi was a refreshing treat as we ventured back outside.

I felt very calm and comfortable as we wandered through the temple itself, shoes left in racks outside. Isha encouraged us to explore the altars and just take everything in. Wanting to be respectful, I didn’t take any pictures or even check my phone inside the temple, so I felt more attuned to my surroundings, maybe more mindful, certainly less distracted than I usually feel. The holiness of the large, open, ornately-decorated room was palpable. There was so much culture and history to behold that it felt as much like a museum to me as it did a temple. Since I eschew organized religion myself, museums always feel like holy places to me, where you can learn about other cultures and contemplate our place in the larger framework of the world. (I feel the same about libraries, but I am, after all, a librarian.) I asked some general questions about the temple and about Hinduism that I hope weren’t stupid, but Isha was very patient and informative, and so was a Hindu priest who happened to be nearby. I couldn’t get over how welcome I felt — how welcome she made us all feel there. As if a large, cheap, tasty, and NEW lunch with nice people wasn’t enough, I learned a lot too.

And one more big lesson I learned was about myself: that I eat A LOT of meat. (I’m sure you have noticed, dear readers!) I have always had the utmost respect for my vegetarian friends, but this lunch reminded me how delicious and satisfying vegetarian food can be. I never missed meat in any of these dishes, so it made me think about being more mindful and maybe not feeling obligated to include meat in every meal I eat as a matter of course or habit.

It was the best Sunday afternoon I’ve had in quite a while. And by the way, the cafeteria is open (to all, including the public) on Fridays from 6:00 to 8:30 PM and Saturdays and Sundays from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM.