A TRIP TO THE MISSION

So like my businesses, the company I work for has seen a slow down due to the economy. This meant that for a few weeks, I was only working 4 days a week (and I had it good). However, I also sought to take advantage of my 3 day weekends, and on a very sunny Tuesday, I headed over to the Mission to join some friends for Mexican food.

Now, I have been to the Mission before, but not since we had moved to the Bay Area. It's kind of a funny thing, to go from our neighborhood in El Cerrito and take the BART 40 minutes to a part of San Francisco that is so different from where we live - it's almost like visiting another country.

Once I met up with my friends, we headed over to El Farolito for lunch. There are a lot of Mexican restaurants to choose from in the Mission - El Farolito just happened to be the one my friends liked. And there are several locations in the Mission. We ended up at one a little farther from the BART station, but it was much bigger. The inside wasn't anything special - we're talking picnic tables and plastic benches, but there were a lot of people inside.

Since I had never been here, I decided to order a couple of different things to try. What I didn't realize was that I'd end up waaaayyy over ordering. First we all got a basket of chips and we got to pick different types of salsa to go with it.

And here's my meal. So on the left there are two chicken tacos and on the right, there's a chicken tostada. See, I could've just ordered either the tacos or the tostadas and been totally fine ordering just one.

However, both were very tasty. I think I liked the tacos more than the tostada just because the tostada was loaded down with too many toppings. The tacos were packed with yummy grilled chicken, and were more simple, but equally messy. I'd imagine that if we had Mexican food like this anywhere near us, we'd be going once a week.

After we finished lunch, we checked ou a new ice cream place just a few doors down called Humphry Slocombe (yes, it's quite a name).

This place makes its ice cream from scratch in small batches, and they change the flavors pretty frequently. They're known for crazy flavors like fois gras, and my friend ordered a beet hibiscus sorbet (which she liked a lot)

However, when it comes to dessert and ice cream, I'm pretty traditional, so I went for their most conservative flavors - a cup with Blue Bottle Vietnamese Coffee and Chocolate.
I found the ice cream to be well made and tasty. However, it's not the best ice cream I've had since we've been out here - I still like Bi-Rite and Sketch more.

I had a great time in the Mission, and I just need to get my lazy butt to go out there more often. I definitely have to take Tom, though, to prove that there really is good Mexican food in the Bay Area.