A foodie note on Mexican food in a food court in Singapore

One of my colleagues had been raving about a mexican stall in a kopitiam food court near Dhoby Ghaut. He had even lead a bunch of other colleagues to the place last week. It was enough of a incitement for me to try out the same. So, on a sunday afternoon, after a lazy morning, me and the missus got our lazy bums out of the house and took the MRT to Dhoby Ghaut station. I knew that it was somewhere between there and SMU, but we didn't have an exact address, and it was searing hot and humid and we were both quite hungry. We did find a kopitiam at the intersection of Bencoolen and Bras Basah, but we didn't find a mexican stall, and so we kept going further ahead. The Maps app on the iPhone showed another kopitiam a block away on the left and so we thought that must be it. It wasn't. Actually, there was no kopitiam. Curses to the Google Maps ensued and sighs from the missus followed. Not.Good.Signs.

Then, I decided to disturb AK, my said colleague and he promised that the last he saw the stall, it was still in the same kopitiam that we found at the intersection of B & BB. Now, my wife dispensed curses aimed at me. By now, I had this ominous feeling that Murphy was playing strange games with us, punishing us hard for dreaming to eat Mexican food.

We trodded back to the same place and on careful investigation, found a place called "EXICANTACOBAR", not really a mexican place, but if you looked carefully, you would notice a sombrero hiding an "M" and on even more careful observation, you could see a space between N & T and O & B. So, there we were, two Indians staring at a caucasian lady in a Singapore food court looking for Mexican food.

We asked her for vegetarian options and the kind lady suggested we have quesadillas and burritos and suggested that one serving of each should be good enough, with the quesadillas normally more than good enough for one person. We settled for those options, waited for the food to arrive, and broke into them like a pair of hungry wolves. Those two dishes were gone in 60 seconds, and we had to order a plate of fajitas to get us close to two full stomachs. 20 minutes and 20 singapore dollars later, we had eaten our best food for a long long time. This was the one time we weren't eating Indian food (I am bored to death with Indian food in an island full of esoteric possibilities) and still both enjoying it (my wife can't appreciate anything but Indian simply because she finds everything else too bland). Today, we learnt that mexican food is awesome, there is at least one food court stall being run by a caucasian in Singapore, that the mexicans eat with their hands too, and that there may be more interesting similarities between Indians and Mexicans despite us having no obvious historical connections.

At the end of it all, the food was so awesome that me and the wifey agreed in consensus (which itself is as rare as a blue moon), that the effort was well worth the super awesome food experience. Three cheers to the Mexican Taco Bar.

For those who plan to go back there:
Stall Name: Mexican Taco Bar (might be spelled as EXICANTACOBAR)
Location: Left corner (sandwiched between Chicken Rice and Economic Rice stalls)
Address: Ground Floor, Plaza by the Park, 51 Bras Basah Rd. Map Link.
Average Cost: $10 per person ($6-$8 per dish and average of 1.5 dishes if you are really hungry)
Rating: 4.5/5
My most liked dish: Quesadillas

Comments

The food here was HORRIBLE. They can't get any order right when you order from them, as not only me but a few customers have reflected.

I specially ordered a beef taco, chilli and a beef burrito on a Thursday evening. Not very crowded. I got a vegetable taco with no beef inside. Worse, they gave me a vegetable quesadilla.

The lady in the queue in front of me was loudly telling the server to make sure her vegetarian taco didn't have meat inside. I thought she was overbearing at first. Now I know why.

The chilli was pretty bad too. The meat was too dry, masked with heavy chilli.

They really need to shape up and put actual cooks in the kitchen, instead of untrained workers. I won't be going back.

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