Papatzul… again

Today’s a day of quickie posts… hope y’all don’t mind, but you’re getting more posts, so hopefully that makes up for it???

Well, after I liked Papatzul so much, I wanted to go back for that crispy fish, lightly dressed with that tangy crema, shredded cabbage, and yummy guacamole.  And you know, ideally, a critic should go to a place more than once to really get a feel for it and before casting true judgment on it.  But I’m not a paid critic.  I don’t have an expense account, my waistline suffers enough as is from the places I do go, and I just don’t have that much time to keep going to one place (especially if I hated it the first time).  So sometimes, it just happens that I’ll go somewhere and like it enough to return, but never return, so the positive impression remains for a long time.

But I made it a point to go back to Papatzul just over a week later.  I even brought two of my dearest friends, HB and StB.  When I arrived, I noticed immediately how much more packed it was than the week before; this was on Friday for lunch, and I’d gone on a Wednesday for lunch.  That Wednesday had seen about two tables besides ours; that Friday, nearly every table was taken save two.

We started with the guacamole, of course.  Immediately I became nervous.  I hatehateHATE picking a restaurant with friends, saying how I liked it, and then when I bring them there… it falls flat.  SPLAT.  I feel like a jerk when this happens (this might explain why I’ve been subconsciously allowing my friends to pick the restaurants for years now…).  Actually, sometimes I even feel personally insulted if a friend doesn’t like a place I’ve picked (which I have to get over, really! but this isn’t really the platform for that right now…).  Well, what made me nervous was how quickly the guacamole had come; last time, with the place next to empty, it’d still taken about 5-10 minutes for the guacamole to come, which made me think they’d made it on the spot.  This may have been pre-made.

And it tasted very flat.  It was completely creamy, not as chunky and wonderfully spiked with tomatoes, garlic, peppers as it had been the first time.  We ate it anyway, but we all agreed it was only okay, nothing that great.

HB opted for the torta but only found it alright.  She had a complaint about it that escapes my memory right now, but I know she decided to eat only half.

StB’s dish… something with almond mole sauce.  She also said it was only alright; expect to read her opinion on her site in a few weeks. 

Last and, sadly least, my fish taco.  What happened to the mound of shredded cabbage?  What happened to the piled-high fried fish, crispy to a fault, spread in bite sized pieces across the tortilla?  This was a soggy facsimile of what I’d previously eaten, just a week prior.  Limp, more spice than flavor, and just overall disappointing, I ate it, but I wasn’t happy at all.  Sigh.

Can I remove the recommended rating?  Well, I’m going to downgrade this from highly recommended, anyway.  This was so disappointing and quite embarrassing for me that I don’t know if I’ll give it another chance to redeem itself.  It was just… very sad. 

Yvo says: One of my biggest pet peeves is inconsistency in restaurants.  If you suck, suck all the time.  Or be good at one or two dishes, but suck elsewhere.  What you’re good at, though, always be good at, or this happens and you’re left with a really embarrassed Yvo.  When Yvo’s embarrassed, she gets pissed off and defensive as a result, and in this case, it means I think you suck.  When I think you suck, well, I’m surely not going to return anytime soon. 
mehhh.  I haven’t decided what to do with the rating yet