Food Pics of the Week (FPOTW): Mariscos 1133

Mariscos 1133 (***)

1133 11th St NW Washington, DC 20001

Last weekend, we hit up Mariscos 1133 - a seafood spot in DC for brunch. It's kind of interesting because I don't really think seafood (for the most part) goes with brunch/breakfast. The place was just ok for me. It wasn't bad, but I think I would prefer to dine there for dinner rather than brunch.

Oysters al Carbón con Crabmeat and Ceviche

Left: Oysters al Carbón con Crabmeat - I'm not really sure why they didn't keep the name all in Spanish or in English. LOL, I had to triple check to ensure that I typed carbón (charcoal) and not cabrón (a male motherfucker or bastard). This dish was interesting because I really didn't think parmesan cheese and grilled oysters would work out. Strangely enough, the dish was quite tasty. It probably was the best dish of the afternoon.

Right: Ceviche - This was very meh because it was a bit too 'soupy' for me. Maybe this type of ceviche popular in Mexico.

Seafood Huevos Rancheros

What a hearty dish that is great for someone who is always in a constant state of hangry. The ranchero sauce was absolutely amazing.

Pisco Sour

LOL. I joked with the server saying that he served the drink in the wrong orientation. I assume the drink was supposed to be placed in a way so that I would see an M instead of a W. Now, is the M because the restaurant is named Mariscos 1133, because the restaurant is on the corner of M Street, or both? ;)

Food Pics of the Week (FPOTW): La Malinche

La Malinche (***)

8622 Colesville Rd Silver Spring, MD 20910

We tried to do something a bit different for a recent happy hour. I guess visiting this place wasn’t thinking outside of the box since this restaurant is next door to the other restaurant (J. Hollingers Waterman’s Chophouse, link to FPOTW entry: ***) that we typically frequent for happy hour.

Marinaor Malintzin (c. 1500 – c. 1529), more popularly known as La Malinche, a Nahua woman from the Mexican Gulf Coast, became known for contributing to the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire (1519–1521), by acting as an interpreter, advisor, and intermediary for the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés. She was one of 20 enslaved women given to the Spaniards in 1519 by the natives of Tabasco. Cortés chose her as a consort, and she later gave birth to his first son, Martín – one of the first Mestizos (people of mixed European and Indigenous American ancestry) in New Spain.

-Wikipedian.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Malinche

Since the restaurant is described as Spanish and Mexican tapas spot, we decided to get a small spread of food that included patatas bravas, croquetas, boquerones (white anchovies, one of my favs), and mussels. Oh of course, we had beers and margaritas since it was happy hour.

First, I’ll say that the service was very exceptional because the entire service staff was super friendly. Unfortunately, the food was not that great. Lemme clarify that. The food was not nasty or gross, but it just didn’t meet our expectations. Well . . . I guess it didn’t meet the hubby’s expectations. Since he is from Spain, he takes his tapas very seriously. 😉 I’ll cut La Malinche some slack because the patatas bravas were pretty good. When all the food came out at the same time (less than 10 minutes after placing our order), I had a feeling that food would not be amazing. We were right because the croquetas tasted like they were fried a few weeks ago and reheated in the microwave before arriving at our table.

If I visit La Malinche again, I’ll probably stick to the patatas bravas and the margaritas. While the food was not that great for me, I’ll say the restaurant has a very generous happy hour.

FOOD PICS OF THE WEEK - Mission Ceviche

Mission Ceviche (***)

1400 2nd Ave, New York, NY (Upper East Side)

It’s time for some FISH. . . . Well, kinda.

The hubby was having a craving for raw fish that was not sushi so we headed to our nearest ceviche spot. We’ve been here a few times and have not had any issues or complaints. However, I feel like the place is becoming more overpriced as time passes. More on that below.

Of course, no excursion to a ceviche spot would be complete without a couple (well, a few) rounds of pisco sours.

Slight rant:

Due to the pandemic, I understand that menu item prices are increasing so I’m not complaining about this issue . . . for the most part. While I get that one should expect ceviche to be a bit up there in price, I kind of feel like this restaurant is doing too much. Actually, I am not complaining about the ceviche prices per se, because no one wants to eat bargain-basement raw seafood. *I learned my lesson after eating at a 2-4-1 sushi place back in the early 2000s.* But, the prices of some of the restaurant’s non-ceviche menu items are a bit outrageous.

For instance, the Aji de Gallina (shredded chicken breast in a yellow chili sauce) was about $35 for a relatively small serving. We also ordered a side of yucca fries (not pictured), which were about $19. You should have seen my face when the small plate came out with five goddman fries (about the same size as your typical steak fries) on it. To be perfectly honest, I was already a bit annoyed that one side was $19 bucks. I guess that restaurants (like any business) have to mark up prices so they will make a profit, but I think there’s a difference between making an honest profit and price gouging. Then again, the restaurant is located on the Upper East Side (UES), which is a pricey part of NYC so I get it . . . I think. Yes, the UES is in a somewhat posh part of town, but it’s not like the restaurant is located in TriBeCa or SoHo. For the most part, I know how the game goes on the UES because I used to work in that area for about 5 years during my 20-year tenure in NYC. Let me stop complaining bc the yucca fries probably would have been $25 bucks had the restaurant been located in TriBeCa or SoHo.

Ranting aside: I will say that the restaurant’s service was pretty on point. No wait, the service was TOO on point. It seemed like the waitresses were constantly trying to take our plates before we finished eating our meager servings. In the restaurant’s defense, it is a popular spot (probably because there are so few ceviche restaurants in the city) so I guess they like to get customers in and out. I was like: Damn, Girl. I was going to order another overpriced pisco sour, but I’ll pass since y’all trying to kick us out.

The next time that either one of us wants ceviche (unless we are in Perú), I’ll just sprinkle lime juice on some sushi or sashimi.

A LOL Moment: A couple of ladies were seated next to us. One kind of sassy lady asked the waitress: so how does this work? Thinking to myself, I was like: what’s so confusing? Take a look at the menu and order what you want. It’s not rocket science or as one of my friends says – it’s not rocket surgery.

Food Pic of the Week - Get out Edition

The Pisco Y Nazca (***) 

1823 L St. NW, Washington DC 20026

The hubby and I needed to get the heck out of Dodge for a couple of days. By “the hubby and I”, mean me. Also, by “Dodge”, I mean NYC. We decided to make a trip down to the Hampton Roads area of Virginia (my hometown) with a three-day “layover” in Washington DC. Also, it just so happened to be the week of our second wedding anniversary. During this trip, I have to say that we definitely had some good food, especially in DC. It felt like we were eating all the time. However, in our defense, pretty much all of the museums (with the exception of The Museum of the Bible) were closed due to the pandemic so we spent a LOT of walking around to enjoy the sights. Funny enough of the museums were going to be open the week AFTER our trip. According to my Apple Watch, we averaged about 15 miles of walking each day.

Since we were constantly in hunger mode from all the walking, I was so glad that we stumbled upon Pisco Y Nazca. Just in case you did not know, Peruvian food is one of my favorite cuisines.

We were both shocked by the amount of food included in the restaurant’s tasting menu. For $55, the tasting menu included: 1) a flight of pisco sours; 2) a flight of leche de tigre shot (shrimp ceviche), toston, and ceviche cremoso; 3) a causa sampler (crocante, tartare, pollo); 4) a choice between lomo saltado, pescado a lo macho, or chaufa de mariscos as an entree; and 5) pionono a la mode for dessert.

I gotta say this was the first time that I was completely full from a tasting menu. Actually, there was so much food that we had to ask our lovely waitress, Luz, to pack up our entrees and desserts to go. I will say that the pescado was not super delicious on the reheat. :(

I definitely have got to keep this place in my mental Rolodex for my next trip to DC.

Random thought about DC:

Growing up (middle and high school age), I never saw the lure of or excitement with DC. Maybe this was due to only relating DC with school. I do not know, but there must have been some rule stating that all Virginian school-aged children had to go on at least one field trip to DC every year. For that reason, I kind of thought that DC was a “boring” city. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know that politics is very important and exciting. As an adult, I absolutely LOVE visiting DC because of the historical and (now) social significance of the district. Since visiting Georgetown (as a potential graduate school), I’ve always had a good time in DC. By “good”, I mean AMAZING. Honestly, if I was not so stubborn in attending a graduate program in NYC, I probably would have attended Georgetown for my graduate studies. I wonder where I would be now had I gone through with that decision.

That said, I CANNOT wait until my next trip to DC.