What's with the peas?

No seriously.

So I'm on a quest, a quest for tasty really cliche"Mexican" food in my neighborhood (that being Uptown/Capital Hill, Denver). I will never claim to be a good Mexican food critic. While I did eat amazing food in Mexico it didn't stop me from loving the taco/refried beans/rice combo platters upon my return. Also I am a giant wuss and my nose runs at the sight, yes the sight, of spicy food.

I have frequented Las Delicas in Uptown quite a few times and have never really been impressed.

Last night I gave a new place a try. Benny's on 7th and Grant. I ordered the Tamale Dinner (Two pork tamales smothered with chili verde, refried beans and rice). This is where the peas come in. You know I just don't understand why Spanish rice sometimes has peas in it. Granted I think peas are absolutely disgusting, in any form, but they look even worse, if possible, in that rice. I've never heard someone get rice without the peas and exclaim, "WTF, where are the peas?!" So, I don't think anyone would miss them, even if they are insane enough to like them. They look gross. Have they been frozen and heated up multiple times? Where do those odd dimples come from? Traumatic shipping? Too much botox? This is something I'll never get over and it transcends into other food types, see: fried rice. I will move on, unwillingly.

The tamales were fine. The refried beans were good, so refried that there was little hint of bean texture. I'm not saying that's classy but I am saying that's how I like it, liquid bean with cheese, yum. The bits of rice that I got while picking around the peas were fair as well. The best was the chili verde. I wanted more of it. I wanted to make a soup of chilie verde and refried bean liquid. I could die happy. Granted, the chili is probably too mild for the spicy fan but it did come with actual chunks of green chilies and I accidentally put one in my mouth and much to the embarrassment of my dinner companion had to spit it back out, that or suffer death by mouth burn. Luckily this guy didn't see me shaming my state like that as he walked inside. If I lived in California I could make some not so clever remark here like "I'll be back, to Benny's" but alas, perhaps I'll just ride my bike there again soon without any well known tag line.

This is only the food I admit to

So I just got back from a 12 day trip to the east coast - York PA, Baltimore, DC, Richmond VA. Below is what I came up with. You have to click on the facebook link, cause there's no way I'm redoing all that.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2442146&id=10209802&ref=mf

Anyway, amidst all the wedding stuff in there are some really good restaurants. Coomb's was okay, but Las Placitas in Eastern Market in DC was really good. Full Kee in Chinatown was also good, if a little lacking in the ambiance and feel. Check it out.