Saturday, February 28, 2009

Oxnard: El Portal

I ate here last night. I purchased one of those coupon booklets from a local high school. Kenna always supports the kids cause hey, I was a kid before and I'd be asking everyone to buy this and buy that! Anyway, El Portal is a small Mexican restaurant in an Oxnard shopping center. It's behind the Carl's Junior off Vineyard:

2311 N Oxnard Blvd
Oxnard, CA 93036
(805) 485-5400

I enter the restaurant and look up at this huge board full of Mexican specialities. I go the punk route and pick the Picadillo enchiladas. Well, I ordered water because I need it! No soda for me! Anyway, the food took about ten minutes to prepare. I received a piping hot plate of 3 ground beef enchiladas, rice, beans, sour cream, guacamole and pico de gallo. These enchiladas were stuffed with seasoned ground beed, diced potatoes and carrots so I guess you could say I got my veggies! They were topped with that infamous red sauce and lots of gooey cheese. Shockingly, the older I get, the less I like cheese so I scraped that off. These enchiladas were flavorful and full of meat. I was not disappointed...I actually cleaned my plate. The rice was seasoned but I was expecting the traditional Spanish style red tomato based rice. I guess the rice there is a family recipe.

The meal wasn't expensive at all. I added an order of chips and my total was $8.52 I noticed that they sell umm..yeah..adult beverages so I decided to have a daiquiri. It was $3.50 which is pretty cheap compared to paying the $6-$8 elsewhere. I guess it's the daiquiri stimulus package??

I finished my meal and watched some tv there. The staff was friendly and they thanked me for coming in when I left. I'll definitely return here again to try their seafood dishes. The place is nice and has a cozy, at home kinda feel to it.

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