It’s no secret that Debeli and me are hard-core carnivore eaters, but sometimes, and that is really sometimes, like to try all veggies meals.
A small 30 seater space, that opened just few months ago in St. Hanshaugen neighbourhood offers authentic Mexican dishes. And they all plant based.
The characteristic ingredients of this country that belongs to southern portion of North America comes from local producers and are organically produced.
The classical ingredients like beans, potatoes, squash, nuts, cactus, avocados, tomatoes, tomatillos, cacao, vanilla and corn, of course, are used in a menu of reasonable size. There’s around 20 dishes on the menu that starts with brunch at noon until 5pm, but there’s also 5 courses tasting menu and a la carte one together with a take away option. Very convenient now in pandemic time.
https://www.vaqueraverde.no/menu
While most of the guests came for a drink or a brunch we have opted for the typical dishes so we started with Al pastor tacos with cauliflower, pineapple and fried hibiscus.
A rather unusual combination but adding the salsa verde (chopped green herbs sauce) on top of it, it was even better.
Esquites or a traditional corn stew cooked with aromatic herb epazote was probably my favourite. Esquites translated from the Nahuatl word ízquitl, means toasted corn is actually a Mexican street food option mixed here with coriander and mayo garlic aioli cream. Fried tacos was another great addition to the whole dish. Can’t go wrong with fried 🙂
Enchiladas filled with paprika, goat cheese and nopales (cactus pads) were not so exciting, but rather just good. Tasty, jummy, boring and nothing ike empanadas with soya, oregano, olives and pesto that were just right.
Last of the savory dishes came gorditas or asmall pastry made with masa (maize dough that comes from ground nixtamalized corn) stuffed with plantains bananas, black beans, spinach, salsa verde and cashew cream. Absolutely fantastic!
The portion is two servings, so each of us got one but I would mind couple more of them.
Dessert was a traditional Mexican sweet bread roll (pan dulce) or concha (shell in Spanish) that we shared.
Concha de matcha with slowly heated sweetened milk or dulce de leche and crunchy topping composed of sugar, butter and flour was a bit too sweet for Debeli so he just took a bite. The rest was mine. Didn’t argue, it would be actually a perfect breakfast option with coffee.
To conclude is that although plant based, no meat dishes, under the right creative mind (here that’s Chef Montse Garza) can be not just delicious but also very intriguing and exciting, leaving you wanting for more.