pat_bruno

BY PAT BRUNO
Barely two months new, Fonda del Mar ("boardinghouse of the seas")
has been packing them in (check the crowd waiting for a seat on a
weekend night) with its unique approach to creative seafood offerings
and interesting Mexican specialties.

Fonda del Mar

$$

3749 W. Fullerton St. Chicago ,IL,60647
Phone: 773-489-3748
Cuisine: Mexican
Parking: No
Serving: Brunch & Dinner
It's all about style, and Fonda del Mar has a certain style that, in its casual
humbleness, is particularly appealing. The whole restaurant consists of
one medium-size room with an open kitchen on the right side.

Fonda del Mar is attracting quite a diverse clientele, a hot mix of people
that really makes the place a fun restaurant to be in.

Yes, the very attractive prices are a draw, and that word got around
rather quickly. We are onto something when you spend just $15 for the
whole fish, a quite impressive-in-size red snapper (huachinango a la
Veracruzana) that is so fresh-tasting you would imagine it still flopping
when it came through the back door. Serving snapper Veracruzana-style
(the fish is slathered with capers, olives, chiles, tomato) has been around
since the first Mexican restaurant showed up in Chicago. Fonda del
Mar's version has plenty of gusto, and for the price it's the best fish deal
in town.

About the chips and salsa. Outstanding. Two salsas and a basket of
chips hit the table with a gratis thud, and the munchies were on. The
salsas, one green (salsa verde), one a deep red (roasted chiles), are
incredibly good. Yes, there's guacamole, and though not the best, it is
decent. On the other hand, why waste calories on the guacamole when
you can do much better with the amazing selection of tacos, empanadas
and seafood cocktails?

Impressive among those was the tacos estilo Ensanada. In most of
Mexico, "estilo Ensanada" signifies one thing -- fish taco. This was one
terrific fish taco. There were two tacos to an order (price: $6), and they
were a composition of homemade tacos painted with an avocado mayo,
luscious chunks of sauteed tilapia, salsa and shreds of jicama. The real
kicker was the delicious accompaniment to the tacos, a small bowl of
guajillo chili sauce teeming with chunks and pieces of calamari and
octopus.
Pozole de camaron was nearly perfect. I loved the fire in the bowl, the
spicy guajillo chili broth part of the soup, also the "meaty" goodness of
the hominy. However, the shrimp in the bowl had become a bit rubbery.

Camarones (shrimp) -- those listed under the entrees -- came in four
different styles: a la plancha, a la diabla, al mojo de ajo, and xanath.
Respectively, that translates as: grilled and mild, sauteed and spicy,
sauteed with garlic, and sauteed with a vanilla sauce. That last one was a
unique and delicious method for serving shrimp: a smooth, creamy and
aromatic (from the vanilla) sauce adorned the shrimp in a way that is
typical of the style in which shrimp is served in Papantla (a region of
Totonaca, where some of the finest vanilla beans come from).

Camarones a la plancha were the complete opposite of camarones
xanath. Here the sauteed shrimp were arranged with chips of roasted red
bell pepper and strips of roasted poblano chiles. An avocado
mayonnaise sauce accompanied all of it. The idea is to slather some of
that on the warm tortillas and partner that with the shrimp.

But all is not seafood. One meat dish sampled, puerco en
manchamanteles, was nothing short of terrific. The roasted pork chop, a
thick one from the start it would seem, was sliced and arranged next to a
handsome portion of a light and delicious sweet potato puree (bordering
on mashed). That great-tasting pork was made all the more outstanding
by a mildly fruity red mole sauce, and this is where the word
"manchamanteles" comes in. In one fashion, manchamanteles means
spicy fruit sauce (there were pineapple chunks in the mole sauce).
Another definition reads "stew that stains the tablecloth." Whatever
translation you choose doesn't matter, but if you go to Fonda del Mar, you
should consider choosing this fine-tasting entree. I ate the whole thing.

Desserts. Flan? Maybe. Tres leches? Possibly. A sample of each. The
flan was flan (OK, the orange flan is quite good). Tres leches, which is
often referred to as "wedding cake," has merit, and here it was love at
first bite. Light and flavorful with an inch of snowcap cream atop
segments of orange and a gridwork of swirled caramel sauce was a
match made in dessert heaven. And, if cake is not your thing, then the
quite tasty creme brulee just might be.

Pat Bruno is a free-lance writer, critic and author.

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