Mexican restaurants have an undeserved reputation for being filthy dumps. Same as Chinese restaurants. What do they say? "If you saw their kitchen, you would never eat there." I think this is true for any kind of restaurant.

Jose’s has a different kind of problem. It may be too clean. How can that be you ask? There was a time when Jose, himself, would clean each booth thoroughly after patrons departed. I’m talking a broom job to sweep up the spilt chips and a Windex job on the table top to remove every speck of grease left by departing slobs. It was impressive. I don’t see this sterilization process much these days. Maybe its cause Jose’s now has two location and has to split his time between them. Anyway, Jose’s is clean, superclean. Not that clean, necessarily, equates to great food. But, its comforting.

Sitting on the edge of the Kaimuki restaurant scene, on Koko Head Avenue, Jose’s has been around for awhile. It’s been pumping Tecate for a long time. The restaurant is nicely chilled, reasonably dark and the service is pretty good. Some of the fake-leather booths are a little too squishy and too tight on space. You really get close to your food. Maybe this is Jose shortening the distance between the plate and your mouth to prevent stuff from falling on the floor. I like it because it’s more efficient. You can eat faster. There’s a bar on the mauka wall that cranks out mucho pitchers of margaritas. And a blazing wall-mounted TV set that’s showing the game-of-the-day.

The ram goes here for his Mexican comfort food. This usually means a two taco, ground beef, dinner and a couple of Dos Equis. Jose’s serves an array of different stuff including a healthy fish taco and some smallish salads. They serve a decent fajita and a nice enchilada.

For a clean, not so well-lighted Mexican dinner or snack, Jose’s is the place.

El Burrito

El Burrito is a very small restaurant on Piikoi Street next to a pawn shop. Parking can be a challenge as you compete against the Side Street Inn crowd for street parking. The place was won all kinds of awards though hardly anyone ever heard of it. I’m told that most Mexican restaurants in Hawaii use the microwave as their main cooking implement. At El Burrito you can see them cooking the food. So don’t expect tamales with a frozen center.

You go in and there are six or seven tables in a very clean small space. The help is friendly and the service is reasonably swift. The chips comes first at most Mexican restaurants and its a nice lead-in to your main meal. El Burrito fries its tortilla chips and you can tell that immediately, tho the basket doesn’t last very long.

The ram comes to El Burrito for one thing and one thing only: Lamb Chimichangas. What’s a chimichanga? It’s a large burrito that’s been deep fried. The lamb meat is shredded and very tasty. Its not a paste or ground-up. The portions are massive. When you do, finally, finish up and trudge out, you vow never to indulge in this kinda food again. Next day, you’re ready for another round. No liquor license here, so you gotta bring your own Coronas.