Mixed feelings

Dad and I were in downtown San Rafael at lunch time the other day, and decided to try out Taqueria el Farolito, the newish place that replaced Taqueria Maria. It is bright, clean and has an expansive menu.

The Pineapple Agua Fresca was very refreshing!

And there was a clean and inviting salsa bar with great choices to accompany your chips.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Chile Relleno Burrito. The addition of of the mild green chili added a little extra dimension to the dish, the other ingredients were top quality and it all melded into a pleasing whole.

Here's where it got sticky. My father is 88 years old, and has difficulty eating things that have a large circumference, are easy to spill, or can't be cut easily. Given that the available utensils appeared to be rather flimsy plastic, I thought a quesadilla may be just the thing. Thin with just a layer of cheese and some ingredient inside. I saw on the overhead sign, and repeated on the printed menu, a ham and cheese quesadilla. So as I requested one, the woman taking the order said 'oh, we don't have those', and took her pen and scribbled out the menu item on the laminated menu taped to the counter, and said 'we only have these', indicating the super type. So I ordered one of those, and hoped for the best. I'm sure it tasted good, but it was very sloppy, hard to cut and my Dad got very cranky trying to eat it. When we were almost finished, someone behind the counter turned some music on at ear splitting volume, which increased my father's discomfort, even when turning his hearing aids completely off. All I wanted to do was escape. The menu item incident, Dad's reaction and the painful music left me with a less than satisfactory experience. There were positives here, I very much enjoyed the burrito and I saw some awesome looking bowls of posole that the other two customers in the restaurant at that time were enjoying.

Restaurant Inspection Results
Critical: 0
Noncritical: 0
Last inspected: 3/2/2009

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