El Quetzal

So I wandered around for far too long on Buford Highway, trying to decide where to have lunch yesterday.
I swung by the Havana Club, but they were still renovating (the very nice owner gave me a signed card for a small discount when they open), almost went into Phở Dai Loi, then decided I wasn’t so much in the mood. And here this little Guatemalan place was, which made me curious.
The very sweet waitress and I had communication issues a bit, the place was a like a darker paneled Mexican joint and a Spanish soap opera was playing loudly. I suddenly had very low hopes, but felt too guilty to just split… I was the only one in there. The stale chips and barely more than tomato sauce salsa didn’t encourage — I dumped a big dose of hot sauce into it to get any tang whatsoever.
I finally settled on a pastor plate, which I’m not sure was especially Guatemalan, and expected little. It actually turned out to be decently tasty, with the just-​short-​of-​crumbly corn tortillas that I like, and well-​cooked meats and assortment of toppings to go with it. There was bacon mixed in with it, which surprised me — I love bacon, but seemed like a short-​cut to any sort of distinctive flavor of its own.
So I felt pretty uplifted that things tasted better than I expected, but in retrospect, I was extremely hungry by that point and the whole platter came with this cube of what I thought was bland cheese, but might have been a cube of LARD. Agh.
I debated whether to post this, since my reviews can MAKE OR BREAK a restaurant, and they seemed so pleasant. But I am bidden by the signal from the heavens to speak the truth to power… eh.

Stopped by real quick w/​Buddha-​san while waiting for C to go eat at Phở Dai Loi.
We ordered a trio of tacos. All were okay — could’ve used a little more seasoning and bolder flavors. At $ 5.95 for 3 tacos, it’s not that bad. Can’t say much for the other dishes because we didn’t try them.

A Guatemalan place in the Little Saigon strip mall on Buford Hwy. I’ve never had Guatemalan before, so it’s tough to judge — but not bad overall. ~$ 12 will get you dinner, soda and enough for a tip.
Since this was a 1^st for all 3 of us in our party, we had our waitress pick our dishes: 2 out of 3 were pretty good! Sorry, but I couldn’t remember what we had if I tried (no habla Espanol).
Their pico de gallo is fantastic!