When you step through the doors of the Santa Ana Bakery and Panaderia, you leave Iowa. In Santa Ana, the food is delicious, the Jarritos cold, and the futbol exciting. It is a small one man shop, run by a man who immigrated to America with a few dollars in his pocket and a dream of running his own restaurant and bakery. Many pastries and other items are available in the front of the shop. The menu is painted on the wall, and specifies, «Whatever you want, ask in English.» I did, and what I received was a delicious steak burrito, filled with fresh avocado, perfectly cooked steak, and other delicious ingredients. The salsa-I should say salsas-are delicious. He brings out four different flavors-habanero, jalapeño, chipotle, and salsa verde. The Habanero salsa may be the best I have ever had. It packs a terrific wallop without overpowering its more subtle flavors. The restaurant has a sense of place and time that is immediately identifiable. More character than a James Mitchener novel. Santa Ana is the place to go if you’re looking for terrific food and service in an authentic, authentically good restaurant.
Jon T.
Évaluation du lieu : 4 Chesterfield, MO
Following a quick trip to a wedding in Muscatine, IA, we returned to St Louis and stopped in Columbus Junction to look for a Mexican restaurant where we had eaten nearly 20 years ago. That restaurant is apparently long gone, but we found Santa Ana Bakery instead. This was a happy eventuality! This is a very small Mom and Pop Mexican restaurant that we can highly recommend. The food is simply comida casera(home cookin’). I get the feel that they would fix whatever you like within reason. They have a huge menu listed on the wall, so I asked for the owner’s recommendations. I always like to ask in small places like this, knowing that they can’t possibly have everything always ready and fresh. I assume they will recommend what they feel is best that day. He offered fresh chicken mole and pork in a sauce. I don’t normally go for mole due to the sweetness, so I ordered guisado de puerco and Ms T ordered tacos de carne asada(sin cebolla, of course). My pork was simple, elegant and delicious. The sauce was dark in color, rich in flavor, with some tomatillo and a hint of oregano. The slices of pork were tender and smothered in the sauce. I sopped the sauce up with soft corn tortillas and when I finished there was really no need to wash the plate. Ms T frowns on my actually licking the plate in public, so I had to do the job with tortillas, which worked out pretty well. Ms T’s tacos de carne asada were served properly with plenty of meat on soft corn tortillas and cilantro. The meat was diced fairly fine, nicely seasoned and had a great flavor of the comal. We each had a frijoles pintos which were very basic frijoles de la olla, partly pureed and served thin in their broth. As simple as it gets, but good. I must mention the salsas served with the basket of totopos at the beginning. These were 100% delicious and homemade with the unique touch of la Señora in each. We debated asking to purchase some to take home, but due to warm weather and no cooler, decided not to risk it. One salsa was green, made from minced raw tomatillo with enough jalapeño to give it nice heat. The second was deep red with ground red chile and chipotle. It was rich and spicy with very fresh garlic. The third was almost orange in color, with nice heat, more garlic and delicious fresh chile flavor. All were good, all were nicely spicy. In addition the totopos were clearly fried from real tortillas, on the premises. This is four star food in a five star place. It is quaint, with a bar you can belly up to and enjoy your food on a stool or eat at one of three tables. I’m sure they offer carry-out. Don’t forget this is also a bakery and they had an assortment of cookies and pan dulce on display. The owner was friendly and helpful. He appreciated that we were not just there for some ground beef burritos. Now our challenge is to figure out an excuse to be there at lunch time so we can explore the menu more. I wished afterwards I had also ordered the mole to try. They are open seven days a week and serve breakfast! I’m thinking of moving closer. Just have to figure out how to convince Ms T.
