After sitting at the San Marino restaurant in Progreso waiting on a clueless waiter, the Critic took his guests to Eladios, and the group was not disappointed!
Abundant botana is served with each round of drinks including papadzules, little polcanes and kibis (photos) and one of the better dishes ordered was the shrimp al ajillo (photo), which is garlic and guajillo chile; a little spicy and a lot tasty!
That last photo is of a little girl who was swimming in Eladio’s little pool – the water was really quite disgusting – next to the restaurant, and kept asking the Critic and Better Half to count up to three so she could jump in the water.
Great food and even better service! Highly recommended.
I was surprised to see you review Eladio’s so favorably. Though there are few better vantage points from which to enjoy the beach and the pier, and though they are (maybe) better than the other cookie-cutter restaurants on the malecon, the food is still not something I would recommend. Go for the people-watching, sure, the massage table song-and-dance on cruise ship days, definitely, the botanas, maybe…but the food? Really?
Well we HAD been dealing with a truly brain dead waiter at San Marino, where the botana was a plate of chopped, really cheap weiners and some rock hard kibis. So the friendly, fast waiter, much better botana and an excellent boquinete frito seemed pretty darn good! What’s your Progreso fave, Malcolm?
Hmmmm…”Progreso fave” may be a contradiction in terms. 🙂
I think you can skip anyplace on the malecon, sadly. For lunch, I like “El Gallito,” though their menu gets boring pretty quickly. If you get lucky, “Los Compadres” is sometimes open for lunch, and serves some nasty (and I mean that in the best possible way) tacos.
For dinner, I like “La Pinata,” which skews Northern-style in its offerings, though lately, the area seems to be baking in sewage smell, which makes it hard to enjoy your frijoles charros. And when we want to get away from Mexican, “Elio al Mare” serves some of the best Italian I have had in Mexico, in spite of service fluctuations based on the owner’s mood.
Thank you! I have heard of this Elio… where is it? Love to try it! The others don’t sound that appealing though 🙂