If you’ve ever driven to El Paso, you can feel the weird. Hours and hours from the next nearest city of any size, the “twin cities” of El Paso and Ciudad Juarez really do look like the spaceport Mos Eisley on Tatooine in Star Wars.
The sprawl emerges from the desert like an alien moon base, ten thousand lights twinkling in the dusty gloom. A few at first, then crest a rise on Interstate 10 and boom, the desert night dissolves and there it is: two adjoining cities home to nearly 3 million humans.
Interstate 10 is the electric spine of El Paso, the main thoroughfare for a city that sprawls 30-plus miles east to west, its tidy, walled exurbs looking exactly like their cousins in Scottsdale and Glendale, Arizona: The Phoenix-ification of El Paso.
The air can take on that crystalline character only a desert can wear without being gauche, but when the winds roar out of the northwest, they kick up dust storms so thick that everyone’s cellphone blinks a warning to stay inside.
Few do. Because life goes on in El Chuco, er, Mos Eisley, er, El Paso, and ya gotta drive to wherever it is you’re going.
Traffic and the Janus-like double nature of the people of these cities are my strongest takeaways from El Paso. Oh, and the burritos.
It is said that Juarez invented the burrito, and those bundles of goodness held closely in a flour tortilla hug are truly the best thing you can eat there. Far smaller and lighter than their California, mission-style cousins — think of those Chipotle burritos as big as your head — a Juarez/El Paso style burrito feels only slightly heavier than a single taco.
They’re typically just folded over, not tucked tight like other burritos, which makes them difficult to eat in a moving car, unless you tuck it yourself. The reason for this is because in most places, the burrito is minimalist — just meat, refried beans, maybe cheese — so you can add salsa, radishes, cabbage, etc., as you wish.
Curiously, the montada, a sort of quesadilla-meets-burrito so popular in the city of Chihuahua, only four hours south of El Paso, is almost unknown here. The closest I got was a thing sorta like it called a gringa at a place called El Cometa.
Tortillas in El Paso are Texas/New Mexico style flour, which is to say thicker and doughier than the delicate and translucent Sonora-style flour tortillas. Corn tortillas, as a rule, are cheap, mass-produced things here, although there are a few exceptions, such as the trendy Elemi, which recently moved from downtown El Paso to, of all things, an old fast food, tilt-up building in the eastern exurbs.
In a week of eating in the city, I generally found that the humbler, hole-in-the-wall places had more satisying food than those places that struck a pose. Elemi was expensive and, well, meh, except for the chocolate tamal I had for dessert, which was amazing.
Billed as the best sushi in town (I know, I know, I was in El Paso, what was I thinking?), Sushiitto was dreadful despite (because of?) its slick, hipster vive. Stinky mackerel, dry, overcooked gyoza, nigiri rice that fell to pieces upon being touched. Gak. It ought to be pronounced sue-shit-oh.
Taconeta, on the other hand, was a hip place that lived up to its billing. Great tacos, although what they call Mexico City-style suadero is actually just brisket in Texas. Don’t get me wrong: It’s every bit as good, just different. And I had a marvelous local beer there called Maiz Azul from Aurellia’s. Yep, made from nixtamalized blue corn, it’s a big lager packed with flavor. I had two.
Contrast the vibe there with Lucy’s Coffee Shop, the original of the Lucy’s mini-empire in El Paso. You can’t get any more humble, old school, greasy spoon, than Lucy’s. It was exactly like the White Diamond and other chrome-walled diners I grew up with in Westfield, New Jersey — only with Mexican food.
Their signature is a machaca burrito with queso con chile. And it’s completely not what I expected. As a guy who thinks Sonora when I think of these things, Lucy’s burrito is not in a thin flour tortilla, the machaca was not pounded, shredded, rehydrated carne seca (which is the definition of machaca as I know it), and the queso was, well, Texas queso, not Mexican-style melted cheese. At least the chiles were green and roasted, as they would be in Sonora.
They explained that they used to use real machaca, but people thought it was too dry, so they now use braised, shredded brisket — I’ve seen this called machaca elsewhere, too (notably Adalberto’s in California), so it is a thing.
What I got was a poofy flour tortilla, a smear of refried pintos, the wet, tender machaca, and a healthy pour of the green chile-studded queso, which, probably, was Velveeta. It was good, and, weirdly, paired well with black coffee.
More notable were the conversations at Lucy’s, which were emblematic of speech everywhere in El Paso. Everyone, and I mean everyone, even old, fat, pale, white dudes wearing pressed chinos and a severe blond-gray buzz cut, shifted effortlessly between English and Spanish — often in mid sentence.
I found myself sliding into this, too, and my level of Spanish is perfect for El Paso. The whole week, I’d say things like, “Just a regular coffee with room for leche y azucar, porfa” or “Que padre! I love esa chela!”
One night I decided to eat steak, something I almost never do. Within walking distance of my hotel is a well regarded place called the West Texas Chophouse. I knew I wanted a ribeye, but looking at the menu, I was pleasantly surprised, if not shocked: It was almost identical to the steakhouses in Hermosillo, Sonora.
Chicharron de ribeye (deep-fried chunks of ribeye served with tortillas and guacamole), which are a Mexican cousin to South Dakota chislic, queso fundido, and a real rarity, crab-stuffed chiles güeros called tortitos, which are super Sonoran! (A chile güero is basically the light green Hungarian wax pepper we see in markets.)
But I settled on a cream of poblano soup. This is a thing all over Mexico; I had a great one in the city of Chihuahua. Gotta say, the West Texas Chophouse makes a mean cream of poblano soup! Was smooth, just enough heat, smoky, and richly creamy. One of my best bites in the whole week.
The steak itself was nicely cooked, and served with an ancho sauce very similar to the one I serve with elk tenderloin.
While I was eating, I overheard some good ole’ boys behind me ribbing a colleague who spoke Spanish with a thick Texas accent. They were mimicking it hilariously. But here’s the thing: All of them spoke English with a Texas twang, but their Spanish was level and unaccented. I’ve seen this all over the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, too. Fascinating.
Like many border towns, El Paso lies in a limnal space between worlds. Not quite Mexican, not quite what you’d expect in the USA. You could, if you wanted, eat only Mexican food, or just food from US chains; inexplicably, Chipotle is popular there. All the sameness of Everywhere, USA exists in El Paso, but so do places like Lucy’s and the Flores Meat Market, where I ate the signature dish of Juarez, colitas de pavo.
Turkey tails, braised tender, chopped, seared and served either in a stew, in a burrito, or tacos or tortas, which are to Mexico what a bahn mi is to Vietnam. Their story is emblematic of this dual existence.
Forty years ago, the US turkey industry needed a home for the tails; few people in the states eat them. So some enterprising cook from Juarez decided to buy a bunch, then performed that Mexican magic of turning trash into gold. Now they are the thing to eat if you want to get a unique flavor in Juarez or El Paso.
What do colitas de pavo taste like? Crispy, fatty, meaty. Chopped in a burrito, there is absolutely nothing off-putting about them. And I’ll be honest: I was nervous at first, but they’re so amazing I ate three on my trip.
And they would never be a thing without the synergistic relationship between the US and Mexico, which is now our top trading partner — take that, China!
On my final full day in El Paso, I walked around the Chamisal National Memorial. It was a surreal experience. The park, which is separated from Mexico only by a highway and a fence, was the El Paso experience in plant form: lawns, grass, oaks… and mesquite, yucca and cactus. Walking on freshly watered and mowed grass in El Paso felt at once homey, like I was a child in New Jersey again, and eerie. There shouldn’t be grass in the desert of El Paso.
Chamisal was an odd Mexican island completely surrounded by El Paso until 1963, when President Johnson, a Texan, and Mexican President Adolfo Lopez Mateos settled the long-running territorial dispute. Peacefully, I might add.
It was eerily quiet, just grackles and white-winged doves and ground squirrels chittering about. A man stepped out of the central memorial building. He was wearing a t-shirt with “North Dakota” on it. I happened to be wearing my University of North Dakota cap. I said hi, and asked him where he got the shirt.
His English was poor, so I switched to Spanish. His name was Mario, and he lived in Juarez, crossing each morning. He was part of a construction crew working on the memorial. Mario had no idea what Dakota was; he’d just bought the shirt at a mercado. So I told him about the state — muy frio y ventoso — and why I was there, and, in Spanglish, he told me about the food he loved in Juarez. He’s a fan of colitas de pavo, too.
We shook hands and parted friends. Nothing could have been more apt, more border, more perfect, than that conversation in that place. Salud, Mario.
Curious, Hank… do you feel a middle aged woman would be safe traveling through this region? I speak some Spanish, understand more, but have been told tha the border towns are not particularly safe…..the food sounds spectacular, and at some point I’d like to go!
Great essay, really transports you there, and no starship or jump drive required, thanks Hank.