Title: Taqueria La Palma
Author: jean komatsu
Last saved by: Owner

Taqueria La Palma			CLOSED
4171 MacArthur Blvd., Oakland, CA
No website. Yelp reviews: http://www.yelp.com/biz/taqueria-la-palma-oakland 
Review date: November 2012

The previous restaurant in this location, Trattoria Laurellino's, closed down recently as a victim of the recession. People in the Laurel are extremely price-sensitive, so I guess it's remarkable we have any restaurants at all on our stretch of MacArthur beyond Quarter-pound Burgers and Kasper Hot Dogs. 

The people running La Palma are part of the family who run Taqueria Sinaloa, one of the more well-regarded taco trucks in the International District. This is their first restaurant. Unfortunately, that truck experience doesn't translate into 'sit-down restaurant' very well.  A couple of cooks rattle around in the not-very-large but larger-than-a-truck kitchen, and one person handles the front: take-out orders, sit-down customers, busing the tables, handling the cash register. 

They're all very nice, but experienced? Fast? Professional?

Nope. Not even close.

They try, but it's obvious they have absolutely no training in how to be efficient. Instead of pitchers of ice water standing ready to bring around and pour into glasses, they clumsily carry glasses over to a refrigerated water cooler, depress the lever for each glass of water to slowly fill it, then carry them two at a time over to various tables. More than two glasses requires multiple trips at both ends. 

Trays are clearly unheard of. Flatware is rolled up in paper napkins, but piled in a plastic bin near the cash register. They seem to be confused about whether this is a cafeteria or a restaurant, since they don't pre-set the tables. So it requires yet another trip by the waitstaff to bring people the flatware upon request, after diners receive their plates but don't have anything to eat with. 

Ummm....how about a sign or two? Couldn't hurt things, and it just might help.

With such reasonable prices, running it cafeteria-style is not necessarily a bad idea. But they need to make this clear to customers, and they don't. Laurellino's was full-service, so everyone is coming in – including us – thinking it's the same setup. But instead it's an awkward, uncertain meld, that has turned a number of Yelp and Laurel listserv reviewers off. This is a shame, because the heart of what they do is pretty good. The devil, however, is in the details, and the owners have yet to work out all the kinks.

We got the salsa and chips. The chips were reasonably fresh, the salsa a simple salsa verde. Both seemed right out of their plastic bag/glass jar from Mi Pueblo Supermarket, a mile or so down nearby High Street. There's nothing wrong with this, but it's perfunctory. Even the really awful Talavera taqueria in Albany, which we reviewed Sept. 2012, offers a choice of three salsas, two of them quite good. This offering was blandly commercial, with the salsa verde only a "mild" chile level.

The burritos are the typical Cal-Mex humonguous logs, more quantity than quality with too much rice. Still, the meat is pretty good. Inez got the grilled chicken, pollo asado, which she is fond of. It was too big for her to finish, so she ate some and then we had it packed up to take home with us. Carlos finished it off the next day and pronounced it ‘just okay.’

The young waiter was hesitant – I'm probably safe in assuming this is his first real restaurant job – but remembered to mention that they had lengua tonight as a special. He described it unattractively as "cow tongue" but usually it's referred to as beef tongue. Carlos and I happen to love tongue. Properly made it's one of the tastiest, most delicious beef parts of all, like well-done roast beef but with a tender texture.

I had been tempted to get the nachos, but decided I couldn't pass up the chance for some lengua. We don't see it often, not being frequenters of taco trucks or the many Mexican restaurants in the International District. So I chose a lengua super quesadilla, with a side of guacamole. Getting the super adds sour cream, lettuce, and tomatoes.

Carlos started off by asking if the fish taco was grilled or battered. Receiving assurance from the waiter it was battered, he asked if he could get it in a quesadilla. The answer being yes, he ordered two quesadillas: a carnitas corn quesadilla and a fish super flour quesadilla. 

This proved too much for the young waiter, although he tried to write it down. For whatever reason, when Carlos' plates came, he ended up with no fish and a reversed order. He was given a shrimp corn quesadilla and a carnitas super flour. Thankfully they had left off the sour cream as per his request. 

Both of us were disappointed that there were no tomatoes or salsa with the super quesadillas; just meat and cheese. The quesadillas were good-sized, the corn in the style of a sandwich: two tortillas with the filling sandwiched in-between. The "salad" consisted of sliced radishes, tart pickled raw carrot slices, pickled jalapenos, and shredded iceberg lettuce. 

The guacamole was fairly tasteless as the avocados don't have much flavor right now. It was extended with some fresh diced tomato but no onion or chile. But they'd neglected to salt it, so it wasn't much use except for lightening up the rather stolid quesadillas.

On the good side, the carnitas was tender and juicy. And we both liked the lengua, Carlos more than I did. I'm fussy about removing all the cartilage from the underside. There's a fair amount of waste on tongue, unfortunately, which adds to its now-high price. Also, they had salted it, which really wasn't necessary. Tongue is high in sodium (all offal cuts are) and it doesn't need much salt. La Palma had cooked it until tender – like corned beef, you simmer it for hours – and chopped it into small cubes. With the lettuce and dollops of guacamole (along with sour cream, in my case), it made a decent quesadilla. I could nitpick and say the lengua could have been cooked further to the 'meltingly soft' stage, but that's pretty much true of everybody's tongue but mine (it takes a really, really long time to cook!). We also used up the remainder of the salsa verde on the quesadillas, to liven them up a bit further. Carlos was happy to munch on everybody's pickled jalapenos, as he likes them.

We asked about dessert. At first the waiter said they didn't have any. Then he hemmed and hawed a little, finally asking tentatively, "Well....if you're willing, my mom has made a cake, if you want a slice?"

We said we did, and he brought out two slices. One was a one-layer chocolate cake with a sweet Betty Crocker-like frosting. The cake itself was hardly sweet at all, and very light. With a better frosting, like a ganache, it would have been terrific. The other was a winner without anything at all – a very moist, Bundt-style yam cake. Again, hardly sweetened, and more interestingly spiced than the chocolate cake. 

I told the waiter they should keep the yam cake on the menu. And yes, we had to ask for forks for the cake. Again.

The two slices of cake, BTW, were only $1.95 for both. Either we were undercharged, or they were giving them away as a marketing ploy. Either way, the mother ought to seriously consider opening a bakery/patisserie, because she's better than 80% of the commercial bakers right now.

The prices at La Palma are rock-bottom. I'm honestly surprised they can make their rent, the prices are so low. The three of us received enough food for four people, even when one of them is Carlos, LOL.

Was it good enough to come back for? Well....maybe. If we don't want to go as far as La Calaca ("far" being relative; LCL is only 5 miles from our house and a super-fast drive on the freeway). La Palma is basic and simple and would probably suffice. Throw in a guarantee of that yam cake with some half-way decent coffee, and I would absolutely return. 

But they need to learn how to run a restaurant. They could make things so much easier on themselves, with only a few changes. Hopefully, they'll get there. La Palma is trying hard and means well, and it would be nice to see them succeed in these tough times.

Three people, dinner: one burrito, three quesadillas, one side, one beverage, two desserts, with tip was an almost embarrassingly modest $32.