Critics for past ¿Qué Pasa, OSU? food reviews have featured Latin@/ Hispanic venues where students could find the seasonings and flavors that remind them of home. While continuing this great tradition of featuring Latin@ viewpoints, we take this food review and expand our palate by drawing from the opinion of a non-Latin@, Columbus native (who refers to himself as “El Gringo”) along with a more traditional opinion, that of a Mexican student.
Located on the corner of Summit and Chittenden, east of the Gateway on south campus, Bohemio’s Mexican Restaurant may be the new flavor of Mexican food in the area by making dishes that are not served in many other food venues. At first glance the establishment may not look like much with no other flashy stores or highly visited shops next to it, but this six-month-old establishment has the potential to draw in customers, especially students.
Upon entering Bohemio’s for lunch, El Gringo was surprised at the lack of clientele; after all, it was lunchtime! No matter, the atmosphere did conjure up the look and feel of a typical Mexican restaurant complete with tile-topped tables, brightly colored walls, and Spanish-language music videos playing on multiple televisions. As inconceivably wonderful as this ambiance was, El Gringo was here for the food.
Angeles Marín, owner of Bohemio’s, gave the restaurant its name to describe the type of environment she wanted to create; a place where one can find a relaxed atmosphere with varying lunch specials every day of the week, candle lit dinners for a more romantic atmosphere after the sun goes down, and the strums of a guitar with a live, three member band on Fridays.
While our student happily nodded in agreement with the offer of sweet, strong vanilla and cinnamon flavor of the home-mixed agua de horchata (rice water); El Gringo started lunch with a glass of Jamaica, not the island. This is listed as “agua fresca” or fresh water. It was really more like tea, made from something reminiscent of hibiscus blossoms. El Gringo enjoyed this drink even though he usually prefers something not so sweet, like cerveza (beer). The first food items to arrive were the tacos mexicanos. There were four of them, each only $1.50: pollo (chicken), carnitas (pork), asada (beef), and al pastor (more pork, different than the carnitas). These are not your typical tacos with a bunch of cheese and ground mystery meat. They were tacos with properly seasoned meat served upon two small soft tortillas. El Gringo must say that he especially enjoyed the taco al pastor. It consisted of delicious, chili pepper-flavored pork and small chunks of pineapple; the whole thing tender and well-seasoned with onion and cilantro. This was the first taco al pastor for El Gringo, but hopefully not the last. Yummo! A word of caution: the green chile sauce that accompanies the tacos is very good, but don’t just pour it all over before you taste it; it has a bit of a kick!
El Gringo also sampled the carne asada (roasted meat) ($10.50). This is steak which has been made very thin, probably by pounding, served with beans, rice and tortillas. The meat had a good flavor and was not overly seasoned. A few slices of this meat and some of the outstanding pico de gallo (tomato, onion, cilantro, and lime) that accompanied it, all wrapped up in a tortilla made El Gringo quite happy. The pico de gallo was outstanding. There, I said it twice. All the food ingredients seemed to be the freshest available which goes a long way to making a tasty meal. The only slight complaint is the tortillas. They were a little dry. Of course, El Gringo removed the tortillas from the foil and did not rewrap them, so who knows…
The prices at Bohemio’s are well within reach of most budgets: $8.50 – $10.50 for dinner; $5.95 – $7.50 for lunch; and, incredibly, daily lunch specials for $4.50. So check it out. |
