La Enchiladita

we stopped  for breakfast  on a trip to the texas mile!
honset to goodness tex-mex home cooking! its worth the time to sit down a spell and enjoy

Excellent food. Friendly service and very clean. Best place in Nixon.

I don't know why I'm doing this.  One one hand I feel an odd sense of guilt and on the other hand a duty to my fellow man.  Guilt probably isn't right word to describe telling that little secret that you know will benefit others.  It's worth it, I guess.  

This place is the best Tex-Mex I have had in many years.  I grew up in Corpus Christi, Texas and think I know a few things about Tex-Mex: that wonderful comforting and peculiar food invention that exists from north of the border to about as far north as Denton (I'm being really generous, here).  

When we travel south to my hometown, we usually go the "back way" which is down 183, etc.  headed out of Austin.  It's a food lover's paradise really when you consider all of the choices for BBQ and other things on the route between Lockhart and the coast.  Those places are for other reviews and in fact, most of them have been covered very well, already.  

This is about pure homestyle Tex-Mex, the way I used to have it growing up in CC.  La Enchiladita (the little enchilada) blew me away when we were there on a recent Friday evening.  I had seen this place many times but never stopped as the timing was never right.  Friday night is Tex-Mex night and we happened to be driving through - the stars were aligned this night.  

The meal started with a basket of thick homemade chips with a huge plastic molcahete (sorry - my Nahuatl is really rusty) of a thin and spicy salsa fresca with a hint of vinegar and lot's of black pepper.  I use the words homemade but really I mean, they're made in-house by the "tortilla lady" as she's always described by the people who run these places.  Clearly, she's working overtime because we cleaned out the basket in like 5 minutes and it was refilled immediately.  AND all of the meals come with your choice of (hm) corn or flour tortillas.  You know, the thick dusty kind of flour tortillas with that perfect amount of saltiness, doughy goodness, and char?  KILLER!  This is probably what I miss the most about moving from south Texas.  That and the gulf of Mexico.  

Hardly anyone makes tortillas in Austin.  I know some places do, but NONE of them taste like back home.  

My wife and I both ordered #2 combination plate from the menu.  My kid, God bless him, ordered a cheeseburger.  I love that kid.  He even turned over the salsa bowl and the waitress cleaned it up instantly, smiling the whole time.  We felt terrible about this (for many reasons) but they had SUPER service with a smile.  The way it should be.  Old-school, if you will.  

The #2 was my usual favorite plate at any T-M establishment since it comes with a Puffy Taco, and Enchilada, rice and beans plus those tortillas that I've been bragging about.  The puffy taco was as good as either of the two best taco places in Austin (Angie's and Amaya's), the enchilada was also great and I was happy to see it stuffed with American cheese and surrounded by a thick chili-gravy.  Oh, and the refried beans tasted like bacon, the way I love them, especially for breakfast, but I digress.  OK, mouth watering now.  We had way too much food so we took some to go, paid, and over-tipped our waitress and complimented the owner on THE BEST Tex-Mex for quite possibly, 100 miles.

The food is excellent, cheap by Austin's standards, and the family who runs the place, super sweet and welcoming I felt right at home.  The only thing is that I would have liked a margarita which is another pleasure of mine.  It's probably better that they didn't serve since I still had over 100 miles to drive.  

If you are ever in Nixon, give it a shot.  You can have BBQ on the way back home, right?  

Get some!

NOTE: Yelp is placing this restaurant in "Edcouch, Texas" but this place is in Nixon on the corner of 80 and 87.