Adobo Grill -Revisit

Hubby and I are such good parents, that we took our kids to see Taylor Swift recently when she was here in Indy. We both love music and wanted the kids to have concert experiences with bands they like, so Taylor Swift it was. Stupidly, we thought, “oh we’ll just run into Scotty’s and grab something to eat beforehand.” Like the other 10,000 parents of tweens apparently. So we ran across the street to Adobo and grabbed one of their last tables. Also with a roomful of parents and kids. There was a lot of glitter people. Everywhere.

However, I saw this as a golden opportunity to update my posts on Adobo. I just looked. I haven’t written about this place since 2009. Wowza. 6 years. Also, I just looked and I said I might never go back in that post, so I guess they have Taylor Swift to thank for getting me back there.

We started with the tableside guacamole ($8.99), because my entire family loves guacamole. My daughter strangely claims to not like avocado, but loves guacamole. Makes perfect sense right? Well, she’s 12, so yeah. Anyhow, they bring over the guacamole cart and mix it to order in front of you—if you like it spicier, they add more jalapeno, etc. Their guacamole is excellent. And I am choosy about it. They use all the same things I do and enough fresh lime to give it an excellent fresh kick. The guacamole alone may be enough to get me back in there for drinks and chips. Speaking of, their chips are pretty good too. Nothing super amazing but not the crappy thick chips that taste like they just came out of a cheap bag.

I ordered the tuna ceviche ($11.99). This was a mistake. I keep being hopeful of getting really yummy ceviche here and other places, and I keep on being disappointed. These were little dices of ahi tuna that I think were nice quality, but honestly they were cut so small they were a bit overwhelmed by the other stuff in there—there were peppers mixed in with the tuna and there was a nice amount of diced avocado on the bottom. And pickled onions on top. At first glance, you’d think it would be my perfect dish—lots of things I love all stacked up on top of each other. But there was also this sauce on it, they called it chipotle ginger sauce—but it was super sweet. I love ginger and am also a fan of chipotle, by thus must have been a simple syrup made of these things or something. Even with some squeezes of lime wedges I asked for, it couldn’t shake the almost syrupy sweetness.

My daughter ordered an appetizer, the Tlayuda ($10.99), which is basically a fancy Mexican pizza. And it was delicious. It was a crisp whole-wheat tortilla topped with black beans, chicken, red onion, cheese, sour cream and pico de gallo.(It is also normally supposed to come with spinach and avocado but she asked for it without.) Regardless, it was really good as it was—the chicken and black beans both nicely seasoned and it was topped with just the right amount of gooeyness. I would have enjoyed the spinach and avocado, but we just added a little guac. It stuck with me enough that I made a version of it at home for dinner the next week. Not overly difficult, but really good. It was big enough too that we all pretty much ended up eating off of it. Honestly some guac and this would be the meal I would want at Adobo.

Hubby had one of their casseroles, or “las cazuelas.” He chose the Cazuela de carnitas ($9.99). It’s an earthenware casserole dish filled with carnitas (pork shoulder here), black beans, salsa and cheese. The flavor was good, but the dish was sort of on the runny side, making it difficult to roll into the warm tortillas they served with it. Instead, hubby went with chips. It came across as more of a dip rather than a casserole based on its consistency. Not a bad taste, but nothing earth shattering here. I think hubby preferred the tlayuda as well. Actually all of us enjoyed that the most.

My son, who was a little cranky and not in the mood for Mexican that night, ordered chicken fingers off the kid’s menu. Normally I would barely mention this, but they were actually quite good for kid’s fried chicken strips—they appeared that they actually might be making them in house. Not the usual exact same ones you can get anywhere from Steak n Shake to Ruth’s Chris.

All in all it worked out and we had a good meal and I got a new post to write. And I found a couple of things I enjoyed. And I learned to stop ordering their ceviche. Taylor Swift put on a good show and the kids were thrilled.

Ceviche though…where to get it Indy?

Adobo Grill

110 East Washington Street

Indy 

317/822-9990

www.adobogrill.com