Nachoquest: El Salto

A few dozen hours ago or so (this past Saturday) some friends and associates of mine collectively decided that we wanted to eat at a cheap Mexican restaurant that wasn’t like “Chevy’s Fancy” and certainly not “Blue Agave Overpriced” but rather “Cheap and Cheap,” and Brooklyn PARK (sorry Neal)’s El Salto (5513 Ritchie Highway) location was the answer. And so the journey began down Governor Ritchie Highway, where our dreams of $6 enchilada platters awaited us.

And so we ordered our $6 enchilada platters, some Texas Margaritas ($7 with a shot of *awful* tequila, mmmmmm) and the signature nachos of El Salto, Nachos El Salto ($7.95).

These nachos, while tasty, are utterly bizarre in every way. I don’t know how else to say it. It’s a puddle of queso sauce, a thin layer of chips, and a big ol’ pile of fajita meats with onions and peppers on top. Throw away literally everything you’ve ever thought about how a proper plate of nachos should be assembled and you’ve got Nachos El Salto. They’re good, they’re bad, they’re weird.

The good: Everything tasted pretty good. Good seasoning, hot toppings and cheesy queso. Can’t complain about that!

The bad: The chips here are totally unusable, they’ve basically become engorged with queso sauce and fajita drippings to the point that a single touch-grab-lift by human fingers would result in disaster. In fact, for a period of time we ate the toppings with forks, which is essentially a capital crime in the world of nacho consumption.

The MacGyver: Since El Salto is a cheap Mexican restaurant, they adhere to Cheap Mexican Restaurant Guidelines and Standards and present the table with a big bowl of chips n’ salsa, meaning the chips left over from the chips n’ salsa are *highly* usable for scooping up the fajita toppings on the plate of Nachos El Salto. This actually made them great, however still an egregious violation of Nacho Presentation and Consumption Guidelines and Standards. Shameful shit, but you do what you gotta do.

At the end of the day, these nachos are tasty, but they aren’t really nachos. They’re cheap and perfect for sharing, but they aren’t really nachos. Therefore, they receive no golden nachos out of five, and instead one golden donkey for effort. Kudos (?) to you, “Nachos” El Salto.