Three Great Mexican Restaurants Reviewed in Phoenix, Arizona
The Original Carolina’s Mexican Food first opened its doors in 1968 on Hilton Avenue. Founder Carolina Valenzuela move it to 1202 E. Mohave in 1986. The building shares a grocery store and a coin-operated laundry.
While it is not in the best neighborhood in Phoenix, it still draws people from all over the city. The exterior of the brick building has holes from bullets and their windows are secured with heavy metal bars. However, the parking lot is full of BMW’s and Mercedes-Benzes.
Inside The Original Carolina’s Mexican Food is a mish-mash of furniture with booths that look like they came from Subway to tables with attached stools that look like they came from McDonalds. Their walls are decorated with awards from the “Best of Phoenix” and “Az Best” marking the passing years.
They are most famous for their amazing flour tortillas. They have a delicate chewy texture that is tin. It is fun watch the cooks prepare the tortillas on their hot griddles. They are packaged by the dozen for people to purchase and take home. It is no wonder this unique restaurant has almost three thousand reviews online giving them a four and one-half-star rating.
Asi es la Vida first opened their doors in 1992. They are located at 3602 N. 24th Street in Phoenix, Arizona. It got its humble beginnings when Moises Treves learned how to cook traditional Mexican food in southern Mexico in the 1970’s. His station wagon was his kitchen where he served his clients. One day, he was telling one of his best customers his story, so she gave him five hundred dollars to help open his own business.
Irving Rodriguez took over Asi es la Vida in 2007 and runs it to this day with his sister and brother. Irving was raised in Mexico where he learned how to cook Mexican food from his Grandpa. When he grew up, he thought he would get into the corporate world in American when he finished his degree. However, the financial crisis hit, and he had to re-think his future. At the time, his father wanted to either sell or close his restaurant to Irving took a leap of faith and took it over.
Today, this popular restaurant gets a four-point three-star review on the internet with over three hundred positive posts. When looking for Asi es la Vida, you cannot miss the fuscia-magenta color on the outside of the building.
Located in a registered Historical Place is Centrico. While the food is awesome, the atmosphere brings clientele in again and again.
The Hotel San Carlos sits on a property that had the first school in Phoenix. It was a small four room adobe building that opened in 1874 then replaced with a bigger building in 1879. There were several add-ons’ through the years, but the building was eventually condemned in 1916.
The Babbitt family purchased the land in 1919 with the idea of building a luxury hotel. They started building the property in 1927 and opened their doors in 1828.
Today, the hotel caters to tourists and locals alike. Employees say they have seen ghosts which caused the Travel Channel to feature the hotel on their show World Travels. Centrico has a four-point seven rating on the world wide web.