Cheap Eats
By Carol Schmidt
October 24, 2008 San Miguel de Allende

Happy chicken born in SMA

To my knowledge, the only chain restaurant to originate in San Miguel, Pollo Feliz at the El Pípila glorieta across from Mega, often has a hundred Mexican diners and maybe one table of expats chomping on its signature rotisserie chicken.

On Sundays and holidays the restaurant, as spacious inside as a big-city high-school cafeteria, which it somewhat resembles, usually has dozens more lined up outside, chairs and shade provided for the hungry families while they wait. Expats who decry the very concept of a chain restaurant and scorn fast food of any kind don’t know what they’re missing. Their Mexican neighbors do. Busloads come in from church groups outside of town. Talk about a destination restaurant.

Started by Carlos Arias, from of one of the founding families of San Miguel de Allende, Pollo Feliz has two takeout-only restaurants in SMA, on Calzada de Guadalupe across from the San Juan de Dios market, and on Salida a Querétaro almost to La Luciérnaga mall. Numerous outlets are elsewhere in Mexico.

The flagship restaurant raised controversy when it vacated its original location for the Mega construction and moved into a much larger building across the libramiento. There are those who still want the restaurant to tone down its bright red, just as Mega redid its trademark brilliant orange façade for a softer color to soothe SMA critics. Often young people in chicken costumes dance around the glorieta to attract customers. Everybody knows where Pollo Feliz is.

But too few expats have eaten there. It’s another secret, now exposed. For 60 pesos you get half of a large, juicy rotisserie chicken with scrumptious seasonings and tasty charring, plus trips to the salad bar that has unlimited tortilla chips, roasted tomato salsa, grilled and pickled jalapeños, iceberg lettuce, grated carrots, sliced red onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, and Thousand Island dressing. The salsa makes a great alternative to the salad dressing. Watch a dozen tortilla makers at work keeping up with the crowds through the window display up front.

On Wednesdays, for the cost of a whole chicken to take out, you get another half-chicken free. A hamburger and fries is 35 pesos, and they put almost a quarter pound of cheese on their 20-peso gigantic quesadillas. You can order chicken nuggets or sandwiches and tasty fries with or without cheese, and just try to ignore their dessert tray with strawberry cheesecake and Kinder chocolates bigger than Easter eggs. A 600-milliliter soft drink is 13 pesos. You can get your beer with chile and lime.

If you don’t like the noise of children having fun, shun the playground section for the main dining area. Even that will be noisy and often chilly—bring a sweater. Look around as you chomp your chicken and count the few expats and know you have discovered another Mexican favorite.

Update: Longhorn Smokehouse, reviewed here a few weeks ago, has moved. Keith Thompson bought out both Barbeque Bob’s restaurant and the organic veggie shop at Salida a Celaya 6 (next to Pemex) and has opened them both up to one space, holding a dozen tables, 14 bar stools, and more tables out front.

He’s keeping the same menu with half a dozen “cheap eats” and adding evening hours, with specials such as all-you-can-eat spaghetti and meatballs for 75 pesos Saturday nights, and he still has the organic veggies for sale 9am to 5pm along one wall. It is closed Sundays. 

Carol Schmidt and Norma Hair run www.fallinginlovewithsanmiguel.com,  which includes a “Cheap Eats” page with more than 70 SMA restaurants where you can get a meal for 60 pesos or less (without drinks), along with blogs, forums, 1,000 photos, recommendations, SMA FAQs, and Mexico news.

House & Garden Tour
By Jennifer Hamilton

Dramatic ceilings and sensual open arches

House & Garden Tour
Sun, Oct 26, noon
Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25
US$15 or 150 pesos
Breakfast at Café Santa Ana starting at 9am

1. One arrives at this gorgeous property, hidden by trees and plants and fronted by a bronze sculpture and British letterbox, after winding along a driveway through countryside vistas and fruit orchards. The home is full of treasures, artwork, statuary, books and curios from around the world. To the right of the entranceway, a cantilevered circular stairwell climbs a dramatic tower with a lit, pebbled fountain at its base. Upstairs, a fully equipped gym and studio overlook the living room below. A stone-paved hallway with a hand-painted, groined ceiling leads to a kitchen with a granite island topped by copper pots, a professional gourmet stove and ollas (pots) on a thick beam. Outside, a trickling metal water wall accents a cozy breakfast area. In the formal dining room, high-backed plush chairs surround a hefty teak table. The television/movie room, a mini-theater with a huge screen, has a purple ceiling, red walls and sofas. The first-floor master bedroom has yet a different dramatic ceiling, with beige walls, an armoire and “his and her” bathrooms. The most dramatic ceiling is in the three-story sala, which houses a huge cantera fireplace and an immense mirror fronted by countless votive candles. The sala and dining room floors are from Salam, a Mexican tropical wood. The sala leads to an outside patio with a Spanish tile roof and swaths of curtains draped along the sides. Outside, a rounded cantera millstone gently trickles water down its sides into a cactus garden and lawn. Dramatic streams of water form a tunnel over the pool with cypress trees along its sides. Across the pampas grass at the far end of the garden is a two-bedroom guest house. The rooftop of the main house offers dramatic views of bucolic countryside. 




2. We can’t seem to stop the owner from working on this beautiful Centro home! All four of the couple’s homes are House & Garden Tour favorites from the past and all are elegant and cozy. This latest accomplishment, on a tiny 180-meter lot, appears larger than it is through cunning placement of windows, glass and light-colored walls. A rectangular pond with fountain and pebbled base greets visitors upon entering, surrounded by a patio with cypress trees, blue walls, rattan chairs, carved cantera and stonework. The sala, dining area and kitchen blend effortlessly into one, with plush seating areas, a large flat-screened TV with eight built-in speakers and a kitchen with granite countertops, skylights and modern accoutrements. The stairway leading upstairs contains sensual open arches to the bedrooms and a tranquil library with antique dark wood bookcases. The owners added a rooftop patio with 360° views over the town, a favorite place to dine and entertain with two seating areas, a barbecue and an herb garden. Only a few blocks from the Jardín, this street is amazingly quiet, almost like living in the country. San Miguel’s renowned artists and sculptors created much of the artwork. 


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