Spicy Chicken Taco

Right there you have the highlight of Tuesday's eating action, the Spicy Chicken Taco at Chino's Taqueria, on the western part of Balboa Street, just past 38th Avenue as it slopes downward towards the Pacific Ocean, which lies just a few blocks beyond, in the direction of China. Chino's was recently featured in the San Francisco Chronicle's Cheap Eats feature, which runs in their Thursday entertainment section called 96 Hours. We were already familiar with the neighborhood, thanks to Shanghai Dumpling King, arguably the premier source of Soup Noodle Dumplings, a.k.a. xiao long bao, in the San Francisco area. But this is a subject for an entirely different entry and will be dealt with at length subsequent to a return visit. At any rate we had espied Chino's previously, and our initial curiosity was further piqued by the newspaper article. And it fit into the schedule for Tuesday.

A few things must be said about taquerias in general. These basically proceed according to a formula. You know what you're in for; some combination of corn or flour tortilla packed with a well-defined set of fillers. At best there will be a choice of beans (black, refried, pinto) and meats (chicken, pork, beef,) along with rice, some salsa, and optionally some sour cream, guacamole and hot sauce. In this regard it is difficult for an establishment to rise above the rest. Some make their own corn tortillas, but the greatest variation is in the different stew and sauce recipes.A few places go the extra mile and offer specialties like lengua (tongue.)

The short story about Chino's is that they make one very tasty meat filling: spicy chicken. This is basically stewed chicken in a red, somewhat hot stew. The pieces of bird are tender and falling apart, and the flavors well melded. Andrea treated herself to the Super Taco ('super' orders add guacamole, sour cream and cheese to the meat, rice, beans and lettuce that come with 'regular' orders.) I had the Pork Chile Verde, which was a mild green sauce with chunks of pork shoulder that were equally well stewed. Of the two the Spicy Chicken was the standout, and was obviously the end product of many hours of work; Andrea overheard one of the workers saying that the place was near-freezing when he came to work at 7 AM (this has been one of the coldest weeks in the recorded history of San Francisco weather.) He was probably starting in on the meat fillings, as well as plenty of other prep, like making beans and preparing guacamole. The irony of a taqueria is that, thanks to all the prep, the final assembly is nearly instantaneous, almost shockingly so, making it hard to believe that anything that decent-tasting can be put together so rapidly. One thing they don't do at Chino's is make in-house tortillas; the tacos came on garden-variety corn tortillas that were perfectly competent but nothing to write home about. Flour tortillas are almost always factory-made; Chino's offers a nice selection of plain, spinach or tomato, and they were certainly fresh
Much of the business is take out, which is not surprising considering the cavernous, unheated, high-ceilinged space the restaurant occupies. Amenities are few; order at the counter, wait about one minute for your entree to be prepared, and either take it to go or seat yourself at the bare-bones tables.We were there for lunch, and mercifully missed the rush from the nearby high school, although driving to Chino's was delayed by hordes of take-out-noshing youth crossing Balboa Street. Our end conclusion was that Chino's makes a very pleasing product, and if were are in the neighborhood it would be a regular stop, but there is nothing that cries out for the mass burning of fossil fuels in order to enjoy a life-changing culinary experience.

On the radiation end, treatment was briefly delayed because two machines were out of commission, but as usual UCSF handled the snafu quickly. Andrea had her weekly meeting with the UCSF doctor, and all was quite routine. In fact, "routine" is a word that could easily describe the course of treatment; show up for a few minutes, five days a week; change into a hospita-style top; lie on the table, get your few seconds of zap; put your shirt back on, and leave.Andrea's treatment is about the warmest and fuzziest you can have; more severe conditions in less convenient places can require much more radiation. She is getting off easy, in a relative sense.

Each day when it's over, we both count down - - two down, 28 to go.