Review: Alejandro’s in Radford brings Mexican flair
Thursday, May 9, 2013
The Best Western Radford Inn has seen several on-site restaurants come and go since its opening many years ago. Now it is home to the fourth location of the Nucamendi family’s Alejandro’s Mexican Grill, which also has two locations in Roanoke and one in Christiansburg.
Instead of being decorated like most Mexican restaurants, this restaurant is decorated like the hotel — it is clean, with bright walls and homey wood and brick touches. With two large sections for dining and a bar area, it can accommodate a lot of diners. During our visits, we were seated in a section furnished with a mix of tables and booths, and large windows facing the parking lot .
Although seating was a bit slow for a not-too-busy restaurant, the servers during both of our visits were pleasant and quick to bring a basket of warm tortilla chips to the table. Instead of delivering salsa to the tables, Alejandro’s features a self-serve salsa bar with a variety of salsas and a stack of small ramekins. Diners make their own choices, whether it be a mild salsa with a hint of cilantro, a fiery hot blend, or a cool and creamy dip . Our favorites were the mild red and the white , which is similar to a sweet ranch dressing. Best of all, you don’t have to feel guilty about double dipping in your own salsa.
The multi page menu is extensive and offers appetizers, tortas (Mexican sandwiches), quesadillas, salads, fajitas, enchiladas, steaks, tacos, burritos, seafood, lunch specials and a kid s menu. It is a difficult decision that takes longer than it takes for the food to arrive. The service is quick, and the plates come to your table hot.
Our first visit left room for improvement . The chimichangas ($9.99) were deep-fried tortillas rolled tightly around a small portion of bland chicken filling, and the sides of red rice and refried beans also lacked seasoning. The taquitos ($7.99) featured the same unimpressive filling and sides — we found that dipping them in salsa improved the flavor dramatically . The arroz con pollo ($10.99), grilled chicken with grilled veggies on top of red rice, was a great-looking dish, but also had no punch of flavor.
We splurged on dessert and tried the fried ice cream ($2.99), which turned out to be little more than a scoop of ice cream rolled in cornflakes and covered in whipped cream .
On another visit, our taste buds had a better time. The seasonal menu offered Tinga ($8.99), a thick, shredded chicken and chorizo stew with heirloom potatoes. The flavors and spices popped with south-of-the-border authenticity. From the same menu, the Alejandro’s cobb salad ($7.99) was a lovely composed salad of shrimp, cheese, lettuce, cherry tomatoes and avocado served with ranch dressing. The carnitas bandero burrito ($7.99) was a large stuffed tortilla with tender steak, black beans and rice and had the flavors that were lacking in our first visit. Perhaps we had ordered from the wrong menu the first time?
Alejandro’s in Radford is similar enough to the Christiansburg location that it wouldn’t be worth a longer drive to visit one instead of the other. We would warn diners to go easy on the temptation to gorge on the chips and salsa bar; the dinners are generously portioned, so you will not leave hungry. Although we were disappointed by a few dishes, others were delicious.
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THE ROANOKE TIMES
