In the foul year of Our Lord, 1971, Hunter S. Thompson found himself cruising down The Strip in Las Vegas. First in a huge red Chevy Convertible, then later in a White Cadillac Convertible. His assignment was journalistic, however his quest was for The American Dream.
Whacked out on a list of drugs that has become something of a lore and benchmark for the hipster generation that envied his freedom, Thompson believed that Las Vegas held the secret to what The American Dream has become. Amongst the gaudy pink neon and wall to wall shag carpeting, somewhere, there had to be traces of it. There was no way it could have been lost within the gap of a single generation.
Whether he was actually able to find The American Dream is up for discussion, more importantly was the quest. The idea that somewhere out there was the culmination of hard work and degradation that this generation can scarcely fathom. The idea that it is waiting to be found.
I took such a question. And somehow, it brought me to Acapulco. The one in Coon Rapids. You can drink the water there. Acapulco Restaurante Mexicano (also located in Blaine, Maplewood, Stillwater, Woodbury, New Brighton and Ramsey).
Of course, my question is far from the perception of The American Dream. It is something closer to the Midwestern Hallucination. Regardless, there is a lot of food and huge beers.
The service is fast. Scary fast. Perhaps to cover up the lack of linguistic skills amongst the wait staff, perhaps because they want to get you in and out as fast as f***ing possible.
Sit down and you get chips and salsa. Don't ask, they will just bring it. Want more? Just ask. They don't care.
Want something to drink? The margaritas are good, but the beer... sorry, I just passed out there for a second. Dos Equis on tap? Always a bonus.
34 ounce glass beer mugs? Even better.
34 oz frosted mugs of Dos Equis lager for $4 any time of the day? What did I do right in life to deserve this? If I thought Mexico was like this for real I would hire my own coyote to head south of the border.
Or just take a plane. But I hate flying. And I like water.
You could do an appetizer, but only if you aren't planning on having an entree. The portions are mammoth and worth a separate trip just to indulge a little bit.
While my typical dinning partners tend to go straight for either the Creamed or Wet Burritos (which in name sound filthy and perverse) I gotta go with the pork. If you are going south of the border and you are dining in Minnesota, you have people from Mexico and Central America in the kitchen. They do pork and they do it great.
The Puerco en Chile Verde (pork in green chile sauce) is fall apart tender and delicious. Enough so that I just drooled on my laptop. Probably the least offensive stain to date. Served in a pool of green sauce that is far less visually pleasing than I tend to prefer, I quickly damn my eyes and dig in. The melding of tomatillo sauce with the wonderful pork fat creates a kind of gravy that must be ingested to be believed.
It also comes with tortillas, beans and rice, but it could easily be a stand alone meal.
This food ain't exactly Mexican. It's somewhere on the spectrum just a few notches above what Leeann Chin's and P.F. Chang's are to Asia food. But it is familiar in the way that we as Minnesotans view Mexican food. And there is a lot of it. And it is cheap. Really cheap.
Huge food. Huge beer. Low prices. All a wonderful mixture that makes the impending date with the toilet and the inevitable hemorrhoids worth it all.
As Hunter Thompson looked out upon Las Vegas he waxed poetic, "you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark- that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back." His mind connecting the visual splendor with the metaphorical disappearance of the hippie subculture.
As I stand, awkwardly in the parking lot of the Coon Rapids Acapulco Familia Restaurante, my stomach filled far beyond capacity with pork, chips and beer, I look out to my surroundings. Strip malls and highways. The product of consumerism and democracy.
And with the right kind of antacid you can almost feel Mexico right here in Minnesota. Indigestion, heart burn and an impending hangover. And you didn't even need a passport.
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