Hippo de Mayo Taco Fest – Manchester, NH

How does running from joint to joint in downtown Manchester, NH sampling different kinds of tacos sound? I wasn’t exactly sure when we first heard about the event so if you are a little skeptical I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.

Organized by the Hippo Press, the local culture and style newspaper, nearly three dozen Manchester restaurants formulated taco ideas (some inspired by existing menu items) to serve to folks crawling between the shops. $2 each! Every establishment was assigned a charity and proceeds from the taco sales and drawings held on site would go the charities. The winning taco, as voted by texting fans, would net a $2,000 donation to the charity assigned to the winning shop.

Some of What We Ate

The Smore Taco at Portland Pie company. It was messy and didn’t photograph well. We liked it but it wasn’t the best lead off.

The El Tiante at JW Hill was incredible! Orange chipotle pork in a puffy tortilla shell. The meat was so juicy and flavorful. We should have gotten seconds or to go!

The El Pato taco at Z was a great follow on to that, especially with a bit of a wait. Duck confit with avocado, pickled cabbage and Siracha sour cream. It was a little messy to eat on the run, but I got over it!

While we waited in line at Z we got to chatting with Sarah-Jane Chaplain and Dick Webster (Sarah’s father-in-law) from Candia. They were planning on hitting 6 or 7 places and had so far their favorite was the Peach Pork taco at the Pattie Shack. When we asked about how they found about the event, they indicated that they saw it in the paper and thought that it looked like fun, so they came out to check it out. They were both intrigued by our comments on the Smore Taco. Our only recommendation was to get more napkins before they started!

Dick and I chatted about home brewing as he was just getting back into brewing with his son. They had recently gotten a clone of the Sam Adams Boston Ale going with great expectations for the outcome.

The Rest of What We Ate

As mentioned above we hit the Pattie Shack and they were between tacos. It was dinner time and anything else they made was ready to order. We tried the BBQ Buffalo Burger, beef with blue cheese and firey BBQ sauce. It was well made, hot and oh so tasty. Sweet and spicy with that blue cheese funk and some lip smacking goodness!

We ended out journey after meeting up with Margot’s new co-workers, at Strange Brew. Strange Brew is a solid beer bar in its own right so I led off with a Dog Fish Black & Blue and an Allagash White. Loaded for bear! They had a smoked pork taco with cheese and an Indian spiced one as well. I couldn’t exactly tell what all was going on here, but it did taste fantastic and went great with the Allagash beer. We hung for a while longer while I finished up the drinks. The Dog Fish Black and Blue is a high alcohol Belgian golden ale with real black and blueberries fermented in it. The fruit is very accessible and the malty sweetness in the middle was intense and nuanced with fruit and spice.

There was definitely considerable demand for this event based on the lines at some restaurants and the quickness with which some others ran out of food. While this could be considered a logistical nightmare and a downer for the event I submit that it is merely food for thought when planning the 2012 incarnation of the event. We did hear complaining but no matter how well it went I expect we would have heard similar words if it was just an issue of waiting in line. The guys at the Pattie Shack had a fantastic attitude about running out of ingredients twice, go get more and keep the train rolling! I think they genuinely liked the traffic even if some folks turned around and left rather than wait. We opted to try something off their regular menu (we hadn’t been there yet) and found it to be fantastic. They get our vote as a great place to check out in the city tacos or not!

This week’s Hippo indicated that 15-20K tacos were served to 5-7K people. Damn! That is a lot of tacos and I hope a lot of funds raised for the participating charities.

We tweeted the crap out of this event and had hoped for more online action to build the hype, but in the end we still had great fun and can’t wait to do it again next year.


Cheers!

Jason

Alley Cat Pizzeria - Manchester, NH

There are those places in every town that you always here buzz about. “Oh, you have to go.” or “I cannot believe you have never eaten at.” Alley Cat Pizzeria in Manchester NH is one of those places. This is the pizza place that many in the area say is a must go to. They have won Best of the Best in the local HippoPress for years. So, as someone who is searching out great pizza places to blog about in New England this one in my hometown seemed like a no brainer.

We purchased to large pizzas, one mushroom and one Stray Cat. I always like to try a simple topping along with a specialty when trying a new place in order to get a real feel for what they have to offer. We picked up the pizzas and headed home on our 15 minute drive. The Jeep smelled wonderful and Jay and I had a hard time waiting until we got it home to dig in.

Alley Cat is known for its super thin crust that is perfect for the NY fold in half technique. Our crust lived up to that super thin reputation. The crusts ends were nice and crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside and though thin it was not soggy. Both pizzas were light on the sauce, which for me is preferable when dealing with a thinner crust, less messy and not overpowering. The flavor of the sauce was somewhat unremarkable, beyond tomato there was not a lot of discernable flavors.

The cheese was the right amount, not skimpy, but not so thick that you could not bit through it. The Stray Cat specialty pizza had both mozzarella and ricotta. It was impressive that while the mozz was well cooked and slightly brown, the ricotta was not a dried out mess as can sometimes happen. The Stray Cat also included breaded eggplant, which was well cooked with perfectly toasted breading. The mushrooms on the other pizza were fresh and were a nice size. As for seasoning on either, Jay and I did something we have never done, we used salt to kick up the flavor a bit.

As we ate our pizza there was a bit of silence, though not the normal silence that accompanies the devouring of pizza. I think that Jay and I were both trying to find the words to describe our experience. The build up to the pizza at Alley Cat had been so strong and so big. Best pizza in the area, the pizza you would travel for, you have to try it! I am not sure if any pizza could have lived up to the hype, but was the hype causing our reaction? Maybe. When we finally spoke our conclusions were in agreement. Alley Cat Pizza is very good, unsophisticated, pizza. It is the pizza that you remember from those late nights in college. It is the pizza that you may have eaten on your first date in High School. I guess one could call it nostalgic pizza. If you are in the neighborhood looking for a quick slice I would definitely recommend it, as it will not be dissatisfying. My goal now is to find a place in Manchester, which may not be getting the hype but leaves a stronger impression.

Mangia!

Margot