La Cholita

A few years back there were only a handful of Mexican restaurants/bars in Perth, good old Panchos in Vic Park and Santa Fe in Subiaco come to mind. Now it seems as if they’re popping up in just about every suburb, either in the form of Mexican themed small bars (El Publico, That Little Mexican Place) as well as chain restaurants (Mad Mex, Salsas etc.). Since we were in the area (near enough anyway) and I had a hankering for some good Mexican food, I thought it’d be a good idea to try out of Perth’s ‘new’ Mexican joints, La Cholita in Northbridge.

We got there just after 7:30pm and the place was absolutely heaving, I thought there was no way we were going to get a table, but we went in any way to try our luck. We were told that there’d be a short wait for a table and in the mean time we could sit in their ‘waiting area’ and order drinks and entrees. So we sat down, ordered a few cervezas and got the chicken tostadas for entrees. The decor is amazing, old industrial style lights hang from the ceiling, there are big Perspex inserts in the floor, allowing you to see the cellar below and the Mexican music was pumping. We were only in the waiting area for 10 minutes before we got shown to our ‘table’ (it was actually two spots along the bar). No complaints though, the closer to the bar the better I say.

The menu has a great range of food and drinks, and the reverse side is solely tequilas (over 60 varieties!). We ordered a few more beers as well as the food; chorizo quesadillas, jalapeño & cheese quesadillas, prawn tacos, chicken tacos and homemade crispy corn tortillas with guacamole. I know that it seems like an excessive amount of food, but the servings are small, i.e. “tacos” is actually a taco, but at $5 each you wouldn’t expect more than one. All the food was absolutely amazing, it’s pretty clear that they make everything in house, even the corn tortillas (corn chips), a pleasant change from ordering corn chips at a Mexican restaurant and getting Doritos with a jar of Old El Paso salsa! The guacamole was great too, it had big chunks of avo and a great zesty flavour from the lime. The stand out for me though were the cheese and jalapeño quesadillas, full of flavour and just the right amount of kick from the jalapeños, not too hot but definitely not boring. At first La Cholita seems a bit pricey considering the size of the servings but all up our meal and 4 beers came to just over $70 which isn’t too bad considering the quality of the food. If you’re quite hungry there is a good chance it might turn into a much pricier night, but the six dishes we got left us feeling pretty satisfied, the beers helped a bit too

Service was pretty good, nothing to write home about, but friendly enough and considering how busy it was the wait/bar staff did a fairly decent job of keeping up with everyone’s orders. So far I’d have to say this is my favourite Mexican joint in Perth, the next time you feel like a good Mexican meal and Tequila or sixty, put down the Old El Paso taco kit and head over to La Cholita, you won’t regret it.