In times that seem to keep the population trotting in order to barely keep up with changes, it’s a refreshing treat to visit a restaurant that has maintained the same menu and high levels of excellent service, presentation, and flavor for decades.
Like most folks, I get into a rut and keep returning to the same few restaurants.
It’s been years since I’d seen Armando Garcia Castro or visited his restaurant hidden away at Privada Ocampo 18. That street is just one block long, and it runs along the east side of the Hotel Danza del Sol between Zaragoza and Ocampo. Want a landmark? The house next door is painted purple with yellow polka dots and Armando’s Hideaway is faced with black slate cemented together with metallic gold grout.
The fireplaces, murals, colored glass, mirrored walls and painted stone and grout create a background as quirky as the most eccentric of the mishmash of interesting characters who have settled at Lake Chapala.
My first meal at Armando’s was in one of his much earlier locations. In October 1990, Garcia Castro had already been in business for nearly 15 years and his small, sophisticated and sleek restaurant was poised on the south side of the Ajijic plaza.
The offerings on that 24-year-old menu were nearly identical to the items this year. Garcia Castro, the owner and chef has carefully guarded his tableside dishes. He’s always made them himself in order to keep the recipes his own, alone. In 1990 finding a Caesar salad, especially one with anchovies was a triumph. Garcia Castro served it any time he could obtain all of the ingredients. His menu at the Hideaway includes an array of flambéed entrees and desserts including his signature pepper steak, the mustard steak, the shrimp dishes and bananas Foster.As Garcia Castro prepared my friend’s pepper steak at our table, we chatted about the old days. ”When I first opened my first place back in 1976 the only other restaurants were the Old Posada and the Tejaban (that large building at Colón and Zaragoza that now houses a real estate office). Our menus were pretty limited back then, we didn’t have access to ingredients like we do today.”
We enjoyed testing each others’ memories with the names of some of the restaurant owners and eateries that are now gone. We reminisced about the “world’s most expensive pizza” from Los Naranijitos, Carlos Goldstein’s San Francisco owners, Munchies and the almost bagels made there, the elegant fare at El Meson, Logan’s Sport’s Bar with his sidekick Pati, Lee’s brick pizza oven in the current Absolut Fenix building, and Big Mama’s Palapa. Some last a while, others don’t.
We never completed a meal at the old Armando’s on the plaza without at least one glass of his fabulous flaming Spanish coffee. The times have taken a small toll on the size of that Spanish coffee. The brandy and other delicious ingredients are balanced in the same proportions, but I remember a much larger glass back in the day. That extra space allowed him to let the brandy flame up to the top of the sugar-rimmed glass. At that precise moment he threw a in pinch of cinnamon. The resulting sparks and flashes were nearly as good as the fireworks on Independence Day and those earlier fiestas.
Isn’t it nice to know that in the midst of so much change, some things stay just the same. Thank you Armando Garcia Castro (and your faithful staff) for continuing to do such a good job.
Armando’s Hideaway Restaurant Bar is open from 1 to 9 p.m. daily, except Tuesdays. Call (376) 2229 for reservations or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..">This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..