An ex once said to me, “You know you’d eat horse droppings if they served it in a restaurant starting with the word ‘Chez’.”

I was eating sweetbreads at the time and I have eaten and will continue to eat most every part of the world’s most tasty creatures. So, yes, by certain definitions, I’m an adventurous eater. But I’m also a creature of habit and I’m also getting (note the italics) old. I’d argue against a fuddy duddy label but I definitely deserve a same old/same old reference.

Cafe Lula landed in San Miguel de Allende not long before this year’s snowbirds started to land. The power of music had already pulled me there twice and, yes, I’d eaten those same old/same old dishes at the restaurant: Baja-style tacos, pulled pork tacos, shrimp and pineapple tacos.

Last Sunday was a quiet Sunday; there was no music at Cafe Lula. Don Day’s Wife and I were focused on the food. Paul Guido, Cafe Lula’s owner, suggested he make some of our food decisions for us. Yes, we’d like that. Get us away from the same old/same old, the tried and true.

Were we OK at sharing dishes? Of course, we were. When you share, you get to experience twice as many things.

Cafe Lula’s menu is interesting, intriguing, innovative, but a little intimidating. If words like dukkah, shaksuka, mochi, macha and kewpie are challenging to a food fanatic like me, imagine how scary they are to normal human beings.

The First Wow. Shaksuka.

Shaksuka was one of the first dishes that arrived at the table. It’s a classic North African/Middle Eastern dish that has grown in popularity as the world’s interest in healthy eating has grown.

The traditional shaksuka is primarily eggs, tomatoes, onions and spices. Like the traditional version, Cafe Lula’s shaksuka is vegetarian and, like everything on their menu, is gluten-free. Unlike the traditional version, Cafe Lula’s chef, Karina Rivera, roasts her tomatoes first, adds red bell pepper, cream and oregano, localizes it with ranchero cheese, pretties it up with radishes and fries her egg Mexican-style, with that little crisp on the bottom.

Other than a soup or dessert, I couldn’t remember ordering anything vegetarian in the last decade or three. We were off to a very tasty and very different start.

The Next Wow. Chilaquiles.

I rarely order chilaquiles because, far too often, they’re just a way for restaurants to use up stale tortillas. But transformed well into chips and used, sparingly, with the right accompaniments, they make a great Mexican breakfast or a Sunday brunch.

“We often do chilaquiles with chicken tinga”, Paul Guido told us, “But today it’s pork shoulder chile verde. Karina slow cooks the pork shoulder for five hours and spices it with tomatillo, jalapeño, and cumin.”

The ratio of crispy tortillas to juicy pork was excellent. The avocado, salsa verde, sour cream, chopped onions and cress all added to the experience. 

Wow Number Three. Ensalada de Invierno.

I’ve never quite understood the term “salad days” but, for me, it’s the not-so-fond memories of iceberg lettuce, unripe tomatoes and bottles with Kraft logos. So, unless there’s a blue moon, you won’t see me ordering greens.

Cafe Lula served what they call a winter salad. The main green was actually a red, a radicchio, which, because of it’s crisp and hint of bitterness, is one of the very best lettuces. There was also a couple of sprigs of escarole, carrots and jicama, and two ingredients that are not unheard of in salads but I can’t remember working so well together, pomegranate seeds and blue cheese.

“This cheese tastes an awful lot like real Gorgonzola”, I said to Paul Guido, knowing that very few restaurants with mains under 200 pesos are going to spring for the price of real Gorgonzola.

“That’s because it is”, said Paul.

The Fourth Wow. Papas Crocantes.

My reason I wouldn’t usually order the next dish was a little, no make that a lot, different. For the next course was centered around my absolute, very best, without a doubt, favorite vegetable. The humble potato. But, as much as I love potatoes, I very rarely specifically order them. They either show up on a plate or they don’t.

Cafe Lula’s potato dish isn’t a main, it’s a side. But if there had been just one person eating it, rather than two, they could have made a meal out of it.

Cafe Lula does something a little unique and a lot magical with their crispy and creamy potato dish. It’s a combination of two ingredients that give it that taste jolt. Neither are household names and might need an explanation.

Chef Karina first tops the potatoes and a few shallots with the seldom seen salsa macha. This sauce, that originated in Veracruz and gives the dish its crunch, combines olive oil, garlic, chiles, nuts and seeds. The creamy part comes from Kewpie mayonnaise. Kewpie (pronounced like the doll) is a Japanese brand of mayo made with only egg yolks, no whites, and a rice instead of distilled vinegar.

Wow Number Five. Tamal de Camarón y Polenta.

My excuse for not traditionally ordering the next dish was a little different again. The next dish was a tamal and most tamales are mostly corn and, sometimes, there’s not much more than corn in the flavor.

Cafe Lula’s tamal is quite different. The corn is polenta not masa. The sauce is a Louisiana shrimp gravy not a mole. And what a gravy! Very rich, Very creamy. Very shrimpy. A little too spicy for Don Day’s Wife. Perfectly spiced for me.

Chef Karina told me the sauce “is my take on a classically southern shrimp gravy I fell in love with on my first ever visit to New Orleans.”

The Final Wow. Waffle de Mochi.

The reason I wouldn’t order this is pretty simple. It’s a breakfast dish and on those rare days I even eat breakfast, I eat savory not sweet breakfasts. I eat bacon, sausage and eggs not fruit, honey and cream.

So why was this a wow? Well, we were now way past breakfast hours. It was close to 3:00 pm. This had been a feast. And the finale to a feast should be a dessert. It wasn’t just the ingredients: the waffle (mochi rice, so gluten-free again), charred figs, candied pecans, honey, and whipped cream with saffron; it was the ratio between the ingredients. Not much waffle, a lot of figs and pecans, a little cream and honey.

The final component was two edible flowers, a reminder that we eat with our eyes before we eat with our mouths, and how we were also wowed visually by Cafe Lula’s dishes. 

Going to a restaurant for a good meal is one thing. Going back to eat again very soon after and making the restaurant one of your regular spots is something very different. We’ve already been back to Cafe Lula since Sunday’s brunch (try the pork ribs sided with the crispy potatoes and baby cobs of corn).

I hope you order something a little different. I hope it lifts you out your same old/same old routine. I hope you’re as wowed as we were.

Cafe Lula is located at Jesus #27 in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. The restaurant is open on Tuesdays from 10:00 am to 8:00 pm; Thursdays from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm; Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 10:00 am to 8:00 pm.