Message: | This is a tricky question for me - as a graduate student, I think normal people's "cheap eats" price range equals my "night on the town" price range. I can stand the loss of time and stature and the late night library jam sessions most times, but I really start to question it when I pass the sushi joints and realize that my budget for the night's meal and the price-of-entrance for the sushi differs by about a factor of ten. That said -
Empanadas Place is sort of at the center of a whole butt-load of cheap eating, most of it Mexican. It's at the center of Oaxacan neighborhood. There's a Guelgezetza around there, but to my taste, it's a lot blander than the Geulg. in K-town. Much better, and cheaper, is a place called El Sazon Oaxecqueno, on Washington, about 3 or 5 blocks west of the 10, on the north side of the street in a little corner strip mall. (Is it still a strip mall if it's in the corner?) Great, beautiful moles, and cheap, too! Mole negro con pollo for what, 6 bucks? And lovely little mole snacks, that could fill you up for $3. There's been some debate on this board about that place - J Gold loved it, and others have complained that it's irregular - the chicken is sometimes piping and fresh, sometimes lukewarm and a little old. I have found this to be so. One solution is to get my favorite dish there - enchiladas with their red mole. Chicken gets shredded and reheated in any case, and the dish is flory for abour $4.50.
A little further down on Washington, on the south side of the street, before the Costco, is Tamara's Tamales. Try the mole tamales, try the sweet tamales. They had sweet pumpkin tamales once, in season. Yum!
There are, of course, many branches of Zankou Chicken, which if you have not experienced the roasted chicken and garlic sauce of, mightily should ye get your ass down for. Yeah.
I've been cruising this town for tacos, and my favorites thus far are the Antonajiro Denise's. There's one on Olympic in East LA, and one on Hollywood Blvd. just east of Little Armenia. Carnitas, carnitas, carnitas. The East LA branch has lonja, which is skin with a hunk of flesh on it - stiff and gnawy and full of flavor, the Hollywood branch has chicarrones, which is just bits of fried skin - less flavor, but what texture! The carnitas at the East LA branch edges ahead a little.
Benito's Taco Shops - get the Tacquitos, aka rolled tacos. There's one on Beverly at the corner of... Fairfax? One on Santa Monica, in SM. The rolled tacos here are the equivalent of Tito's - horribly Americanized, covered with guacomole and *orange cheese*, but horribly addictive. The tortilla is crunchy on the outer roll, and soft and melty by the inner. Who cares if there's any meat inside? And 5 for three dollars, hey!
In Little Odessa - the strip of Russian stores on Santa Monica between, say, Fairfax and La Brea, tons of Russian deli food for cheap. There's a little bakery next to the Whole Foods on Fairfax and SM that makes damn fine pierogies that reheat up like little sweet grease bombs.
Chinese hand-made noodle places. The usual suspects - Mandarin Deli, Mandarin House. Check out J. Gold's book, counter intelligence - the man has a nose for the noodle. And a dowsing rod for the dumpling. My fave's Mandarin House, on 8th in Koreatown. Changmia noodles with black meat sauce. Fish dumplings at Mandarin Deli. Strangely, my mother located what, to my tastes, are the best chinese-style frozen dumplings in Costco. The Panda brand. Big ol' bag for five bucks.
There's more, but I have this sudden violent need for some Antonajiro Denise's.
-thi
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