In Mesa, it takes a village to create an endearing Modern Mexican eatery with perfect queso and magnificent mole.
Last fall, a group of friends and colleagues in the restaurant industry joined forces to acquire Casa Ramos Redux – which, as the name implies, was the second go-round of a longtime, family-run Mexican restaurant located on Mesa’s downtown drag. Taking the reins, barkeep Michael Schreier and his life and business partner Alysia Gratton rechristened the restaurant The Guadalupe on Main but kept many of the Ramos family’s Jalisco-style recipes, adding modern flourishes devised by their culinarian co-conspirators, Salim Council, Hannah Carpenter and Colin Burkhardt. At this point, I’d say so far, so great.
Naturally, given Schreier’s background, there’s a cocktail program, which includes the gorgeous, dangerously quaffable Buckhorn Baths, a nod to a historical Mesa motel famous for its mineral hot springs. It pairs perfectly with the street corn queso starter, a molten mixture of roasted corn, roasted jalapeños, queso fresco and crema, eaten with house-made chips.
I’ll gladly return for the Jalisco hot chicken sando, featuring a crispy chicken breast dipped in salsa macha – essentially a spin on Jalisco’s famous torta ahogada and enjoyable to the last crumb. Almost as good: a blackberry relish-topped smash burger. Both illustrate how freewheeling the Guadalupe kitchen can be…