Artego Pizza (Midtown, KC)

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY, FRIENDS!!

It's Tuesday again, and that means I've got another taco review for you! Maybe this will tip you off on where to go with your sweetheart tonight, even!

I want to be honest with you - I love tacos, and I love eating them all the time, but it gets old for the people around me. This week I went a little outside the box for my taco trip, heading to Artego Pizza. Now you're probably thinking, they have tacos at a pizza joint?!

While I'm sure that many pizza joints do have tacos, I instead went the TACO PIZZA route. I had a Groupon, it was #NationalPizzaDay, and honestly, a small part of me wondered if the perfect taco did in fact come on a pizza crust...

Essentially, Artego is a pizza place/pub in Midtown that has a great menu and cool look. I did not think to take any photos of the restaurant, but the vibe was really cool so I wanted to include this in my experience recap. Thankfully, their website had this cool snap shot, which I think shows the overall feel. It was a laid back environment, with portraits of a number of music legends all over the walls.

Artego offers their pizzas in S, M, L and then a "Z" size, which is half of a small pizza. With the Groupon, you paid $15 for $25 worth of food/drinks, so we ordered two small pizzas ($12.99 each). We obviously tried their Taco Pizza, and then we tried their "39th Street" specialty pizza.

Their Taco Pizza consisted of the following ingredients:
- Artego fermented crust
- Seasoned ground beef
- Homemade Perez family salsa
- Tomatoes
- Onions
- Black olives
- Cilantro
- Fresh garlic
- Cheddar cheese
- Sour cream

 

Overall, the food was really great and we had wonderful service! If you check out Artego's website, you'll see that they have a baller crust process. With the perfect combination of crust fermentation, herbs, oils, and bake time it is the perfect combination of fluffy, but crunchy. Maybe the best crust I've had aside being in Italy. The toppings worked really well together, with everything tasting really fresh (even the onions were not overcooked!!). I wasn't sure about the sour cream, but even that was really tasty!

To be honest, if this blog were about rating PIZZA, I think I would give this pizza 5 slices! Alas, we are grading tacos... and while I thought it was really yummy, I'm assured now that the perfect taco is, in fact, in a shell. With that said--

Rating (out of 5):

  

Burrito Bros. (River Market, KC)

Last week, I decided to do some research on taco joints in Kansas City. I found a huge list of places that sounded really great ranging from butcher shops to decades-old restaurants on the Boulevard. This weekend, I decided on Burrito Bros. in the River Market for a few different reasons:

- I love City Market Coffee Roasters (I went with the Mexican blend to stick with the taco theme)

- It had great reviews online for pretty much everything on their menu

- The River Market is always a great place to hang out on a weekend morning in the city

- I had a short grocery list consisting of all produce and spices

 

Alright, so there are a few cool things about Burrito Brothers:
- It's locally owned and privately held
- All of its produce is sourced from nearby River Market vendors
- They have a variety of options in terms of proteins and main courses

Essentially this is like a hometown Chipotle where you can go and build your own burrito, taco, etc. The idea of this is awesome because then you know you're going to get what you're looking for.

Burrito Bros actually had a really great lunch special running where you got 2 tacos, chips, and a drink for $7.53. This sounded like a great plan to order a couple different tacos AND try the chips. I also ordered a side of guacamole (which was $1.48 extra).

 

- Taco 1: soft shell, melted cheese, rice, black beans, chicken, fire-roasted salsa

- Taco 2: soft shell, melted cheese, rice, black beans, carnitas, hot salsa

 

I thought it would be  easiest to review this together, because in general, I had an overall experience feeling here. I would say that the food here was okay - I can definitely see it working (and working WELL) as a burrito... but as a taco, I was not impressed.
- To start, my chips needed more salt and the guacamole had a bit too much onion for my liking
- As far as the tacos go, the were very WET, giving a very one-note/mushy consistency. There was no textural component that broke it up. With everything being wet and mushy, my soft tortillas got soggy and I had to eat my tacos with a fork...
- I also felt that the seasoning of the meat it self was lacking, though maybe I'm just being especially partial to spicier or charred options lately

I think I would go back to Burrito Bros and try a burrito. My feeling is, that is where they really shine!

Rating (out of 5):