Pobre Pancho's

Last week the cooking club I belong to got together for our monthly theme night. This month's theme was "cheese". It was much like Iron Chef with a secret ingredient, everyone making completely different dishes - dips, cheese balls, pizza, cheesecake, home-made cheese (which was the best cheese I've had in a while) and I made beer cheese soup. It was a really fun night with great food. It was also a chance for me to hang out in my kitchen tweaking recipes and honing my palate which really helps with restaurant reviews.

Everyone was really excited about cheese being the theme, with the general feeling that cheese is awesome, you can't make a bad cheese dish and cheese makes any meal delicious. It made me think of Pobre Pancho's. Cheese is a staple at this place.

Pobre Pancho's is one of the oldest family-owned restaurants in Fort Collins. Owners Frank and Mary Perez, native Mexicans who've lived in the city since 1943, have their family members heavily involved in the day to day aspects of the restaurant. Everyone from their daughters, son-in-law and their grandchildren chip in to keep the business going.

We went for a family lunch there one afternoon and really did feel the family-friendliness of it all. Surrounded by sombrero's and service with a smile, we saw customers leaving and making sure to give members of the Perez family hugs good-bye. I don't know how often I've seen people hug chefs, servers and bus boys after their meal. Clearly, not regularly.


While Pobre Pancho's offers Mexican dishes cooked from special family recipes, I'm not sure I'd call it "authentic Mexican", exactly. It's more like "comfort-Mexican". The home-style is the same as a casual American diner serving pot roast and biscuits and gravy. There's not a lot of flavor, but lots of cheese and iceberg lettuce. I think I told my husband that it was mid-western Mexican as it reminded us of some of the restaurants in North Dakota.

After getting the kids situated, we ate chips and salsa while we decided on what to order for lunch. The chips were pretty basic and unsalted. The salsa was thin and almost exactly like the sauce my husband makes from canned diced tomatoes and the spice packets from a restaurant his family sends him when they go back up North.

The Preschooler had a cheese crisp with chicken - basically, a quesadilla ($5.40). The baby had a half order of a baby bowl - refried beans, ground beef and cheese in a cup ($2.80). My husband had a beef enchilada with a flour tortilla ($7.00) and a chicken enchilada with a corn tortilla ($4.00). I had the #22 - a flour cheese enchilada, chili relleno, beef hard shell taco and rice ($11.00).

The Preschooler was being a bit picky (as usual) and didn't eat much. Little did he know that he had the best meal of all of us. The chicken had a really great, deep, slow cooked savory flavor with a crunchy, crispy tortilla and lots of oozing cheese. My husband and I kept stealing bites because it would have been a shame to let this go to waste.


The Baby didn't care much for his baby bowl of beans, beef and cheese. He kept spitting it out. I couldn't blame him, it wasn't that appetizing.


My husband's enchiladas were buried under a layer of sauce, a mound of cheese and a thick sprinkling of iceberg lettuce. In his words, "Meh". Not completely bad, but nothing that would make him go running back for more.


My enchilada and chili relleno were also hidden under the garnish of cheese, sauce and lettuce. Again, not much flavor and it was definitely Mexican comfort food. It was the most mild/bland chili relleno I've ever had, that's for sure. The rice and beef taco were unremarkable as well. It's something I would whip up at home if I didn't feel like cooking for more than 30 minutes.


The service was nice and the kids were offered an ice cream sandwich after the meal (which had they finished lunch, they would have been able to have). You could tell dining here that Pobre Pancho's has been in business for over 40 years because of the community support, the family atmosphere and not the food (unless comfort-Mexican is what you're going for). But I guess you need some cheese and soul food every now and then and not every meal needs to be gourmet.


Pobre Pancho's
1802 North College Avenue
(970) 482-0895
www.pobrepanchos.com

Kid-Friendly? Very!

Parking: Small lot parking behind the building

Healthy Options? Not a whole lot to choose from, but the small tacos aren't going to be too bad.

Budget-Friendly? There are some slammin' deals on the menu, but you get what you pay for with portion size.

Recent Health Inspection: Good