Some of the best dishes are also some of the simplest: a soft taco with grilled tuna and red cabbage ($2.75) drizzled with the restaurant's "special" sauce: a sourcream sauce with spices. In Mexico, the cabbage would be mixed with a sauce, Mendoza says, but keeping it separate makes it easier to tailor the dish to vegans. The beef in the carne asada taco ($2.25), which arrives with minced onions and cilantro, is tenderly grilled.
The restaurant recently got its liquor license after prolonged negotiations with the church across the street. The church allowed the restaurant to share its parking but was displeased that drinks would be served; the agreement allows Ay! Caramba to serve alcohol with a few limits: none before 2 p.m. Sunday and a maximum of three drinks per customer.
Now the menu includes margaritas, sangria, wine, and beer. The cafe also serves nonalcoholic limeage and aguas frescas, including an iced hibiscus tea as red as wine.
We are stuffed, but in the interests of journalism, we order desert. The Kahlua Sombrero cake ($4.25), a three-layered chocolate cake with Kahlua-laced toffee icing, is good. (It looks flashy: a teenage girl eyes it as she and her friends leave, cooing, "I want that cake, girl.") But the bourbon pecan pie ($4.25) is better. My husband , a pecan pie aficionado, raves about the shortbread crust. And it arrives with a gooey caramel sauce made with goat's milk.
The kitchen was out of another equally calorie-packed dessert: the cheesecake Xanga ($4.25), cheesecake wrapped in a tortilla, fried, and served with a raspberry sauce. We'll try it next time.