Dining Stett Holbrook
NORTH BAY BOHEMIAN | FEBRUARY 1–7, 2012 | BOHEMIAN.COM
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TIPPING THE PLATE The aguachile at La Condesa combines slices of opa in a chile-infused citrus sauce.
The Countess ’ Aria La Condesa hits all the right notes in St. Helena BY STETT HOLBROOK
T
hese are good days for upmarket Mexican food.
While taco trucks and divey burrito shacks are the still the soul of North Bay Mexican food, there’s a growing sophistication among restaurants in the mid-tier. Mateo’s Cocina
Latina in Healdsburg, El Molino Central in Sonoma, and C Casa and Cielito Lindo in Napa stand out for their use of local ingredients and for diving deeper into regional Mexican food. St. Helena’s five-month-old La Condesa does both, and offers even more—the cool factor. La
Condesa (“the countess,” in English) is the West Coast version of a popular Austin, Texas, eatery of the same name. It has the heavily branded feel of a multiunit operation but stops well short of feeling like a chain. The restaurant is in the old Keller Brothers Meats building on
Main Street. The place is a mishmash of styles, with robin-egg-blue walls, midcentury modern chairs and a spider nest of hanging light bulbs garlanding from the ceiling. The kitchen is visible through a portal at the back of the restaurant, while up front, large windows frame the street outside. Most striking of all is the bar, a knotty, exposed wood structure that casts a warm amber glow over the dining room. The head of an angry black bull hangs above the temple of tequila and mescal, while a wellcurated loop of indie rock (Band of Horses, the Breeders, Silversun Pickups) fills the room. Chef Rene Ortiz has created a menu that’s accessible and creative. The menu name-drops local farms and purveyors while keeping rooted in traditional Mexican fare. What sets the food apart is its innovative style and sybaritic glee. Chef Ortiz carefully pushes many dishes over the top, mainly with the addition of pork. The selection of ceviche is a good introduction—only it’s not really ceviche. Rather than limecured seafood, what you get is more like ornately sauced sashimi or crudo. The “aguachile” ($15) combines slices of opah in a bright orange, chile-infused citrus sauce that had me tipping the plate back to get it all. “Chifa” ($15) is yellowtail kingfish with fiery Thai chiles, apples, Japanese turnip and avocado in a yuzu-lime dressing. One of my favorite starters was the zanahoria ($12), a carrot salad made with epazote-accented grilled carrot slices, roasted beets, grilled romaine lettuce drizzled with a carrot-habanero-chile dressing and served alongside wonderfully sweet and gooey burrata. While you won’t find burritos on the menu, La Condesa does make good tacos. The slow-roasted pork in the cochinita pibil tacos (two for $10) has a great citrus and achiote flavor. While a bit dry, the tangy and smoky chicken tacos ($8) were good, too. For something more exotic, there’s the huitlacoche huarache ($15). Huitlacoche, “corn smut,” is a fungus that swells kernels of corn