Where there is smoke there is chicken!

If we are driving anytime from mid-morning till early evening there will be smoke by the side of the road . . . every road!

Clouds of it mark the many roadside restaurants and alcoves where you can pull up and buy the most delicious chicken, potatoes/rice and coleslaw. If you like, you can “eat in” although at first glance you may not recognize that the one or two plastic tables, under a tarp, equal a restaurant. The accoutrements leave a lot to be desired but once seated and served you get so lost in the flavor that the dust devils set swirling by endless, noisy traffic, goes unnoticed for the most part.

Don’t let me give you the impression that all of the pollos (Spanish word for chicken) places are the same. There are some large operations lakeside with dozens of plastic tables and chairs, an expanded menu, and men and boys waiving red cloths and whistling you into open air restaurants where the water, when the level is high enough, laps at the concrete or dirt pad where you may be seated. Again, the food is wonderful and served so hot that you can hear it sizzling before it arrives at the table.

As an added bonus, if the view and the ambience fail to delight, then perhaps the Mariachi in their silver studded charro outfits will put a song in your heart. These wandering minstrels play an assortment of string instruments and trumpets and sing of love, hate, betrayal, politics, often with a seemingly tongue in cheek presentation.