South Austin Soul Food - Polvos (for Caroline)

As a writer, I find my reasons for writing as various as a cowboy finds reasons for riding a horse, or a drunk finds reasons for drinking, or a holy roller finds reasons for praying. Today, I am sitting in the Atrium Cafe in the St. David's Medical Center (it's a hospital, just for those of you who, like me, are intolerant of clunky euphemisms) while my wife is asleep in a room upstairs. She's been in labor for nearly 24 hours now - an experience that, for those of us who haven't witnessed or undergone it and therefore might have some difficulty appreciating it, is like taking a very, very hard hit from Lawrence Taylor in excruciatingly slow motion; a 24-hour-and-counting tackle. It is to Caroline and her indomitable strength that I dedicate this column.

You can't come to Austin and not eat Tex-Mex - this is so basic that it's gospel. Last September, after a 12 hour day which was the fifth such day in our drive from Oregon (we took a somewhat circuitous route, which is why it took us nearly 60 hours), my wife and I arrived back in Austin ragged, road-weary and generally uninterested, unwilling and we thought unable to stand another minute, another second, another nanosecond in our car. We were stuck in a lousy hotel out on 290 where the carpet smelled like chemicals and the bedspread looked like it had been polished with turtle wax. We needed sleep and we needed food, and while it seemed like getting back into the car was the very last thing of which, in our attenuated state, we were capable, the thought of Polvos was like a shot of pitocin to our travel-weary muscles. We couldn't agree on who got what side of the bed, the cable control, or to piss first, what got brought in from the car and by whom, whether the dog should be brought or left, whether we should, in truth, have come to Austin in the first place, whether we loved each other any more, whether the sky was up and the economy down, but there was no discussion here: first thing, no question, go eat at Polvos. Gimme some of that queso.

Polvos sits on South First St., a busy thoroughfare that divides Soco from the Bouldin Creek neighborhood. A large, shaded verandah looks over, well, a parking lot. Many of the tables are plastic topped, the chairs folding, the music wildly variable. Nothing about this place is precious - except the food. Which isn't to say it's mincey and delicate, dollops, shavings and sprinkles. This is hearty fare, but prepared with care and that oh-so-often missing ingredient in restaurants (so often that we sometimes forget to look for it): a love of food. Maybe it's pretty, pricey, organic, free-range or trendy, but if the cooks or chefs don't love the taste of food, it shows like sleaze on a used car salesman.

Let's start with the basics - at Polvos: magaritas, chips and queso. The chips are good and fresh, unsalted so you can eat them how you like, a perfectly benign vehicle. The queso is delicious. For those of you not in or from Texas, who have never had queso, think somewhere in a populist middle ground between cheese fondue and the stuff you spray on Ritz crackers. Queso is a soupy, goopy bowl of beer laden cheesy goodness served with a pile of sauteed beef crumbles, cilantro, jalapenos and onions that you add to taste. We always add it all, give it a good stir and gobble it down.

Then there are the margaritas. The margarita is a Texas invention, and it's as simple as pie: lime juice, sugar, triple sec and tequila, stir or, if you want it frozen, blend and you've got a recipe for a great night and bad morning. The margs at Polvos are three things that they need to be: limey, large and strong. The way to fuck up a margarita is to use lime extract, Rose's lime juice, reconstituted lime juice or any other substitute for the real thing (including all mixes). Polvos does not, and the proof is in the flavor. Real lime juice has a perfume and subtle sweetness that neither overwhelms nor leaves intact the desert herby taste of the tequila. In a renaissance age of the mixed drink, the margarita stands as an example of the merits of simple preparation and good ingredients. A 'top shelf' margarita is a waste of expensive tequila, Grand Marnier and a poser's cash; this drink is just as good with Cuervo (or worse, if there is such a thing) and your locally made triple sec as long as you have that one, right thing - fresh lime juice. There are, in Austin, literally scores of good margaritas to be had and they all have this in common.

Polvos has a few dishes I go back for over and over. The migas are the best breakfast in South Austin - said with apologies to The Magnolia, but without qualification. The chips are just stale enough to give a slight crunch and an excellent chew, the jalapenos are fresh rather than brined, and the chorizo smoky and delicious. Add some cheese on top, a swirl of refried beans and a stack of tortillas to eat it with and you've got what mankind has been looking for for centuries, nay, millenia with limited success: the perfect cure for the common hangover.

Enchiladas are the mainstay of the menu at Polvos, with a dizzying variety of fillings and salsas that allow you to indulge your limited math skills in the construction of your meal. Fillings range from the pedestrian - chicken, cheese, picadillo - to the traditional - guisado and al pastor. The salsas could keep you busy for days. Fifteen varieties, and rather than summarize, I'll put 'em all here: tomatillo, mole, carne guisado, chiptole, roja, chili con queso, poblano, ranchero, ahumada, haustaca, cartuja, pipian, margarita, veracruzano, calientes. Not an enchilada man myself (nothing against them, but they aren't my favorite), my trusted sources have yet to find a bad combination, and for the most part they are great to excellent.

A couple of dishes you should try: the chile rellenos al Nogal are a surprising and superb dish, the peppers large, stuffed to capacity with your choice of filling and then smothered in a nutty, caramelly and slightly sweet pecan cream sauce. It is rich and filling but delicate and delicious as well, and something I have found nowhere else. Also excellent is the Michocan salad - basically pico de gallo with a generous addition of chopped avocado and, again, fresh lime - an excellent appetizer, especially when combined with a margarita or three.

As with many tex-mex joints, the menu at Polvos is extensive, and, as examplified by the enchiladas, combinatory. I have not, I confess, plumbed its depths entirely, but I've rooted around enough to know that this is a restaurant driven by the taste buds. In the Age of Commercialism, as this one will come to be known once the corrective lenses of history have been put on our societal noses, there are many, many factors that go to make up a dining experience, and only a very few of them have anything to do with food. Atmosphere, reputation, location, scenesterism, jargons (sustainable, chemical-free, heart-friendly, wild-caught, gmo-transfat-cholesterol-artificial-everything-and-flavor free [ack], vegan [double ack]) - all employed to sell us food. And make no mistake, it's a market, not a place of worship that throws around all of this self-sanctified language. I find it fascinating in an anthropological sense, but utterly corrupt and even immoral as a writer and as an eater. Food is elemental, it is physical and sensual, visceral and intimate; it is not rhetorical, metaphorical or euphemistic - not when it's good anyway. This is not to say that there are not great fancy restaurants, but to say that the greatness of these restaurants starts with the same thing that the greatness of Polvos starts with; the mouth, the nose and the belly.

In the course of this column's gestation and completion, my wife Caroline gave birth to Elias Harper Wilson Wei, our son. A gourmand he is not - yet - his appetite running the very narrow spectrum from right to left breast, but are you going to argue to me that he gains less satisfaction from his 'dining experience' than I would at the French Laundry? You can make the point, and probably do it elegantly, perhaps substantively, amusingly and maybe even compellingly. Consider this, however - wailing, vocal cord wrenching, red-faced despair to silent, angelic joy in the time it takes to put his mouth on the source. Go ahead, make your case; I'm not buying it. Polvos, as all good restaurants, starts with a love of food, a physical, personal, passionate love. Like family, it all flows from there. So go there, grab yourself a folding chair, stuff a paper napkin into your shirt, ignore the Subaru that just pulled up to one end of your table and order a marg and some queso - and make sure you do it with loved ones.

And while he ain't eatin' any queso yet, you better believe that Elias is gonna be weaned on Polvos. Goddamn skippy.