Combo #2 at La Casita Gastown

Combo number two @ $11
Tortilla Soup & 2 Flautas or Black Bean Soup & Salad Quesadillas

Soup is a generally warm food that is made by combining ingredients such as meat and vegetables with stock, juice, water, or another liquid. Hot soups are additionally characterized by boiling solid ingredients in liquids in a pot until the flavors are extracted, forming a broth. Traditionally, soups are classified into two main groups: clear soups and thick soups. The established French classifications of clear soups are bouillon and consomme. Thick soups are classified depending upon the type of thickening agent used: purees are vegetable soups thickened with starch; bisques are made from pureed shellfish or vegetables thickened with cream; cream soups may be thickened with bechamel sauce; and veloutes are thickened with eggs, butter, and cream. Other ingredients commonly used to thicken soups and broths include rice, lentils, flour, and grains; many popular soups also include carrots and potatoes.

Tortilla means “little torta” or “little cake” in Spanish; the Spanish word applies to several different foods eaten in various Spanish-speaking countries. The Spanish word is used in English for a more restricted range of foods, mainly a potato-based omelette originating in Spain, and for a flatbread made from corn or wheat originally made by Mesoamerican peoples.

A taco is a traditional Mexican dish composed of a corn or wheat tortilla folded or rolled around a filling. A taco can be made with a variety of fillings, including beef, chicken, seafood, vegetables and cheese, allowing for great versatility and variety. A taco is generally eaten without utensils and is often accompanied by garnishes such as salsa, avocado or guacamole, cilantro, tomatoes, minced meat, onions and lettuce.

The small, shiny black turtle bean is especially popular in Latin American cuisine, though it can also be found in Cajun and Creole cuisines of south Louisiana. It is often called simply the black bean (frijol negro, zaragoza, poroto negro, caraota o habichuela negra in Spanish, and feijão preto in Portuguese), although this can cause confusion with other black beans.

A quesadilla is a flour or corn tortilla filled with a savoury mixture containing cheese and other ingredients, then folded in half to form a half-moon shape. This dish originated in Mexico, and the name is derived from the Spanish word queso (cheese).

Example of combo #2 at La Casita Gastown:

Kinda saint in flowers - stained glass

La Casita Gastown Interior

Combo #6 at La Casita Gastown

Combo #6 @ $19
1 Mini Beef Burrito & 2 Mole Enchiladas with Rice, Beans and Salad

A burrito, or taco de harina, is a type of Mexican food. It consists of a wheat flour tortilla wrapped or folded into a roughly cylindrical shape to completely enclose a filling. (In contrast, a taco is generally formed by simply folding a tortilla in half around a filling, leaving the semicircular perimeter open.) The flour tortilla is usually lightly grilled or steamed, to soften it and make it more pliable.

In Mexico, refried beans or meat are sometimes the only fillings. In the United States, however, fillings generally include a combination of ingredients such as Mexican-style rice or plain rice, refried beans or beans, lettuce, salsa, meat, avocado, cheese, and sour cream, and the size varies, with some burritos considerably larger than their Mexican counterparts.

An enchilada is a corn tortilla rolled around a filling and covered with a chili pepper sauce. Enchiladas can be filled with a variety of ingredients, including meat, cheese, beans, potatoes, vegetables, seafood or combinations.

Example of combo #6 at La Casita Gastown:

Combo #5 at La Casita Gastown

Combo #5 @ $17
1 Chorizo Quesadilla & 1 Beef Chimichanga with Rice, Beans, & Salad

Chorizo is a term encompassing several types of pork sausages originating from the Iberian Peninsula.

Chorizo can be a fresh sausage, in which case it must be cooked before eating. In Europe, it is more frequently a fermented, cured, smoked sausage, in which case it is usually sliced and eaten without cooking. Spanish chorizo and Portuguese chouriço get their distinctive smokiness and deep red color from dried smoked red peppers (pimentón/pimentão or colorau). Due to culinary tradition, and the expense of imported Spanish smoked paprika, Mexican chorizo (but not throughout Latin America) is usually made with chili peppers, which are used abundantly in Mexican cuisine. In Latin America, vinegar also tends to be used instead of the white wine usually used in Spain. Traditionally, chorizo is encased in natural casings made from intestines, a method used since the Roman times.

A quesadilla is a flour or corn tortilla filled with a savoury mixture containing cheese and other ingredients, then folded in half to form a half-moon shape. This dish originated in Mexico, and the name is derived from the Spanish word queso (cheese).

Chimichanga, also known as chivichanga or chimmy chonga is a deep-fried burrito that is popular in Southwestern U.S. cuisine, Tex-Mex cuisine, and the Mexican states of Sinaloa and Sonora. The dish is typically prepared by filling a flour tortilla with a wide range of ingredients, most commonly rice, cheese, machaca, carne adobada, or shredded chicken, and folding it into a rectangular package. It is then deep-fried and can be accompanied with salsa, guacamole, sour cream and/or cheese. Many restaurants offer non-fried chimichangas, which are similar to normal burritos, with cheese sauce, guacamole, and tomato.

Example of combo #5 at La Casita Gastown:

Churros at La Casita Gastown

Churros $3
Mexican cinnamon-sugar coated straight doughnut

A churro, sometimes referred to as a Spanish doughnut, is a fried-dough pastry—predominantly choux—based snack. Churros are popular in Spain, France, Portugal, Latin America (including Spanish-speaking Caribbean islands) and the United States. There are two types of churros in Spain, one which is thin (and sometimes knotted) and the other which is long and thick (porra). They are both normally eaten for breakfast dipped in hot chocolate or café con leche.

Example of churros at La Casita Gastown:

Flan at La Casita Gastown

Flan $4
custard caramel al Chilango

Flan is a tart, a type of pie, with a base of shortcrust pastry. An example is a quiche. In both savoury and sweet flans the filling tends to be based on a thick custard. However there are some types of flans not based on custard, such as the bakewell tart. The British savoury flans may have diverged from the sweeter Spanish flans in the Middle Ages.

Crème caramel, flan, or caramel custard is a custard dessert with a layer of soft caramel on top, as opposed to crème brûlée, which is custard with a hard caramel top. The dish is eaten throughout the world.

Crème caramel is a variant of plain custard (crème) where sugar syrup cooked to caramel stage is poured into the mold before adding the custard base. It is usually cooked in a bain-marie on a stove top or in the oven in a water bath. It is turned and served with the caramel sauce on top, hence the alternate French name crème caramel renversée.

Example of flan at La Casita Gastown:

Casita Sundae at La Casita Gastown

Casita Sundae $6.5
a churro & vanilla ice cream, topped with whipped cream, abuelita sprinkles, and strawberry puree

The sundae is an ice cream dessert. It typically consists of a scoop of ice cream topped with sauce or syrup, and in some cases other toppings including chopped nuts, sprinkles, whipped cream, or maraschino cherries.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the origin of the term sundae is obscure, however, it is generally accepted that the spelling “sundae” derives from the word Sunday or, according to one source, from the German name Sonntag, which means Sunday.

Among the many stories about the invention of the sundae, a frequent theme is that the dish arose in contravention to so-called blue laws against Sunday consumption of either ice cream or ice cream soda. The religious laws are said to have led druggists to produce a substitute for these popular treats for consumption on Sunday. According to this theory of the name’s origin, the spelling was changed to sundae to avoid offending religious conventions.

In support of this idea, Peter Bird wrote in The First Food Empire: A History of J. Lyons and Co. (2000) that the name ‘sundae’ was adopted as a result of Illinois state’s early prohibition of ice cream consumption on Sundays, because ice cream with a topping that obscured the main product was not deemed to be ice cream. However, according to documentation published by the Evanston Public Library (Illinois), it was the drinking of soda, not the eating of ice cream, that was outlawed on Sundays in Illinois.

A churro, sometimes referred to as a Spanish doughnut, is a fried-dough pastry—predominantly choux—based snack. Churros are popular in Spain, France, Portugal, Latin America (including Spanish-speaking Caribbean islands) and the United States. There are two types of churros in Spain, one which is thin (and sometimes knotted) and the other which is long and thick (porra). They are both normally eaten for breakfast dipped in hot chocolate or café con leche.

Abuelita is a brand of chocolate tablets, or powdered mix in individual packets, made by Nestlé and used to make Mexican-style hot chocolate. It was originally invented in Mexico in 1963. The name is an affectionate Spanish word for “grandma” (literally translated as “little grandmother” or “granny”). Since 1973 the Mexican actress Sara García has been the image for the brand before it was acquired by the Swiss company.

Example of casita sundae at La Casita Gastown: