Restaurants & Bars

This MI Eatery Made The New York Times' List Of Best Mexican Restaurants

One Michigan restaurant landed a spot in the New York Times' list of best Mexican restaurants.

A Michigan restaurant landed a spot in the New York Times' list of best Mexican restaurants.

Vecino, located in Detroit's Midtown neighborhood, made the list.

The restaurant, which opened two years ago, draws similarities to upscale restaurants in Mexico City. It features several custom touches, such as exposed brick walls and Spanish moss native to Mexico.

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Vecino's menu is simple but innovative. It features traditional dishes such as enchiladas, tostadas and tlayuda, and more elaborate dishes like duck enchiladas under salsa verde.

They also source non-GMO corn from Mexico that the chefs use to make their own corn dough through a special technique known as nixtamalization.

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"The results — butterflied whole snapper painted with verde and roja salsas, airy tetelas stuffed with carrot tinga, luscious sikil pak pumpkin seed salsa — carry the thrill of what Ms. Jiménez discovered when she finally returned: a valuable inheritance she didn’t know she had," the Times' Brett Anderson wrote.

The Times also noted Vecino is located close to where co-owner Adriana Jiménez spent most of her childhood after fleeing violence in Mexico City in the 1990s.

"Ms. Jiménez didn’t return to the city of her birth until adulthood, after the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program made her a permanent legal resident of the United States," Anderson wrote.

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