A trifecta of flavor

A review of three local restaurants: La Casita Chilanga, Humphry Slocombe, and Venga Empanadas

BY LUCIA KITCHING Staff Reporter

In the heart of Redwood City, Sequoia High School lies just walking distance from a downtown area filled with restaurants with variety in size, price and flavor. For students who enjoy the popular activity of walking downtown for lunch with friends, Redwood City offers many culturally diverse food options as well.

Whether they are smaller or less popular than other chains, these hidden gems deserve to be discussed. I’ve decided to unearth three of these gems by trying out La Casita Chilanga, Humphry Slocombe ice cream and Venga Empanadas.

Directly across the street from Sequoia, La Casita Chilanga is a small restaurant specializing in Mexican food. Less than a minute away, you need only exit on the corner of Broadway and El Camino Real and turn left to arrive. With a wide variety of food including tortas, sopes, burritos tacos and flautas, there is something for everyone.

I ordered a carne asada taco and a medium horchata, a traditional drink of rice milk and cinnamon.

For $3.95, the taco consisted of well-seasoned carne asada, onions, cilantro and salsa. The food was ready in five minutes, with helpful and friendly service.

Continue on Broadway for five blocks, and after the cross street Jefferson Ave, you will find Humphry Slocombe, a unique ice cream shop.

The store specializes in their distinct ice cream flavors, differing from more popular flavors such as vanilla, chocolate and mint chip. Instead, they feature flavors such as Vietnamese coffee, malted milk chocolate, black sesame, peanut butter fudge ripple and cherry elderflower.

I ordered the malted milk chocolate and honey graham, for the price of $5.50 for a single scoop. I ordered the malted milk chocolate and honey graham, for the price of $5.50 for a single scoop. For that price, I received two large scoops of each flavor.

“The owners who started all this were kind of bored of all the normal ice cream flavors and they kind of wanted to shake it up so we do weird stuff like bourbon flavors or cherry with flour in it,” a Humphry Slocombe employee said. “So it’s just that I guess to make it a little different.”

Continue on Broadway and turn right onto Main Street to find Venga Empanadas, a shop that is known for their delicious empanadas, as well as several drink, salad and soup options. For just $5.50, you can buy a meat or veggie empanada.

The store offers a very inclusive menu with lots of vegetarian options, such as a mushroom, fresh spinach and mediterranean empanada.

I ordered two empanadas - an argentine beef and five pepper manchego. I was also offered a dipping sauce of chimichurri, an uncooked sauce found in Argentinian and Uruguayan cooking made mainly of parsley and garlic.

“Lo que me gusta es aprender y conversar con la gente. No solamente entrego las empanadas; pongo las instrucciones de el nombre, el sabor, si los llevan frías, que temperatura, cuanto tiempo cocinar por el cliente así que pueden entender cuando están en casa,” a Venga employee said. “Vas aprender lo que cada cliente desea. No es igual.”

“What I like is learning and talking with people. I don’t just deliver the empanadas; I put the instructions on the name, the flavor, if they are cold, what temperature, how long to cook for the client so they can understand when they are at home,” a Venga employee said. “ You will learn what each client wants. It is not the same.”

If you want to try new, innovative ice cream, head over to Humphry Slocombe for delicious new flavors.