Ghost Ranch

It is always a treat coming here. When people, in the valley or visiting, ask which Mexican restaurants in the East Valley I would recommend, this spot definitely makes the top list. During this visit, I shared the Cowboy Steak and a side of veggies. The cowboy steak has nopales, boiler onions, fingerlings, and ribeye in a delicious sauce chipotle sauce; it could be shared between two people or is substantial enough for a person with a raging appetite. (Also, as leftovers, paired with some eggs...it's the gift that keeps giving.) The vegetable mix (side) is also quite good with a savory and smokey sauce. The cornbread has peppers but not spice, and the corn tortillas are thick and authentic; both are worth getting.

I have been meaning to review this restaurant for quite a while now. We had a waitress whose name started with an "S" that served us but I can't remember her name! She was so awesome! I know it wasn't Samantha though... In case you're the owner reading this! Ghost ranch has set a new bar for my sit-down restaurant Mexican food. This is now what I expect. The opposite would be something like Si Señor... I hesitant to going because I also don't really like when places try to jazz up Mexican food in an attempt to make it fancy and expensive. This is not that. This is really good Mexican food with the flavor you expect, but jazzed up with just enough extras that add to the flavor and textures. You have to go. Full stop. No longer will I accept flavorless, monochromatic Mexican food. I want flavor, spice, and color. The other place that is close to this on flavor is my favorite La Olla Mexican food in marana, Arizona. But Ghost ranch has definitely raised that bar, and La Olla is far behind. We had a medley of dishes! The short ribs with polenta, the chicken asada, potato tacos, queso fundido, and a cheese crisp! Everything was amazing. My first gripe was the amount of extras on top of my short ribs. The flavor and texture of all of the additional vegetables was amazing, but it really took away from the presentation of the dish, which yeah doesn't really matter but I love seeing a beautiful short rib sitting on top of some mashed papas! My least favorite were probably the potato tacos. Cooked this way they quickly become soggy. But if you mash the potato, roll them into taquitos, fry them crispy, stack them double layer Cross oriented, then talk with some microgreens, and they'll HIT!