Augusta Eats: Sample Mexican menu or skip to array of Mexican desserts on Washington Road
Parents of small children are familiar with the typical dining-out routine.
“When I have my kids or when family members come visit, we go eat at one place then get dessert at a different place,” Oscar Ortiz said. “Here, they can eat and have dessert in the same place.”
Ortiz runs La Michoacana Creamery and Mexican Grill at 2805 Washington Rd., specializing in handmade frozen Mexican desserts. The Augusta restaurant has been open for about a year-and-a-half, but the concept reaches back further.
The phrase “la michoacana” is instantly recognizable in Mexico and other Spanish-speaking countries as a place to enjoy cold treats such as ice cream, yogurt, popsicles and fruit juices, all made from scratch. That’s what Ortiz counted on. Even though “diversity is growing” in the Augusta area, he was a bit skeptical about a Spanish business name for an American audience.
“When you open a La Michoacana, it’s going to be a good start with the Spanish-speaking customers, so they’ll know,” Ortiz said. Word of mouth, he added, would come later, and it did.
Ortiz moved to Augusta with his family when he was 10. With his family in the restaurant business, he grew up washing dishes, bussing tables, serving and cooking, learning the ins and outs of the restaurant like his mother did before starting a restaurant of her own in south Augusta.
Ortiz got the idea to open La Michoacana about three years ago while visiting relatives in Chicago, where an estimated 12.5% of Chicago’s Mexicans are from Michoacan, the state in Mexico where the dessert shops get their name. Las Michoacanas thrive throughout Chicago, so Ortiz thought: Why not bring that different taste to Augusta?
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Unlike many similar dessert shops, the Augusta shop also features a robust dining menu representing a mixture of the familiar and the traditional.
Sharon Arnold of North Augusta visited La Michoacana on Wednesday for lunch, where she said the staff “know what they’re doing back there,” giving a thumbs-up on the menu’s authenticity as a “former Californian,” she said.
“We try to keep it simple, but we also try to incorporate something traditional for people to try, to have something different,” Ortiz said. “We have our own recipes and our own traditional touch to it.”
La Michoacana is one of just a few area Hispanic restaurants that serve menudo, a Mexican soup containing cow’s stomach. Another savory menu item is birria ramen, which pairs the flavor of a Mexican cal de res soup with Asian ramen noodles.
Other vendors sell ice cream and popsicles. La Michoacana offers treats such as the mangonada, featuring mango ice cream with real mangos, topped with chamoy – a Mexican condiment made from pickled fruit – and candied tamarind straws.
Some ice cream flavors won’t be easy to find elsewhere. One flavor that bends toward tradition is gancito, named for a popular Mexican chocolate-covered snack cake filled with strawberries and cream.
Is La Michoacana part of a chain? It is and it isn’t. More typical chains such as McDonald’s maintain strong oversight over each location to ensure uniformity. The La Michoacana “chain” is more of a concept and a business model composed of family-run businesses, with no formal company uniting them as a more conventional franchise.
When training employees, Ortiz said he emphasizes that all homemade menu items have one common ingredient.
“Two people can have the same recipe, but it depends on the amount of love you put into it, and that’s the result you’re going to get,” he said. “In Mexico, we have a saying that ‘love comes through the belly.’ And that’s true. Make something with love and people will enjoy it more.”
This article originally appeared on Augusta Chronicle: Come for traditional Mexican food but stay for the handmade desserts
