Frida Restaurant

Last Saturday night while trying to find a new place to eat with my boyfriend, we realized we had not tried the new Frida Restaurant, at the Americana at Brand shopping and dinning development in Glendale. So we got in the car and drove to Frida.

As we had already experience in the past by coming to the Americana, the parking is very convenient and the service is good.

The restaurant had a good atmosphere and the décor really impressed me, it was a mix of traditional Mexican techniques and modern culture. In the middle of the room, right between the patio and the inside of the restaurant was a glass curtain. The glass curtain was the perfect system to combine the inside and the outside in one easy flow. It made the restaurant seem bigger and the breeze from the night was refreshing. The restaurant was well designed and decorated. Very appropriate for a Mexican restaurant in Los Angeles, it brought a piece of Mexican art with the contemporary culture of LA.

When we arrived the restaurant was almost full, so we wrote our names and waited about 5-10 min. We were promptly seated and the waiter came by quickly with chips and salsa and offered drinks. The waiter brought two types of salsa, a red on and a guacamole one. The red one had a smoke dried chile taste and the second one a lime cilantro flavor. The first salsa was okay, but the second one was too liquid. I didn’t know at the beginning it was supposed to be guacamole, because it seemed diluted with water. My boyfriend decided to try a Mezcal: Gusano rojo (Red Worm) shot of tequila, which runs about $8. According to him the tequila was not bad, but nothing amazing either. It was served with a red chile/salsa type of drink to complement the shot. A different waiter took our order, we both wanted to try the Pechuga Fogata (Bonfire Chicken Breast) which ran about $16. When it arrived, by a different waiter, it was a red butterfly half chicken breast with a sauté mushroom balsamic salad. The salad was delicious, sweet and tangy, just the right flavor. The chicken had a smoked sweet roasted pepper taste. It had been longed marinated and then quickly grilled, served with a little bit of the same taste sauce on top. The texture was good, a thin layer of chicken with just the right moisture, not dry at all. But for me the salad did not complement the chicken, and the chicken fell short to my expectations. The taste was good, but not worth of eating it again. On the other side my boyfriend really enjoyed it. So it may just have been that I did not appreciate the heavy smoked roasted pepper taste. At the end the service was good, but I wish we would have had only one server through the night. The food most likely will not make me come back, but it wasn’t horrible. I might give it a try at a different night…

Overall it was decent, but not as I had imagined it. It defiantly fell short to my expectations. The service was good, but the food was not as I had anticipated. Not one of my favorite places, defiantly not on my favorite list. At the end I was more impressed with the décor than with the food.


Frida Mexican Cuisine Glendale
www.fridarestaurant.com
The Americana at Brand 750 Americana Way
Glendale, CA 91210
(818) 551-1666