Topolabamba, a Mexican restaurant in Glasgow

Wedding shopping continues. Last weekend Emily, Maria and I went to Glasgow for wedding shoe shopping. Having gone through quite a many shops, Maria managed to find a lovely pair to go with her bridesmaid's dress. I am still searching for mine....

We did not get to have lunch till almost 3.30 in the afternoon. We thought restaurants would be still quieter as it was not evening yet but not at all - one Thai restaurant we tried did not have any tables until after 8. We decided to try Topolabamba (http://www.topolabamba.com) on St Vincent Street, a newish Mexican restaurant in Glasgow.

Luckily we got a table without any problem. In fact we came at the right timing as not long after that, people started to arriving and some had to wait.

First thing first, we got to order drinks!. Poor Emily had to drive so Maria and I decided to try cocktails.  Don't worry, Emily, you will have plenty of time for 'real' drink opps this weekend for your  hen-do!

Maria decided to have Frozen Strawberry Margaritas and I decided to have Fresh Watermelon Jose Cuervo House Margaritas. 

We were expecting that Margaritas would arrive in typical Margaria glasses but they didn't, unfortunately, however frozen strawberry was very nice and my watermelon was interesting but refreshing taste.

I must however say non-alcoholic drink of Jarritos that Emily had was very very nice.  It is 100% natural ...... SUGAR!!!  According to Wikipedia (what do we do with them!), Jarritos is a popular brand of soft drink in Mexico. It is made in fruit flavours. The word jarrito means 'little jug' in Spanish, referring to the Mexian tradition of drinking water and other drinks in clay pottery jugs. Ah, that's why picture of jugs on the label! I guess this is Mexican equivalent to our Irn Bru!

There are so many to choose from the menu despite dishes are all in one sheet - to be honest I almost lost my will to live, just looking at so many words to describe about each dish. I just wanted food already.  So I decided to focus on my Watermelon Margaritas and let girls to choose for everyone. 

So what they ordered?   From Classics menu, they chose Classic Queso Fundido (home made artisan style jack cheese fondue with garlicky roasted peppers & chorizo served with corn tortilla chips). Phew,  such a long description for just an one dish!

Also Jalapeño Poppers (Poblano peppers, Japanenos, Molito cheese and corn, breadcrumbed and served with roasted Brava sauce). Sounds yummy.

Then from Street Food menu, they ordered Shrimp, chunky avocado & salsa verde tostadas; actually this was my request. I somehow liked the sound of shrimp and avocado combination and 4 chilli marks next to it indicating this is really hot!  They also ordered crispy fried fish tacos.

What else did they order?  Guacamore with Tortilla chips, Quesadillas with char roasted vegetables filling and salt & chilli pepper fries.

There are more to choose (http://www.topolabamba.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Topolabamba-Glasgow-alacartemenu1.pdf) but we had to put a stop to this at this point.

Can't wait for the food to arrive .....

Services was very good. All waiting staff were really friendly, like really friendly and awfully cheerful like waiting staff in America.  And then our food started arriving....

First, Jalapeño Poppers. This was really really good but Brava sauce is addictively spicy and hot!

And then came Guacamore with Tortilla chips.  Real home-made like Tortilla chips, not like packet of Doritos. And Guacamore was really tasty. In fact, I could go for this right now.  We were at Costco the other day and a girl was giving away samples of tortilla chips and guacamole for promotion.  I wish we bought some that day..... however these are rather high in calories so just as well as I need to start seriously thinking about slimming down around my waist to squeeze my body in that mother of bride dress. Clearly I have not done any attempt whatsoever to do this....

And you know what, salt & chilli pepper fries were really really dyno! This is soooo bad but soooo good that we ordered another bowl later on!

More foods arrived!

Crisp fried fish tacos. Three little ones so one each. To be honest, I prefer fish tacos at Las Iguanas but it's good to try different things.

Also Queso Fundido or cheese fondue arrived. I am not sure about this but girls seem to like them.

Even more foods arrived...  Quesadillas with roasted vegetables. These were quite good.

Then Shrimp, avocado & salsa verde Tostadas!  By then we started getting full so could not enjoy this as much as we could have, such a pity!

Anyhoo, we were already too full but also still have no problem to create some space for desserts. So what we had? Churros (hot Mexian doughnuts), Mexican chocolate cup and chocolate chilli ice cream.

Well, well, well. Churros were really good. I have tried Churros at few different places in Glasgow but this was the best I have had so far.  (Mind you, I have never tried Churros in Mexico, never mind outside of Glasgow, so my knowledge of what Churros should taste and look like is obviously very limited...).

Just look at the chocolate sauce .... dipping into with hot and crunchy Churros....yum!

Mexican chocolate cup was good too; chocolate was not too sweet and really smooth and creamy. I can't remember why it is 'Mexican'; what is Mexican about it???
Maria has just told me that it had chilli in it. ... was it spicy, I can't remember though....

Then also had chocolate chilli ice cream with chopped chilli in it which sometimes stuck in the back of your throat as you try to swallow ice cream.  Interesting....

Can you see some bits of chilli?

Ah, also to mention that Maria and I went to ladies for toilet check.

The deco was a bit like rustic Mexican saloon bar or shabby chic but somehow confusing, however it was clean so it passed.

Anyway, overall we really enjoyed our foods and cocktails.  Despite the amount of food we ordered, it was not hugely expensive. Service was fairly quick too. We did come in at the right time indeed. The place was really busy by the time we left. Had we come later, we could have waited for while for our foods to arrive.

We would be happy to go back and try some more dishes, but before that, we need to go and try getting a table at that Thai restaurant we couldn't get into earlier.

That's all forks!