Casa Sanchez ~ Colorado chain : Buena Vista

First visit: Apr 2024 (Buena Vista)

Locations: This restaurant is known as Casa Sanchez 3. Casa Sanchez 2 is in Leadville. There are two other Casa Sanchez's in Colorado: one in Frisco, the other Fairplay. They sport the same logo but have different websites. We'll presume different ownership but a common beginning.

For the next morning we decided to walk the Sands Lake SWA trails in Salida. Stunning scenery of the snow capped mountains with the sounds of running water beneath. After that, it was time to head on home. Rather than going back from whence we came, we decided on taking a circle route through Buena Vista, and that will be our lunch destination.

Mrs. RJG surprised me again by suggesting Mexican. This was the staple of the RJG lunch diet for many years. Well it still is - considering Mrs. RJG is, in fact, Mexican. But going out for Mexican is a different story and we rarely do that anymore. Based on reviews and the fact that we would be arriving a bit early at 10:30, Casa Sanchez looked like a good choice. It's a nice spacious location with a few rooms decorated in the rustic style.

Been ages since we craved chips and salsa, but we were there this Sunday morning. Chips were fine, crispy and flavorful. They brought out two salsas - a medium red chipotle sauce and a mild green avocado. I thought the former could use more taste, and surprisingly I enjoyed the latter more. I'm not usually fond of the style. I asked for a hotter one, and the waiter said he would check... and never got back to us. Guessing no, or he may have forgotten altogether. For lunch I ordered the chipotle enchiladas with rice and beans. Not what I expected. I'm looking for a dark sauce with a smoky flavor but instead I got a very creamy (sour cream I'm guessing) slightly spicy dish. It was almost like a Suiza sauce, it was so white. It was OK, but not really my kind of enchilada. The rice was fine but needed to be hotter temperature. The beans were very saucy - too much so and had little flavor. 

Conversely Mrs. RJG had the carne asada plate. I tried some of the steak - thin cut flank that was very salty but delicious. She enjoyed the rest as well. Her rice was hotter indicating my dish may have been sitting around a few minutes while hers was cooking. Came with a grilled jalapeno that she really liked. She made some homemade taquitos with the corn tortillas as well. We both only had water to drink.

Overall verdict is we probably won't return. But if someone insisted we try it again, we'll give it a go. Seemed like nice folks running the restaurant.

And this closed out the trip after stopping by one shop in Buena Vista. It was a beautiful blue sky day so the views were stunning all the way home.

4/14/24 (new entry)