Centro in Raleigh

One of my favorite trends in the restaurant world is the influx of chefs elevating "standard" ethnic cuisine either with modern twists or more upscale ingredients and preparations.  One such example is Vivace in North Hills (Italian) and another is J. Betski's in Raleigh (German / Polish).  Last night, Jessica and I joined a friend for dinner at Centro (http://www.centroraleigh.com/) on Wilmington Street in downtown Raleigh.  Billed as a Mexican restaurant and tequila bar, Centro isn't a regular restaurant serving chicken quesadillas and boring tacos.  Instead, they use fresh ingredients and more authentic preparations (which come with a larger price tag if you're used to $1 tacos!) to create a unique dining experience.

The restaurant itself is VERY small and doesn't take reservations... this can lead to long wait times even if you call ahead to get in line (which didn't work for us anyway) but the bar is more than willing to take you on.  Our party tried their margaritas and also their take on an Old Fashioned, and we were not disappointed.  The cocktails were well-made; fresh and flavorful with a lot of "Mexican" ingredients and flavors.  After waiting for thirty minutes or so, a table was finally ready for us.

To start, the server brought a shot of spicy, corn-broth soup.  My experience with corn soups is that they are creamy; instead, this was more like water but packed with great flavor and a fair amount of heat.  I always enjoy when restaurants start the meal with something like this (whether here it qualifies as an amuse bouche I don't know) because it shows they are proud of their concepts and cooking methods.  After the soup, we treated ourselves to their queso with chorizo.  It was, clearly, delicious, as was the standard salsa served with their fresh-made chips.  I'm normally not a salsa person but I could have eaten my whole bowl here.

For my main course, I went with the Chile Sureno... a poblano pepper stuffed with cheesy grits, mushrooms, onions, and shrimp.  The gravy, allegedly made with tequila and ancho chilies, was amazing but not identifiable with those two flavors for me.  I thought the dish (pictured above) featured the broth best, with the grits soaking up a lot of the flavor.  The shrimp were well-cooked although I think serving them without tails would make the eating experience simpler (without losing presentation points).  My minor complaint for the dish would be that it needed a bit more salt, but I got over it and cleared my plate save for the mushrooms, which is no surprise to anyone who knows me.  The portion was perfect too; I was full without feeling miserable as is often the case with more casual Mexican places.  Both Jessica and Matt liked their entrees as well (Tinga Poblana for Jessica and Tacos de Pescado for Matt).

Centro focuses on preparations of fresh ingredients with their simple menu (I thought almost everything sounded great) in a wonderful atmosphere to dine.  Throughout our entire time drinking and dining, every table was filled with a line of people out the door.  I think they hit the mark on every dish and drink I tried; their food seems more "authentic" than Mez in Durham even if Mez has a wider range of choices and is probably my prefered choice.  Regardless, for a fun night out when time isn't super critical, I think Centro is a wonderful place to start with a fresh, festive meal.