He’s hungry as a wolf; she does the happy crocodile dance

I have been meaning to write about the kitchen inside Border Psycho’s tap room for a while. Border Psycho is one of the few breweries in Tijuana that exports to the U.S., a well-established craft beer notable for playing naughty.

One of their first beers is called Belga Psicotica, which translates to Psychotic Belgian. The joke here is that belga is a play on words for verga (slang for penis). With 20 beers on the menu, all taps are different types and shapes of dildos. Bathrooms are labeled “perversas and psychos.”

Since they opened they have changed their menu several times, trying to figure out what works. What was working for me was their vegetable tostada and a chimichurri Argentinean chorizo. But I was waiting for them to have definite menu before putting it into writing.

I went in last week to find out that they have scrapped their kitchen and replaced it with The Rib Shop. Plaza Fiesta is constantly changing. One of the owners of Border Psycho told me that they intend to have a rotating kitchen. The current one will be there for six months to a year. People still ask for the previous menu, but it has been wiped.

I have heard mixed reviews about The Rib Shop, which is a food truck located in the neighborhood of La Cacho. I had invited a date to Border Psycho, trusting that their beer and food would be on point. My date was an hour late but was kind enough to let me know. Hungry as the wolf, I ordered a maple-bacon sandwich for $6.

A generous amount of floppy, chewy, and very sweet bacon in between soft ciabatta, the sandwich tasted like breakfast. Crispiness to the bacon would have gone a long way. The fries were very limp yet not soggy. Not bad overall. Good flavor, just lacking some stiffness for the bacon and the fries (which were lemon peppered). I chased it all down with a flight of five beers ($5).

When my date arrived, she ordered exactly what I was hoping she would, the ribs. As the plate arrived, she did a happy dance similar to the crocodile in Peter Pan when Captain Hook is about to fall in the water.

The plate of three ribs for $6 was fantastic. It is rare to find ribs cooked the right way in Mexico. They usually slather them with sweet cheap barbecue sauce from Costco, ruining the flavor of the meat. But not The Rib Shop. They slow cook them for more than five hours at the home of the chef. The meat falls off the bone and has a smoky flavor.

As we left Border Psycho to try one of the other 20 tap rooms that Plaza Fiesta has, I spotted the marinated octopus plate. It looked fantastic, and I will have to try it next time. That’s unless everything changes again, and The Rib Shop gets replaced by who knows what.