The original is so much better and only 15 miles down the road. If you're passing Casa Grande on the way to Tucson, just keep driving and get off at Sunland Gin--you won't be sorry. The first Eva's, in Arizona city, has been around forever. It's ingredients are fresh (or more fresh, at least) and it's service can't be beat: You feel like family! The tiny restaurant's decor though...At the prime Mexican eatery everything is claustrophobic, artificial and intense. Just like a family owned business should be.\n\nGustavo had fond memories of the newer Eva's decor though, and so we went. Spanish baraque anyone?\n\nWe ate here together once with my friend from Chandler who met us halfway between her house and our home in Tucson. If I'm honest, I'd been here a dozen times before. I used to live in that little hole of a town. Glad I'm out, but I sill miss it at times and it's great to visit my mother, who lives there now to be close to her mother and sisters--my awesome grandma and super-cool aunts--uncles and cousins.\n\nThat's what we were in town for and, after some kick-butt garage sales and a little bit of thrift store salvage finding, we opted to go back to Eva's and give it another go.\n\nA note on Decor: Gorgeous. But maintenance has fallen off. Much of the courtyard Spanish jungle has withered and browned. There are even some fake (and broken) plastic cheapos lurking in the remains of the burnt-amber undergrowth. I was sad to see the lush garden fall into disrepair.\n\nDay-old beer bottles with smelly cigarette floaters dotted the grotto inspired tiled tables that I think about backing the truck in to load up every time I'm there. Terrible. Inside there was dust--and not a sprinkling. But the Spain imported dome still lazy curls down the rounded building top singing a lascivious song of promise, just as the similarly shipped and elaborate archangel, carved of solid wood and blood and shine, beckons the unsuspecting traveler into the dining room with it's polish, poise and holy stature. \n\nThese are the sirens of the Sonora desert, folks; promising shelter, food and comfort and delivering, if not death, disappointment and a belly full of underwhelming fire and acid reflux. Beware the rocks of cottage cheese, you stalwart sand-sailor you; the guacamole is disgusting and they charge for every side of every thing.\n\nFrom Mexico, Gustavo is both a lover and an authority on accurate traditional Mexican cuisine. He's especially critical of pork adobada and, as the fates would have it, that's what he ordered at Eva's: an adobada filled chimi.\n\nHe hated it. From the first bite, he complained of the too-sweet flavors and the strange sour aftertaste. It was wet, his tortilla--as thick and floury as it was--bowed in the middle and fell apart. And, he never even picked it up. The guacamole had him gagging. And the jalapeno white cream-cheese sour-cream jalapeno sauce--or something, the-title-had-like-seven-words--was, and I quote (minus the bad-words) \"microwaved, lumpy, tepid, sour cream.\" He was a bit more vivid, but I only have so many characters and I poses, in my esteem, a bit more tact.\n\nMy mother and I fared a bit better. I didn't hate my spinich enchilads, they were just \"ehh...\" and the sauce that topped them was alright, but bland. I ordered the same multi-titled sauce as Gustavo, but mine, I don't think, had been processed and cooked nearly as many times as his had. There were no lumps (hopefully, flour?) in it. But it lacked the kick I was expecting, that's for sure.\n\nMom ordered the mini-chimi platter and said the tortilla was hard and the meats were bland. She did love the Baja sauce though and, having uttered her disdain for the place before we sat down, was surprised to a moderate extent.\n\nBeer selection was a joke. They list several San Tan brews on tap and were out of all of them. The inattentive waitress--who never refilled our salsa (the best and most flavorful menu item; also the freshest and free-est) said: \"Oh yeah, we're out of that. And that. And tha--it's such an old menu, they should really update it.\" I ended up pounding two pints of \"Victoria\" I suspect had been sitting in the keg for quite sometime. Pure speculation though, and I don't expect you to take my word for it. Try it for yourself.\n\nThat's all there is. Much less gaiety than expected in this grub, despite all the glitz, glam and color of the place.\n\n-Fairy Food Father
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