Marvelous Molé

The dinner club rang in our 15th meeting by heading south--not quite to the border, but to south Kansas City to eat at Guadalajara.

Ambiance: Guadalajara is a casual family place. You won't feel like your in Mexico or anything, but it was nice enough.

Service: We were a party of eight plus a baby. Handling hot platters of food and balancing large margarita pitchers isn't easy around a huge table. That said, service was on the slow side, so don't go here with a large group unless you can spare a couple of hours. The server made sure we had plenty of water refills, a must when tasting spicy salsa.

Drinks: I mentioned margaritas, and these were fantastic. We tried the regular margaritas and the Guadalaja house style with Grand Marnier.

Food: This is where the place shines. For appetizers, we had a few kinds of quesadillas (mushroom and squash blossom) and cheesy chicken enchiladas. They were really good, especially the chicken. I'm no fan of chicken generally, but the enchiladas were great.

So great, in fact, I ordered more chicken enchiladas for an entree, this time with molé sauce. I have never tried molé, which is made from cacao. It was fantastic. Don't picture Hershey's syrup--it's nothing like that. Think a subtle chocolate-tasting gravy with a hint of cinnamon, but still very savory, and topped with sesame seeds. Delicious, and my fellow diners who sampled my dish agreed. 

I sampled other dishes, and they were all OK. I enjoyed the refried beans very much, but how can you mess up beans fried in lard?

I give Guadalajara a 3.75 stars. It gets a boost from the delicious appetizers and molé sauce. I would go back, but instead of trying something new I would order the same thing again.