A couple of weeks ago, Gustavo Arellano and I drove out to Mitla Cafe in San Bernardino to try authentic Cal-Mex food. Doesn’t that sound like an oxymoron? “Authentic Cal-Mex food”? But it was. Replete with refried beans, yellow cheese and lots of sour cream. And it was delicious.
Mitla Cafe is a family-owned restaurant that opened back in 1937. It’s the oldest restaurant in the Inland Empire. This week on the show, Gustavo and Evan talk about how Mitla Cafe is emblematic of this type of American Mexican food. It’s a part of a series of stories that we’re doing here on KCRW about Mexicans in the U.S.