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Flash in the pan The renovated Bolero takes a few faulty steps
Staff Writer, The Prague Post Jan. 13, 2005 With a great Colombian place just a block away, those who have seen the renewed Bolero restaurant might imagine that a pan-Hispanic renaissance is taking place on New Town's Masarykovo nabrezi. Unfortunately, the renaissance is far from complete. Bolero offers salsa dancing to go along with its Mexican kitchen, but only the bootie-shakers are actually throwing off any heat. The interior's concessions to the Latin American theme are a few serapes and garlands of chilis and maize, with a looped track of Hispano-pop -- some good, some bad -- coming through the stereo. The second time you hear the freaky guy trill his Rs and shout "bailarrrr" will be enough to last a lifetime, barring a deeply masochistic development in your psychic profile. The menu features a fairly standard run of standardized, Mexican-esque meals. Among starters, there's a factorylike guacamole, nuclear green and almost flavorless, served with just eight tortilla chips and some good fresh veggies --cucumber wheels, bell pepper slices and carrot sticks, the latter being cleaned but not very carefully peeled, meaning in places they're brown and slightly bitter. Also disappointing is the Mexican red bean soup, which seems a heck of a lot like a bowl of refried beans with some stock added to make it soupy. It doesn't taste like much.
Much better are the sopecitos, three patties of white cornflour, topped with refried beans, sour cream and slices of sweet red bell peppers. They're hearty and filling, similar to the arepas at the Columbian place down the street, though not nearly as good. However, with the sopecitos you see the inclination of the kitchen to dust everything with paprika, a compulsion which reaches its apex with the flautas: two "flutes" made from corn tortillas, rolled up and fried, then covered with enough paprika for decent skiing. Though I ordered the beef version, the flautas which arrived were filled with chicken strips and wilted iceberg lettuce and topped with Balkan cheese. Now this might sound bad -- I mean, how often does Balkan cheese appear in authentic Mexican cuisine? -- but it's not. Because Balkan cheese is salty. And without that salt, the flautas would have almost no flavor at all.
The fajitas are a lot better. They're served properly sizzling, the bell peppers and onions caramelizing nicely, with three flour tortillas and a small smorgasbord of condiments: a featherweight salsa, grated white cheese, more guacamole, sour cream, Spanish rice and tomatoes. Though the veggies are hissing and cooking away in the pan, on closer inspection you can see that the strips of chicken with them are not, because they were cooked separately (earlier?) and then added just before the order was sent out. That robs the dish of much of its complexity of flavor. In other words, it's cheating. Another main course, enchiladas verdes, wraps more chicken strips and more iceberg in three more tortillas and dusts the plate with more paprika. It doesn't seem to be baked, merely assembled on the plate, but the iceberg wilts away nonetheless. There's no verde sauce to speak of, and the most dominant flavor here is the mild taste of sauteed white onions. When you see that the sour cream is topped with chopped parsley instead of cilantro, you'll probably be ready to clock out. The service at Bolero is OK -- not terribly attentive, but not terribly terrible, either. However, you may have trouble getting the check. Once you do, you may notice that you were charged for two beers, though you were only served one. With relatively high prices for such unaccomplished cooking, Bolero seems confused about what it wants to be -- a corner place or a destination restaurant -- and that's before you factor in the dance floor at one end and the publike TVs above the bar. To put it politely, it's not quite found its feet. Someday soon Bolero may well dance. But at this point it's crawling. Evan Rail can be reached at erail@praguepost.com
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