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Best Bargain Restaurants: Cactus Cantina

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Cactus Cantina
Washington

It started as a pale imitation of the original Rio Grande Cafe in Bethesda and met with such popular acclaim that it had to expand into the present cavernous Tex-Mex eatery. But give Cactus Cantina its due: Despite crowds that require a wait of 25 minutes for a table at 8:30 on a Tuesday night, management has never stopped trying to improve the quality of the cooking.

A recent sampling of the generously meaty, pork-stuffed tamales with their admirably spicy chili and an order of chiles rellenos--both formerly weak points on the menu--showed them to be every bit as good as their counterparts at the Texas-sired Rio Grande Cafes.

You can get more good combination plates than you can count at Cactus Cantina, but the best main courses on the menu are cooked on a mesquite-fired grill. The soy-sauce-accented fajitas--beef, if you're a true Texan--the spareribs, the exquisite quail, and the moist shrimp are reason enough to become a Cantina regular.

Now that almost everything on the menu is about as good as local Tex-Mex gets, management should turn its attention to improving the bar's watery excuse for a margarita. Compared with the exemplary ones served at the not-too-distant Austin Grill, these are a top-dollar disappointment.

Cactus Cantina , 3300 Wisconsin Avenue NW, Washington; 202/686-7222. Open Sunday through Thursday 11:30 am to 11 pm, Friday and Saturday 11:30 am to midnight. AE, D, DC, MC, V. MapIt!

QUALITY: ****Excellent; *** Superior; **Very Good; * Good
PRICE RANGE: $$$= Very Expensive; $$ Expensive; $=Moderate; ¢=Inexpensive

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