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Best Bargain Restaurants: Picante: The Real Taco

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Picante: The Real Taco
Chantilly

Sunny yellow and tangerine walls and chili-pepper lights add considerable charm to this narrow storefront, whose owners hail from Mexico by way of San Antonio. The result is Tex-Mex with homegrown flavor, starting with the basket of tortilla chips with roasted chili salsa on the table and moving into more complex territory with chicken mole. Tamales are especially fine here, either with a cover of vivid, smoky guajillo chili sauce or filled with queso fresca and blanketed with a tomatillo salsa.

Narrowing things down is always tortuous, which is why the the mix-and-match menu works so well. Shall it be the chicken in soft corn taco, taco al carbon (broiled flank steak), chicken or beef fajitas, or chiles rellenos in a cinnamon-scented tomato sauce? Why not one of each?

Enchiladas filled with cheese, chicken, beef picadillo, or chicken mole also satisfy. The best of the lot, though, are the green enchiladas slathered with a sweetish tomatillo sauce. Both the corn and flour tortillas are house-made, and aficionados will want to buy a stack of each to take home and stash in the freezer.

On the specials roster are such traditional dishes as chicken mole, chicken marinated in annatto seed, and sirloin tips in a chipotle chili sauce. Amidst these riches one can forgive chili con queso that on a recent visit tasted like microwaved Velveeta, and margaritas made from a mix. Mexican beer is a better choice.

Picante: The Real Taco , 14511-B Lee Jackson Memorial Highway, Chantilly; 703/222-2323. Open Monday through Saturday 11 am to 10 pm, Sunday 11 am to 4 pm. D, MC, V. MapIt!

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

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