I was skimming the LA Times Food section as per usual when the words "Mo-Chica, the alpaca question" caught my eye. I've been looking for a place to eat llama or alpaca, and Mo-Chica was my foodie saving grace. As a crazy carnivore on a mission, I made plans to eat there that night.
I brought my teddy bear made of alpaca fur named Chewy, I thought it could be neat to eat alpaca while I hold an alpaca doll... kind of a weird, sick idea, I definitely got some strange stares.
Anyways, upon entering Mo-Chica I took note of its trendy and casual feel. What a great place to relax with friends and eat great food! Mo-Chica is very similar to the restaurant Son of a Gun in Beverly Hills. Totally different cuisines, but they both are top restaurants in LA, both have a casual feel, and both give super small expensive courses which force you to order more. So, warning: be prepared to spend around $30 for your meal since they recommend ordering 2-3 dishes.
All the waiters are super modern and take food orders on their ipads which was interesting to see, I've never experienced that before. However, they would look down a lot, and I felt like I was with friends who were just attached to their iphones. The extra technology was a modern touch, but a simple pen/ paper would have fit right in with the hip ambiance.
I was ecstatic when the alpaca arrived. I ordered the estofado de alpaca which was alpaca stew estofado with tagliatelle, aji amarillo sauce, and fried organic fertile egg. The sauce and egg were very good. The alpaca meat itself wasn't too flavorful, but that's probably because the meat is thin. Similar to the deer, it needed a lot of sauce to zest it up. I also tried some of the alpaca and lamb hamburgesa with pickled cucumbers, avocado, and aji amarillo yogurt dressing. Now that was amazing. Fusing the lamb and alpaca together in one meat patty was awesome. I wonder what would happen if I mixed all 30 meats I try into one patty? I don't want to know.
Estofado de Alpaca
Hamburgesa
Conclusion:
I would definitely go to Mo-Chica again and try something different on the menu, maybe a dessert. Alpaca I probably wouldn't go out of my way to eat, though.
You should eat it because: It's a good first date story.
Hello Foodsters! My name’s Dasha and you’re going to see a lot more of me on this website. So, nice to meet you.
Here’s some tidbits about me: I’m from Los Feliz, but I spend a lot of time in the OC because I go to Chapman University. I recently went to Prague, CZ for 4 months, in which I went crazy with food pictures/ food adventures and developed a love for fried cheese (that’s a Czech dish!). I love to play the guitar and write songs, maybe I’ll write some food love songs. Maybe not though. Basically, Food+Music = Happy Dasha
So why am I here ruining the Ben and Drew flow? Well I have accepted a challenge, as you can see from the video. I’m going to eat 30 different types of meat. These meats will include squid, alligator, quail, chicken, beef, sea urchin and more! Feel free to suggest meats you want to see me eat. I’m willing to try eating anything once. Except for poison, lava or anything that will most likely kill me. Nom saying?
I hope you follow my stomach’s journey! My twitter name is @goshdasha, feel free to get an insight into my personal food/life experiences. Adios for now.
