More than Mexican 🍽
More than Mexican 🍽
Chef Beto Reyes makes the traditional original with creative touches at Eleven18
Chef Beto Reyes is one of the chefs to watch right now in Colorado Springs.
What he’s doing at Eleven18 Fusion Cuisine rates up there with what his industry pal Fernando Trancoso is accomplishing at Inefable. The two are putting Hispanic chefs in the spotlight in a way nobody has done prior in Colorado Springs. It’s not just that they’re showing Mexican cuisine’s upscale side — far too long missing across America due to assumptions about what gringos will recognize and eat — it’s that they’re bringing their unique creative visions to their plates in exciting ways.
The Hispanic element aside, they’re doing what great chefs do and making delicious food and culinarily thirst trapping us with beautiful, colorful presentations.
But this isn’t Trancoso’s review (that one’s still on my list for the near future; I see you Fernando) — it’s Reyes’ writeup. So let’s shift the focus solely to him and Eleven18. And let’s start with the quickest of recaps from my earlier reporting. Reyes left Milagros Cocina Mexicana back in November 2023 after having moved to the Springs from the Chicago area in mid 2022 to take the job. He has familial roots in Michoacán, Mexico, and told me back in my initial chat with him that he started in kitchens at age 8 and was working a grill station by age 12. He's professionally cooked everything from French fine dining and Italian to steakhouse fare and high-end Japanese food.
I first reviewed him in September 2022, and kicked it off by saying how impressed I was with two appetizers on his Milagros menu: polenta tres quesos and a huitlacoche quesadilla. (I commended him simply for getting huitlacoche, one of my favorite delicacies from past Mexico trips, onto a menu in the Springs.) But our whole meal was on point. I could easily see that Reyes and Milagros at the time were doing something not seen since La Cava ushered in Mexican fine dining in 2016. (In a land of hundreds of enchiladas and fajitas and typical Mexican fare, La Cava introduced folks to dishes like Chiles en Nogada and they gave me my first sip of Bacanora.)
Flash forward to this past December and Reyes bootstrapped a launch in a borrowed food truck and parked outside of the former Folklore space next to Tipperary Cocktail Parlor (where I co-presented bartender battles over the past six months). Mere weeks later, thanks in-part to some business mentorship from Chef Brother Luck (who holds the lease on the space with Sean Fitzgerald), Reyes had ditched the wheels and moved inside to take over Folklore’s vacant kitchen (once Brother Luck Street Eats’ and Lucky Dumpling’s). Eleven18 in a more complete form was born.
Reyes started with both simplified street tacos and some more dolled up “tacos de la casa” which are what I highly recommend going for. The asada, pollo al pastor (a twist on the typical pork protein), carnitas (his family’s decades-old recipe) and cochinita pibil (something he served as a signature entrée at Milagros, made into tacos here) are all excellent in their own ways.
My partner and I — in for a casual, late evening Valentine’s dinner where I requested Reyes chef-table us and bring out what he wished — split on our favorite taco bites. We both enjoy the pastor for the pineapple pop complementing the zesty adobo chicken. And the cochinita pibil, also plated with pineapple, uncharacteristically, delights with tender Mayan-style slow-cooked pork. Pickled onions add welcome acidity to both.
But she champions the asada the most for its earthy mushroom and caramelized onion relish atop the tangy, chewy steak bites, with a charred cheese skirt affixed to the notably outstanding Don Zorros Molino blue corn tortilla. (All the heirloom corn tortillas Reyes sources from that Denver company deserve attention on their own. They’re levels in quality above commercially made products; thick and supple, not falling apart after a bite.) I fall for the kick-ass confit pork carnitas, which burn my lips and tongue with a truly mighty salsa macha, made with hot chilies and peanuts. Its oil bleeds on the plate, drips down my chin and lingers over the palate, waiting to be amplified by the boozy heat of a spirits sip.
The cocktail menu remained in early development so we skip some stopgap canned offerings in favor of a fine house sangria and an interesting blackberry-cinnamon Mexican gin drink mixed with cinnamon-infused tequila and yuzu juice with a refreshing soda water body sweetened a touch with simple syrup.
Reyes had started us with small-plate samplings of his mole wings, morita Caesar salad and camote patatas bravas. I confessed to him that I’ve never been a wing guy (making me super un-American, I know) but I give credit to the dark, chocolaty and complex-spicy-floral flavor of his mole application to wings versus whole chicken pieces as is common. They’re star anise-forward with white sesame seeds sprinkled atop along with Cotija cheese and pickled red onion and cilantro sprout garnish.
Patatas bravas in Spain consist of white potatoes but here sweet potatoes (camote) are utilized and browned to a crispness such that the skin has peeled partly off and taken on a satisfying crunchiness. Under a topping of tomato, cilantro and Cotija there’s a thick drizzle of bright guajillo mayo that gifts heat balance to the potatoes’ inherent sweet quality. In a world of boring, afterthought potato dishes, this one’s a rockstar. Definitely get it.
I love Eleven18’s Caesar firstly for having the chutzpah to contain anchovies, whereas the majority of chefs/restaurants out there play it safe and assume the public generally loathes the salty fishies. They make all the difference. As does the smoky morita chili pepper essence that laces the dressing. Sweet corn and creamy avocado are a departure from the normal salad, too, adding richness to bites.
During a later visit, I also try the final appetizer on that menu iteration (Reyes has been making regular updates), which is a tuna tostadita on a crispy tortilla. Again the salsa macha strikes with its heat, accentuating ahi-style fish this time. A garnishing avocado-lime purée cools the mouth a bit. It’s a lighter, fresh bite, also accentuated by pickled serrano acidity.
Whatever you order, make sure to include the side of esquites, basically elote off the cob. But here, Reyes turns it into a fantastic sweet corn porridge of sorts, bound by tortilla ash and Cotija cream sauce. He flame sears the tortillas and then grinds them down into the ash, and you’ll see tiny black flecks throughout the polenta-like texture. We’ve never had anything quite like it and fawn over it to each other the rest of the evening. I could go for just this and be content.
Also consider the side of charro beans, more soupy and hearty and fortified with chorizo, bacon and hotdog slivers. The pintos also get roasted garlic, diced jalapeños and Cotija and cilantro garnish. For $8, they’re almost a meal on their own.
I’ve saved the most surprising dish to tell you about last: something I would likely not have ordered until exhausting everything else on the menu because I just wasn’t tempted by a pasta dish on a Mexican menu. It wasn’t that I’d lost any faith in Reyes, but neither of us honed in on the dish during our menu read as something we had to try. I can’t explain it any better and it’s not important. What’s important, or impressive, is that this Poblano Pappardelle has quickly become the menu’s bestseller Reyes tells us — it’s here to stay because people can’t get enough of it. We now understand why.
It’s essentially a Cajun fusion item with juicy, blackened chicken strips and Andouille sausage segments over wide strands of soft pappardelle pasta. Its roasted tomato sauce holds rajas (roasted poblano peppers), roasted corn and jalapeño coins. With all the grill-kissed elements it’s a symphony of layered char flavors. We’re over the moon. I bring a buddy in a couple days later and make him order it. It’s a dish so good you’ve gotta tell somebody. Although I’ve saved it for last, you should try it first (with some tacos on the side).
For dessert, Reyes demonstrates another creative fusion via his ube flan. It wasn’t long ago that nobody around here had heard of ube; then Vietnamese milk tea menus and boba shops popularized the purple yam for its vibrant color and taro-like, starchy sweetness. Reyes takes the Asian ingredient and blends it with the Mexican dessert favorite (originally a Roman-created dish brought to the Americas by the Spaniards). The result adds more flavor depth and slightly firmer texture to the typical egg custard body while retaining its creamy consistency. Plus the atypical color (more of a purple-brown after caramelization) is cool and unique.
I guess in really simplified terms, those two words, cool and unique, apply to Eleven18 in distinguishing it from other taco and Mexican places in town. It’s not as upscale as the aforementioned Inefable, yet gourmet touches are everywhere and there’s a lot of chef technique on display to elevate the food.
As I said, Chef Beto Reyes is a chef to be watching right now. This is only the beginning at Eleven18 and I’m excited to see where it goes from here. With town support I can see Reyes feeling comfortable enough to continue pushing palates with unexpected fusions, but in a way that retains authenticity via the anchor cultural flavors. Who knows, he might even return huitlacoche to a menu item and make my day. Meanwhile, there’s plenty to enjoy, and those carnitas, esquites and the pasta will lure me back.
