Lupita Perez, originally from Morelia, Michoacan, Mexico, cooks all her food from fresh ingredients and serves her guests with a smile and a kind word. Photo by Don Anderson.

Commonly, restaurants possess an atmosphere and décor that coincides with the food, the feel and the character of the restaurant and its owners. When this is not the case, one can sense that something is amiss, though sometimes it’s nowhere near that subtle.

Lupita’s Café, a new place in Ilwaco specializing in homestyle Mexican cuisine, occupies an awkward building for establishing a restaurant, at least in its current state. Formerly an antique mall, the large space features a wide-open seating area of mismatched tables and chairs, an exposed kitchen and prep space and a floor-to-ceiling glass enclosure that seems to be a makeshift employee break room as well as the espresso and ice-cream “sub-cafe.” Fluorescent lighting does no favors for the humble food, which may arrive on paper plate holders with parchment paper and plastic utensils, or sturdy dishware with metal cutlery (I could suss no pattern). Furthermore, beverages – hot and cold – tend to be served in disposable take-out cups, even if you order several courses of food.

And despite these grievous blunders of interior design (which I will attribute to owners opening their “fixer-upper” before the work is done to generate the capital with which to complete it), I wholeheartedly recommend the food at Lupita’s Café. This is the kind of Mexican food I love: fresh, quality ingredients expertly crafted into simple, homestyle dishes that let the core ingredients shine.

Everything on Lupita’s menu is made from scratch, to order, with pride, by Lupita herself. There is a slight wait for the food, but that’s just how it is with one person cooking for a restaurant, and besides, it really is worth waiting for.

Comparable to the Rio Café in Astoria, Lupita’s food is of central Mexico, and an authentic interpretation of the food people in Mexico actually eat. Corn tortillas are made daily from scratch, and what a difference it makes! The chips are infinitely better than what you’re served at the interchangeable Tex-Mex places, as is the salsa, which is why they aren’t free. But $2.95 gets you a big plate of the freshly-fried, thick, crunchy and untraditionally-shaped chips, and I don’t remember having had a better salsa recently. Guacamole ($1.95) is also worth adding on.

Friends Loretta Bennett, left, from Seaview, Wash., and Esther Poleson from Lewiston, Idaho, enjoy a leisurely lunch at Lupita’s Café in Ilwaco, Wash. Photo by Don Anderson.Lupita’s gazpacho ($2.95 cup, $3.95 bowl) is a fruit variation to which I was not previously accustomed, but won over by immediately. Made with fresh mango, pineapple, orange juice and crunchy, watery jicama, it is a very refreshing soup that isn’t too tart or sweet and boasts wonderful textures.

Five meat choices are available for filling most of the items. Be it taco, burrito, enchilada, chimichanga or taco salad, your choices are: Carnitas (fried pork), marinated beef, chicken, chorizo or Pastor (pork, chorizo and pineapple).

Tacos go for $1.75 apiece. I eventually tried all five, but three makes a good meal. All of them were wonderful, especially the Pastor. I recommend the mix-and-match approach when faced with many small options.

Many items are sprinkled with Cotija cheese, a crumbly, white aged cow’s milk cheese reminiscent of but milder than feta. This is much better than the greasy, melted blends that overpower so much Tex-Mex food.

The taco dorado ($2.95) comes in a fried tortilla topped with Cotija and shredded lettuce. The chimichanga ($3.95) was one of the better things I tried because I couldn’t crack its spice profile. There was something in the mixture that was almost … cinnamon-y. I can’t wait to take more tasters there to figure it out.

Enchiladas ($2.95) aren’t drowned in sauce and cheese at Lupita’s, rather subtly sauced, served like a baked, folded taco. Torta de milanesa ($5.95), a sandwich made with house-baked Mexican bread and filled with breaded, fried beef strips, was also tasty, though the beef contained some tougher bites. The bread was soft and light, wonderfully textured without being airy.

There are a lot of Mexican restaurants in the phone book. Few impress me. I hope that eventually the atmosphere of Lupita’s will catch up with the quality of her food. In the meantime, the current one is worth putting up with.

– The Mouth

mouth@coastweekend.com