When you’re in Cantina La Mexicana, Union Square is the same as it ever was

“I’ve lived in Union Square since 1994. I put $5,000 down on my house. Now, it’s so expensive,” says Robert Rendon.

He should know: Fifty-nine-year-old Rendon has run Cantina La Mexicana — originally Taqueria La Mexicana — for nearly 25 years. He’s watched the neighborhood change and expand. Used to be that you could park right out front in a lot without thinking twice; now it’s tough to find space. There’s Bow Market, for everything from lox to pierogis; Celeste, for sleek Peruvian; Juliet, named one of the best restaurants in the country by Bon Appetit; Bronwyn and T & B Pizza for sausages and gourmet pizza, respectively, from noted T.W. Food chef Tim Wiechmann. And on and on.

These are all excellent developments for those who appreciate good food. And these are not faceless chains, either; they’re independent businesses run, by and large, by locals. But it does mean that the neighborhood is different now, and busier, reflecting a younger demographic with more disposable income.

“Sometimes we lose customers. Customers move out of Somerville due to the high rent. It’s nothing we can control,” Rendon says.

Rendon arrived in Massachusetts from Texas in 1988. His wife of 31 years, Carolina, first worked at Boca Grande. He opened the restaurant, originally a small counter-service taqueria, to share her recipes.

“I knew my wife was talented, and I wanted to test the waters,” he says.

She has worked behind the counter since 1995. His son, Robert Junior, also helps out. In 2008, the family expanded to add an adjacent cantina with a full bar, open in the evenings. Rendon also does a brisk catering business, he says.

And the small taqueria still soldiers on, and busily so, on a recent lunch hour.

There are no bells and whistles here; no sleek assembly-line ingredients; no efficient army of burrito rollers. There are no signs announcing the provenance of today’s avocados. (“Do you know how much it costs for 10 cases of avocado, with 32 avocados? $1,100! It’s expensive,” Rendon says later from a catering job.)

No, there are just a handful of wobbly tables, a few stools, plastic Market Basket utensil boxes on the counters, mellow magenta walls, and a chalkboard menu. A few construction workers sit in a corner. Another young woman devours chips and guacamole while playing on her phone. This is a local, not a corporate, crowd. The vibe is take it or leave it. And I’ll take it.

I’ve been coming here for nearly 10 years — mainly for tamales and hot sauce — and it looks exactly the same as it did a decade ago. My best friend lived in a third-story walk-up on Rossmore Street then, and I was always jealous of her proximity to the best chips and salsa in town. In 2010, right before my (enormous) first son was born, I wedged my protrusive stomach behind a table and devoured a heaping chile relleno bathed in habanero sauce to induce labor while she and her husband, a sensible statistician, looked on.

“What are the odds I’ll have this baby tonight?” I begged him, a deadpan numbers type.

“The odds are you’ll have the baby at some point,” he said.

I left with heartburn and had to wait another week.

I return last week with my son, who eventually did emerge, and order a $2 pork tamale, a $5 gordita, chips, and hot sauce. He’s in that lazy netherworld between school and summer camp. He chooses soft chicken tacos, $2.95 apiece.

We place our order and wait on stools facing the parking lot, watching the parade of Union Square day-timers pass by. Food appears in a proper wooden vestibule that looks like a bank teller window without the plexiglass; pick it up yourself and tote it to your table. No one is going to fawn over you here.

But that’s fine; we came to eat, and mainly to eat chips, my favorite for miles around. They’re just mildly salty (every so often you’ll get a welcome salt bomb), almost greasy but not quite, fat and thick. Ask for a plastic tub of hot sauce on the side. I ask Carolina what’s in it, and she says it’s a secret; I ask her husband, and he says that it’s jalapeno, habanero, onions, and tomatoes, fashioned into a thin paste. It’s a burnt orange, hot and smooth and sweet, and both my son and I just keep on dunking until our food arrives. This just might be the best condiment in Somerville.

Tamales are steamy husks of cornmeal jammed with pork; a satisfying snack. Gorditas are sturdy and stiff-at-the-edges cornmeal pancakes plied with shredded lettuce, shredded spicy pork, sour cream, refried beans, and queso. We slice into them with plastic knives but end up abandoning that technique and scoop out the softer center, just like carving pumpkins. Splashed with hot sauce, it’s delicious: sweetish sour cream cut with crisp lettuce and soft cornmeal. My son isn’t an intrepid eater — most of his favorite foods are beige — but he gobbles his chicken tacos, marinated in orange juice, onion, garlic, and paprika.

I ask him for his expert opinion, and he strokes his chin.

“Very flavorful,” he concludes. They are.

We munch in companionable silence. Nobody jostles us for a table. We could sit here all afternoon if we wanted to (and it’s clear that some people do). At night, it’s a different scene. But on this stool on a quiet, muggy afternoon, Union Square is the same as it ever was.

Kara Baskin can be reached at kara.baskin.com. Follow her on Twitter .

Source: Bostonglobe.com

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