Autentica

[October 17th, 2007] 5507 NE 30th Ave., 287-7555. Dinner Tuesday-Sunday, brunch Saturday-Sunday. $$ Moderate.

This cool, serene Mexican restaurant takes items you’ve been eating from taco trucks and your microwave and shows you what they taste like uptown. Take the humble tamale: as often as not, a dry affair with all the give of a rolled-up washcloth. Autentica’s tamale, stuffed with poblano pepper, is so delicate it quivers beneath its veil of epazote-laced cream. This tamal literally melts on the tongue, an experience that’s almost confusing: Why make tamales any other way? Ditto, the margarita: It’s tart, fresh, clear and makes other margaritas taste like melted candy by comparison. There’s an octopus salad so tangy it makes your eyes squinch. Fat Mexican prawns, glossy with garlic sauce, squirt the essence of the sea when bitten. A whole roasted fish marinated with adobe chile paste arrives looking like a bronzed god—it’s easy to ignore your tablemates while you focus on picking every sweet piece of flesh from the body, the tail, the cheek. If there are quibbles to be had at Autentica, they are not with the mole Teloloapan made with chocolate, chiles and nuts, nor with the lustrous, rich corn soup with habanero, but with consistency. One night, you’re in tamale heaven; a month later, you think you’ve misremembered, until you realize that your drink tastes like a Jolly Rancher. (NR)

Signature Dish: Chef Oswaldo Bibiano says it’s the queso con chorizo ; we say it’s the ephemeral tamales.

Standouts: Margaritas done right; whole-roasted fish with adobe chile paste.

Regrets: Sometimes, food and service are flawless. Other times, less so.