My friends tend to think I never leave my ZIP code. They tease me about my “zone” or my “bubble” that I supposedly stay within. 

It’s true, I’ve had the luxury of working from home more than a decade. During the pandemic the pajama lifestyle and convenience of having everything, even groceries, magically show up at my front door sure did make it hard to find motivation to put on pants and leave the house. 

But my position has never been one of refusing to go places. Rather, it just has to be worthwhile. For example, there’s a Chinese restaurant that I enjoy less than a mile from my house, so why would I drive across town for something similar? 

So OK … maybe there’s a little truth to my friends’ ribbing. 

Last summer my boyfriend and I were going to a social gathering in “Canada,” which we call anything north of Dupont Road, and we decided to try someplace new to us for dinner on the way. 

We ended up at Solbird Kitchen & Tap, a Tex-Mex restaurant for those 21 and older with a focus on fresh local ingredients and local craft beer. 

Jerry Perez began with a taco cart that led to the Sol Kitchen food truck, becoming a staple at the YLNI Farmers Market. In 2018, Solbird opened their brick-and-mortar location near the Dupont and Lima roads intersection and sold the food truck a few years after.

Trying the burritos 

We started our meal with some chips and guacamole. 

I spent the first 40-some years of my life not enjoying guacamole, because too often it’s overly pureed mush that doesn’t actually resemble food. Then on a vacation I had some guac made tableside, and discovered, “Hey, when it’s fresh and has discernible ingredients, it’s pretty tasty.” 

Solbird’s guac isn’t prepared tableside, but it was fresh and chunky, with a sprinkle of chicharrón dust on top for some added zing. The house-made chips were light and crispy but substantial enough to do their job transporting the guac, with what we referred to as “magic dust,” but I believe it was actually ancho seasoning. 

I knew I wanted something from the “Death by Burrito” section of the menu for my dinner (I mean, who wouldn’t?). I couldn’t decide between the carne asada, which sounded like a pretty straight-up steak burrito, and El Californio: ground beef or carne asada (I had the carne), guacamole, queso chihuahua, pico de gallo, ancho fries, salsa, and chipotle cream in a grilled tortilla. 

Wait. What was that thing in the middle there? You read “fries” correctly. 

I asked our server for her recommendation between those two, and she emphatically recommended El Californio. 

“The french fries make it different,” she said.

Yep, it has french fries inside. As someone who once ate a burrito with a corndog buried within, I can assure you that “different” doesn’t necessarily mean good. 

This time, though, different was great. The fries didn’t compete with the burrito-ness  at all. They were somehow both crispy and creamy and added yummy textural elements. 

Overall, my burrito was packed full of ingredients, with good distribution. I could easily take bites that had all the tastes. And the burrito was huge — half went home for another day. 

My boyfriend had the Mac Attack, a grilled flour tortilla filled with ground beef or chicken (he had the beef), black bean mash, grilled poblano, red peppers and onion, queso chihuahua, pico de gallo, and chipotle crema. 

“It was yummy,” was his (uncharacteristically brief) report. 

Having gotten to try a bite, I can attest to that. It was flavorful without being overly spicy, with good balance. You could taste the flavors of each individual ingredient. 

Returning for more

On another occasion, I was taking a friend to dinner, and I proposed Solbird. Happily, she agreed. She also agreed to share the guacamole. 

On this second visit, it again did not disappoint, and it had a little more kick to it that night, but not unpleasantly so for this super-spicy lightweight. 

Ignoring the call of the burritos, I decided I had to explore a separate area on the menu. Tacos? Quesadillas? 

I opted for a rice bowl: rice verdé, tinga sauce, pico de gallo, queso fresco, chipotle crema, cilantro-green onion, and pickled jalapeño, with a choice of chicken or carne asada. I went for the chicken. 

My friend ordered two chicken tinga tacos: chipotle braised chicken breast, guacamole, cilantro-green onion, tomato, roasted red pepper salsa, chipotle crema, queso fresco, and lettuce-cabbage blend in corn tortillas. 

So, our meals had very similar components in different shapes. 

When my bowl arrived, I was worried it might be a little dry — it just had that look about it. I was delighted to discover how wrong I was. The shredded chicken was fall-apart tender with slightly crispy bits which added flavor and texture, and the rice was fluffy. One of the things I love about bowls is that you control distribution, so it’s easy to compose a perfect bite. There was a nice balance of all the components — I didn’t find myself wishing I had more of this or less of that, with just enough spiciness to liven things up. 

And once again, my meal was abundant, with leftovers that still tasted great when I had them for lunch a few days later. 

Having been a few times now, I offer this ultimate compliment to Solbird: I wish it were closer to home, but I will happily drive across town to eat there. In fact, they have a Saturday brunch menu from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. that I’m dying to dig into, with enough delicious-sounding options that it’s clearly going to require multiple trips to sample them all. To which I say, let’s go!

Hey readers, get me outside my bubble for a future article about local pizza! Send your recommendations to WendyEatsFW@gmail.com.