Cinco de Partyio!

I have lived in Detroit for 28 years and have never gone down to Mexican town to celebrate Cinco De Mayo. This year I decided that for the sake of this blog and my love of Mexican food, I would make sure to stop in and see what the day was all about. I called up a few of my favorite lady friends and one cute baby and we headed down for lunch. We parked at a friends house and walked the few blocks over from her place to avoid paying to park. 

They had the entire area that is is considered “Mexican Town” blocked off for the event. There were a lot, and I mean a lot, of Detroit officers walking around and on every street corner surveying the area and keeping things cool. There were people of all ages from children to adults and everything in between. Some people were there to drink and hang out and others were there to get a meal. 

We quickly got a table at one of the restaurants with an outdoor patio. They had a DJ announcing drink specials and playing tunes including the Beastie Boys (with a shout out to MCA) and Sublime (with no shout out to Brad...tisk tisk). Many of the patrons dressed up for the day including wearing large sombreros, the colors of Mexico's flag, and what I would call slightly offensive and racist “Mexican mustaches”. 

We all ordered some kind of fish dish, fajitas and tacos and got huge servings of some great food that included chips, salsa, rice and beans. Most importantly, we got a few pitchers of Margaritas to turn the day into a real celebration. They had drink specials running all day and kept announcing further specials over the microphone as we were dining. 

  
When we finally finished our meal and were ready to leave a few hours later we noticed that the streets had really started to fill up. There were lots of people in the streets drinking, dancing and celebrating. We also nicknamed our little friend Emitt party baby because not only did he try to dip his hand in the margarita his mother was drinking, but he also danced the entire time that we were at the table. He had a table of fellow diners laughing so hard because he really loved all the music. 

Overall I really enjoyed going down there and having a great meal with friends on a nice patio. I would not recommend going down with family after 5 p.m. because as we were leaving I noticed that the age of the crowd was starting to change. They were setting up for a long night of drinking and partying in the streets. The lines to get into the bakery, the bars and the market had grown and were growing by the minute.This is just a few of the pictures that I snapped today. There are even more that I tweeted out throughout the day! (If you you like to see them add @hipindetroit to your feed on twitter!) It was a great day in the city, Cheers! 

~S