The Long Beach Nachos Quest – Part 1: E.J. Malloy’s

James Goux — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 07:12:13 +0000

Today, Ryan and I decided we wanted to get nachos. Not only that, but we wanted to have the best nachos in Long Beach. Unfortunately, we weren’t sure where the best nachos in Long Beach were located. So we put out a poll to facebook and twitter, and were given quite a few suggestions, none of which seemed to be in agreement, but many of which claimed to be the best nachos. We decided that many of these people were probably judging from limited experience, and that in order to truly know which nachos were best, we had to try them for ourselves. All of them.

So, as of today, the Organization for the Quest for Long Beach Nachos has been formed. We have a list of restaurants that provide excellent nachos, and we will be trying each of them, giving them ratings upon various factors, and eventually ranking them and choosing Long Beach’s best nachos. The list so far of restaurants that we will be frequenting (at our own pace), is the following:

E.J. Malloy’s
Linda’s
Rock Bottom Brewery
Patricia’s
Bright Spot
Mi Lupita
Merced’s
Famous Dave’s
Acapulco
Island’s
Claim Jumper

Of course, there’s room for additions. We also came up for a rubric for rating the nachos. Nachos will be rated out of 10 for the following categories: presentation, spiciness, and overall flavor.

Tonight we decided to go with E.J. Malloy’s. It was a very good first round. The nachos were in, to say the least very healthy portions. I myself got the chicken nachos, which cost an extra $2.50 on top of the $9.95 beginning price, certainly not cheap but well worth it. The ingredients were somewhat isolated into their own areas, which isn’t really optimal in my opinion, because you’ve really got to work to make sure there’s multiple flavors on each chip, but at least the mix was well proportioned for each ingredient. The cheese in particular was excellent, a mix of two cheeses with a lot of flavor. Everything else was also very good, and it had all of the ingredients that I would want. Overall I gave the nachos a 7 for presentation, a 3 for spiciness, and a 7 for overall taste.

E.J. Malloy’s Nachos:

E.J. Malloy’s	Presentation	Spiciness	Taste	Style	Beer
James	7	3	7	Chicken	Stella
Ryan	7	4	7	Carne Asada	Smithwick’s
Jared	9	5	7	Carne Asada	Fat Tire
Jonathan	8	4	7	Carne Asada	Moose Drool Nut Brown
Ingredients	Black Olives, Diced Tomatoes, Refried Beans, Jalapeños, Sour Cream, Guacamole, Cheddar Cheese, Crisp Home-Fried Corn Tortilla Chips				Cost	$9.50+$2.50

More research must be done before this can be compared with other nachos, but needless to say this will be an ongoing quest, and we will keep you updated.

James Goux » Food

The Long Beach Nachos Quest – Part 1: E.J. Malloy’s