Seeking boffo huevos

There are only two states in the entire Union where you can get a great Mexican breakfast, and I live in both of them: California and Texas. So what if they are the heaviest breakfasts in the world: rice, beans, guacamole, sauce, eggs, meat, the works. We are lucky to live here. Woody Allen was wrong when he said that being allowed to turn right on a red light was the one cultural advantage of living in California. You can also have a wonderfully authentic Mexican breakfast.

My friend Victor Lomeli and I are intent on finding the best in our little slice of L.A. Besides being my hairdresser and a fellow resident of Silver Lake, Victor is a breakfast maniac. He always has a plan: We rarely go west of La Brea. Los Feliz usually defines the western border of our travels, and Echo Park, the east. We have explored the region thoroughly from taco stand to strip mall to grand old restaurant with fancy booths; from the $2.99 chorizo and eggs on a paper plate to the $7.50 huevos rancheros plate. Victor, who was born in Guadalajara, knows what gets the bang for the buck. He cultivated his culinary refinement at his grandmother’s cenaduria, which means her home was a local restaurant.

Along the way we discover certain universal principles. The most immediately striking is that the quality of a Mexican breakfast is almost always in inverse proportion to its cost.

Before our outings turned into a compulsive search for the perfect Mexican breakfast, I was a conventional breakfast orderer. I would order French toast, waffles, bacon, pancakes and hash browns. Victor would have chorizo (Mexican sausage) and eggs or huevos rancheros. Because I kept picking at his breakfast until he couldn’t stand my fork in his plate any longer, eventually I had to order my own huevos rancheros. It wasn’t long before it became an obsession.

Here’s the thing about Mexican breakfasts.

First of all, Mexican breakfasts are dinners. They come with at least two major side dishes. They are for people who like big breakfasts. Not people with teeny-weeny appetites in the morning.

Second, they cure hangovers. (And whatever else ails you, except stomachaches.)

Third, they consist of thousands, and I mean thousands, of calories. They are high in carbs. Let’s face it, they fit into no known diet, though I once had a gym coach who suggested you eat a major breakfast and then eat less and less throughout the day. Maybe they fit into that diet. So work out first; you will certainly need a siesta after.

And by the way, to us Mexican breakfast means only two things: huevos rancheros or chorizo and eggs.

I will never have another waffle in Los Angeles.

A weekly pilgrimage

Every Sunday morning around 10:30, as I leave Ashtanga Yoga Shala, I’m sweaty and ravenously hungry. I meet Victor at his salon, Pussyfoot, which is famous for offbeat coloring (translucent curtains of mahogany red with pale blond chunks underneath and coffee brown accents was a recent order), every imaginable waxing experience under the sun and, though I’ve never actually witnessed them, famous pole dancing battles when the shop is closed.

Victor has already selected the site of that morning’s exploration. We always have both coasts’ Sunday papers in hand, Victor clutching Sunday Styles, I clutching my precious news sections. We stop first to blow out my bangs. (It is a real plus to dine with one’s hairstylist.) Then we hit the road -- top down, music blaring, stomachs growling.

A line has already formed at the counter of the cafeteria-style Rodeo Grill in Echo Park; Victor grabs a table before it’s too late. The wallpaper -- vintage rodeo scenes -- brings me back to Bandera, Texas. Kids are running around with grandparents and the joe is black and basic, but the whole place just keeps us smiling from ear to ear.

The beans turn out to be the best we taste on our entire quest. Rodeo Grill’s chef, the delightful Gonzalo Gonzales from Veracruz, is mighty proud of his grandmother’s recipe: He boils the lard “super, super hot,” then mashes the beans into it (sorry, folks, all great refried beans have to be boiled in lard). He then cooks them with onions and garlic over a very low flame for four hours. His philosophy is so sweet we nearly weep: “I make home cooking,” he says, “so Mexicans here don’t forget what beans are supposed to taste like.”

But it’s not just about beans; we love the chorizo and eggs. They prepare it scrambled haphazardly, the chorizo just spicy enough, with the idea that you’ll pick your favorite salsa from one of the five they offer and spice it up yourself. We can’t decide if the atmosphere beats the food at Rodeo Grill or the food beats the atmosphere. Beans close the tie.

It is perhaps not fair to judge Quality in Hollywood on the quality of its Mexican breakfasts, as it is clearly as popular for its pancakes. But our trip there becomes a defining moment in our quest: It is here that Victor’s Rules of Huevos Rancheros are born.

We know we’ve gone far afield when the huevos arrive in a bowl! Not a deep bowl, mind you, but a bowl nonetheless. Thus Rule No. 1: Huevos rancheros must be served on a flat plate. The second fatal flaw is that the crucial underlying tortilla is a soft flour tortilla. Rules No. 2 and No. 3: The tortillas must be crispy and corn. Rule No. 4: The cheese must be queso fresco, not Jack. Rule No. 5: The sauce must be ranchero sauce (Quality’s is something akin to pizza sauce). Ranchero sauce is a smooth tomato sauce spiked with serrano chile, garlic, lime and oregano. The farther east you go, the more the serranos come into focus.

A spectacularly hip waitress comes over to our table as we snap away, asking where we’re from.

“Silver Lake,” we say.

“Me too,” she says excitedly. “Have you ever been to Tacos Delta and tried their huevos rancheros?”

Tacos Delta is a Silver Lake insiders’ favorite. It has a white plastic corrugated roof with painted red wood beams on its good-weather-only patio, which Victor swears looks exactly like his grandmother’s cenaduria. It’s a hangout for both the Mexican diaspora and the Silver Lake artiste crowd. It shares a parking lot with a fluff ‘n’ fold.

The huevos rancheros recipe here is a family heirloom. Irma, 23, who was practically born in the kitchen, makes the delicious salsa. (She toasts chiles de arbol, then grinds them with garlic, onions and cilantro. It’s the same recipe they have used since the stand opened in 1980.) The birria (goat cooked for hours) is great-great-grandfather’s recipe, according to Irma. The cheese is Monterey Jack, not queso fresco, but the tortillas are crisp, deep-fried in fresh oil, and the sauce is classic ranchero sauce -- piquant and zesty. The beans, too, are made on premises, quite amazing for a taco stand, as far as I’m concerned.

Saucy in Eagle Rock

The next Sunday we try Victor’s father’s favorite joint, La Fuente No. 3, in a strip mall in Eagle Rock. It’s very clean and nice in a black-Naugahyde-booth kind of way, and the huevos rancheros have a bit of a twist: They’re drenched in ranchero sauce, with Spanish sauce on top. The Spanish sauce is greenish, colored by bell peppers, fresh tomatoes and onions, so you can barely see the over-easy eggs. (I prefer them sunny side up.) I think too much of a good thing can be a bad thing, but Victor disagrees. The corn tortillas are fried crisp, the beans are soft and fresh and the Mexican rice is fluffy and spicy. The tortillas are served in a red plastic warmer, which I covet and want to take home.

There are no rules for chorizo and eggs; it’s Mexican breakfast’s free-for-all. Whereas with huevos rancheros you’re looking for the separation of flavors, with chorizo and eggs flavor melding is king. The thing about chorizo and eggs is that the spicier the chorizo, the tastier the eggs; the fat melts the spicy, crumbly sausage and the eggs into one harmonious whole. At La Fuente, they’re formed into a neat log-like roll.

The only first-rate somewhat expensive Mexican breakfast we find is at a place on Vermont called Hollywood Hills. The gold standard was set on our first visit here. The huevos rancheros are divine, with two sunny-side-up eggs and a particularly good ranchero sauce, garnished with avocado and tomato slices; on the side are black beans topped with queso fresco. The queso fresco convinces us the chef is Mexican, but we’re wrong; the chef-owner is Susan Fine Moore, a kindred soul and huevos rancheros freak.

“I wanted to do huevos rancheros and improve it,” she says. “The key is crunchy. When people want soft tortillas I tell them I have a non-responsibility clause.” Moore also has reason to be proud of her huevos Leno, a chorizo-and-eggs scramble with warm homemade corn tortillas, served as they should be in aluminum foil wrapping.

After a couple of unsuccessful experiments with breakfast spots too hip or too pricey to be authentic, we once again need our fix of La Raza. Near where Sunset turns into Cesar Chavez in Echo Park is El Huarache Azteca No. 2.

Efrain Pena, the owner of this kitchen in a strip mall, makes us feel like long-awaited guests. Since I’m becoming a regular, I bring my Spanish-English dictionary. I now order entirely in Spanish, which Victor pretends to find endearing. A sign on the wall warns that the salsa ranchera is “para hombres muy hombres” (for men who are real men). The sunny-side-up eggs are always yolky and perfectly done, covered in the powerfully piquant and tart salsa ranchera; Victor says it makes him feel he’s in Jalisco. They’re served with fresh avocado and beans with melted Parmesan cheese, which we’ve never seen anywhere else. The place is packed with regulars -- mostly real men with their real women, all watching soccer on TV.

The chorizo conquistador

We find another winner in El Conquistador on Sunset and Maltman, right in the heart of Silver Lake. It’s a perfect spot for a birthday party, a Sunday brunch or lifting a depression, with butterfly kites hanging from the ceiling and festive Mexican-colored paper cutouts on the walls.

Angel Guzman has been the chef here since his arrival from Veracruz 16 years ago. He prides himself on buying only the best chorizo, which he hangs to air-dry, draining it of excess fat. This makes his chorizo and eggs a specialty. The huevos rancheros are notable because the eggs are drenched in his wonderful salsa de molcajete, a smoky-flavored red sauce made with a stone mortar and pestle. Of course the tortilla is pan-fried and crisp, and everything else, including refried beans and rice, is worthy of the appropriately named angelic host.

So which is the best? It’s a tie. Hollywood Hills wins in the luxury category. Tacos Delta wins the prize for price-to-quality ratio; there you’re never disappointed.

Today at Tacos Delta, I tried another of Victor’s all-time favorites, chilaquiles.chilequiles I experienced nirvana. Now that I’ve graduated to this advanced level, it is clear that the quest is endless, and it is existential, an end in itself. It is the joy of discovering Los Angeles.

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Victor’s Rules

of Huevos Rancheros

1: Must be served on a flat plate.

2: The tortilla must be crispy.

3: The tortilla must be corn.

4: The cheese must be queso fresco. Jack cheese is not permitted.

5: The sauce must be ranchero (not pizza sauce).

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Mexico on a breakfast plate

El Conquistador, 3701 Sunset Blvd., Silver Lake; (323) 666-5136. Heavenly chorizo and eggs with a first-rate sauce in a cheerful, festive atmosphere.

El Huarache Azteca No. 2, 1378 Sunset Blvd., Echo Park; (213) 250-4567. Jalisco-style ranchero sauce on perfectly done huevos in a strip-mall find filled with regulars.

Hollywood Hills, 1745 Vermont Ave., Los Feliz; (323) 661-3319. The winner in the luxe category, the chef scores with the crunchy quotient on her huevos rancheros.

La Fuente No. 3, 2256 Colorado Blvd., Eagle Rock; (323) 258-4303. Even with twists -- added Spanish sauce, rolled chorizo and eggs -- authenticity and freshness are first-rate.

Quality, 8030 W. 3rd St., Los Angeles; (323) 661-3319, (323) 658-5959. Maybe because pancakes are the specialty here, the huevos rancheros depart too far from tradition.

Rodeo Grill, 1721 Sunset Blvd., Echo Park; (213) 483-8311. A lively Tex-Mex atmosphere, the best beans of our quest and terrific chorizo and eggs.

Tacos Delta, 3806 W. Sunset Blvd., Silver Lake; (323) 664-2848. Looks like a taco stand with a diverse clientele, but the house-made salsas, sauces and beans make it No. 1 for the price.