In January of 2019, I had my first travel experience of the year when my dad and I rode north from our hometown of Miami to the city of Orlando, in partnership with Greyhound, with the goal of exploring the city beyond its famous theme parks and learning about the side of Orlando that most tourists never get to see. Come along with us as we check out one of the city’s top Mexican restaurants and then pay one its best breweries a visit!
My dad and I started off at Chela Tequila & Tacos, a popular Mexican restaurant in downtown Orlando that also offers between twelve and fifteen different tacos and over fifty varieties of tequila and mezcal! We were both really hungry and couldn’t wait to start eating and drinking!
We ordered the same three tacos (the Drunken Fish, the Crispy Pork Belly, and the ground beef) and two different mezcals (Crema de Mezcal and Casamigos). We started with the Drunken Fish taco, which was topped with guacamole, cabbage, and tomatoes. It was very creamy and the Tapatío hot sauce I added gave it a nice tingle. Then I tried it with some habanero hot sauce, which was really hot but also really good! We followed that with a shot of Crema de Mezcal, which was fantastic.
Next, we went with the Crispy Pork Belly taco, which was topped with pineapple. It was super crispy and was so good that it didn’t need any hot sauce at all, but I added some of the habanero sauce anyway. The combination of the pork belly with pineapple on the was fantastic! Afterward, we tried the Casamigos, which was stronger than the first one.
Then we tried the ground beef taco, which was topped with lettuce and tomatoes and had a crispy tortilla inside it. It was the most authentic taco of the trio and was very juicy and filled with meat. I tried it with the chile habanero hot sauce!
Next, we had the truffle mushroom fundido, which includes mushrooms, melted cheese, and truffle oil alongside fresh tortilla chips and flour tortillas. I had it with the flour tortilla. It was very creamy and had lots of truffle flavor throughout, and the earthy mushrooms made it a fantastic dish! It was like a very cheesy taco. It was also great with the chips!
Our last dish was cauliflower with garlic aioli, toasted almonds, cumin, and lemon zest. It was amazing! The garlic aioli with the lemon zest gave it a really nice punch. It was extremely creamy and earthy with a nice crunch from the almonds. We followed that with El Sully a Mexican-Style lager from America.
After that filling meal, we took a walk through Orlando’s beautiful downtown area to our next stop, Orange County Brewers, which aims to serve lots of different craft beers and also has a partnership with Pizza Bruno, a local Neapolitan style pizzeria.
We ordered two different flights of beer on boards shaped like the state of Florida. It was a dozen beers in total and we were eager to sample them all. Their Schwarzbier, Black Hops Down, was like a dark pale ale, and their Bock That Ass Up was very light and tasted almost like an amber. The Dankster’s Paradise East Coast IPA was light on the hops and kind of citrusy, while the Dankster’s Paradise West Coast IPA was my favorite so far! Next I had the Lower Country Stout, which is an oatmeal stout that was very milky. I tried my dad’s espresso stout, which I loved, and then we finished up with the Double IPA, which was my dad’s favorite!
Then we went inside to see their 7-barrel, 2-vessel brew house, which has 5 conical fermenters. They brew three to four times per week. The brew house was really cool! I liked it a lot.
I hope you enjoyed our visit to Chela’s Restaurant and Orange County Brewers in Orlando! If you did, please give this video a thumbs up. Leave me a comment below and please also subscribe to my channel so you don’t miss out on any of my upcoming food and travel content!
It's just strong.
No, but it actually has like...
No, it's not that strong.
It's not that strong.
It actually has more like a...
But you drank nothing.
Look.
Compare it.
I mean, I don't know.
You drank the whole thing?
You're crazy, man.
What's up, guys?
David Hoffman here from David's Bin here in beautiful downtown Orlando, Florida.
I'm super excited today because I'm taking you to eat some delicious Mexican food here
at Chela's Tequila and Tacos.
They have tacos.
They have queso fundido.
Lots of Mexican food, but they also have over 50 varieties of tequila and mezcal.
What?
That's crazy.
I'm also here with...
My father.
And right after this, we're going to a brewery nearby.
It's called Orange County Brewers.
Are you excited?
Are you hungry?
I'm very excited.
I'm hungry.
I want to eat tequila.
No, I want to...
I want to eat tequila.
He's already drunk.
I'm drunk without the tequila yet.
Hey, how's it going, everybody?
My name is Chef Marcel.
I'm the chef over at Chela's Tequila and Tacos.
We're right on the corner of Church and Orange, right next to the movie theater.
We're a cool taco joint.
We got all-you-can-eat tacos on Tuesdays, and it's just basically a cool, chill place
to come, have a couple tequila shots, also come and enjoy a few of our tacos.
We have maybe about 12 to 15 tacos, and each one is a little bit different, all the way
from your regular ground beef tacos all the way to pork belly, crispy skin, scallions,
and radishes on top.
We also got a great bar offering a bunch of mezcals, tequilas, great variation on tequilas.
If you like mixed, handcrafted cocktails, we'll be more than happy to make you one here.
Also, a flight of shots all the way from light all the way down to dark.
If you're ever downtown Orlando, want to catch a movie, grab a couple of tacos, we're right
on the corner of Church and Orange.
Come and hang out, have a few tacos and a few cervezas with us.
So here we go.
We got three tacos each.
We have the drunken fish, we have the crispy pork belly, and then we also have the beef,
right?
Yes, ground beef.
Perfect.
And then in the middle, we have two mezcals.
We have to try some mezcals.
Come on, guys, you know.
This is a place with beef.
Especially on an empty stomach.
No, we're going to eat a taco before we try the mezcal, so let's try a taco.
We have two different mezcals here.
We have crema mezcal, so this is part of like 12 different villages and each one, they make
their own mezcal.
And then here, this is casamigo.
This one looks a little more earthy, is what it looks like.
This one looks very clear.
But what do you want to start with, Elise?
I don't know.
What do you think?
The fish?
The fish.
Let's do the fish.
What is this?
Drunken fish.
Drunken fish, yeah.
Maybe we'll get drunk with the fish.
Maybe the batter they put into here.
I don't know.
Maybe mezcal.
Mmm.
Amazing.
Love the fish.
Look how there's so much guacamole in here.
Mmm.
Some cabbage, some tomatoes, and it's very creamy.
It's very, very good.
Adventurous.
So I'm going to try some of these hot sauces.
And they gave us so many different ones.
I'm going to try this one.
It's called Tapatio.
Tapatio.
Hot sauce.
You want to try some hot sauce or you're good?
Um, maybe I'll try some.
There's some habaneros in there.
It's scary.
Yeah, right?
It's actually not that bad.
No?
It's more of a salsa type of hot sauce.
Oh, but it's great.
It's a little hot.
It gives it a nice ting.
El Yucateca.
Let's see.
Let's be adventurous.
It's good.
Okay, it's good.
Woo!
It's just pure habanero.
So I'm going to try the habanero now.
Mmm.
Whoa.
Too much?
You think?
You're crazy.
Mmm.
It's hot.
Mmm.
I told you.
You didn't believe.
It's really hot, but it's good.
The drunken fish is amazing.
That is a stellar taco.
Mmm.
And all this guacamole, the cabbage, all fell here with some of the habanero sauce.
Mmm.
Mezcal.
Cheers.
Mmm.
It's just strong.
No, but it actually has like...
No, it's not that strong.
It's not that strong.
It actually has more like a...
But you drank nothing.
Look.
Compare it.
I mean...
I don't know.
Amazing.
Super good.
You drank the whole thing?
You're crazy, man.
It's actually pretty good.
So next up we have the crispy pork belly.
This thing looks incredible.
You ready?
I'm ready.
Let's go.
Pork belly is always good, right?
Always good.
And this one's like super crispy.
Mmm.
I don't even think this needs hot sauce at all.
Like at all.
Amazing.
I gotta just add some of this habanero sauce.
Oh, right there.
Mmm.
Want to try something smoky?
Something a little different?
Hot, right?
Hot.
No, this is worse.
No, I don't want to try it.
No, it's too much.
What I like the most about this one is the pineapple.
Right.
Crispy pork belly is fantastic, but the pineapple makes it.
You want to put some on?
Just one, two?
Yeah.
Try it like this.
The other one's better, no?
Mmm.
I don't know.
This chili habanero.
Look at this.
Just look at, look at crazy.
There you are.
Okay.
Hot.
Okay, so here we have the Casa Amigo.
Casa Amigo.
Is it Amigo or Migo?
Oh, Amigo.
That's more important.
Makes friends.
I mean, mezcal is amazing, but it's hard.
It's hard.
It's like tequila.
It's like, it's like, almost like moonshine.
But this is made out of mezcal.
But the Mexicans drink it like a lot.
All right.
So the next one's the ground beef taco.
This is a little complicated, but it looks amazing.
And, uh.
A lot of juices coming out of it.
A lot of juices.
As you can see, they also have a crispy tortilla inside.
Right?
What would be the purpose of that?
I don't know.
It's good.
We'll find out.
Mmm.
It's really juicy.
I love the tomato.
This is like a real, real taco.
Traditional.
This is like traditional.
Traditional.
It's the most authentic.
Mmm.
It's what you would eat in Mexico City on the street, basically.
Something like that, right?
I think so, right?
Yeah, this one's like, enormous.
Like, there's so much meat.
And you can see it's just dripping.
It's overflowing.
Look at the catnip.
It's like, dripping down in that.
You know what?
I gotta get this.
Ready?
Ready.
Over the past few years, what's happened to me is that it's hard to eat anything with
no, no spice.
Like, nothing.
It doesn't taste very good for you.
Unless it's like barbecue or something, but.
No, but barbecue has taste.
I mean, you can, but you cannot eat it as a bland meal.
Like, something that doesn't have some kind of flavor.
Mmm.
Here we have it.
The truffle mushroom fundido.
So basically, we have some mushrooms.
Whoa.
We have mushrooms.
We got cheese.
We have truffle oil.
We have tortilla chips.
Queso fundido, no?
Queso fundido, yeah.
Queso fundido.
Flour tortillas.
Flour tortillas, yeah.
So.
Ana, this is for you.
You'll probably love this.
Wow.
Decadent.
Super.
So.
Okay, so how do you grab this?
Just like that.
Like a straight taco.
Mine is not falling.
Oh, mine's falling.
I put a lot of cheese.
Mmm.
That cheese.
It's very good.
It's very creamy.
Very creamy.
Mmm.
You can taste the truffle throughout.
Oh, and I love having the earthy mushrooms.
Basically, that was like a cheese taco with truffles and mushrooms.
And then you can also just go like this.
Let's pick some up.
Oh, that's great.
And we have more food coming, no?
One more.
I love this.
My wife loves this, too.
Well, she loves the fundido.
She doesn't like the mushrooms.
Mmm.
Oh, my God.
Right here we have the cauliflower with garlic aioli.
What else did he say?
There's so many ingredients.
Garlic aioli.
Okay.
Toasted almonds.
Cumin.
And a little bit of lemon zest.
And lemon zest.
And I can smell it.
Wow.
Spread it here.
Spread it over there.
That's too much.
Look at this.
That's too much.
It's way too much.
You don't like it?
I love it, but it's too much.
This is up your end of the valley.
This is like very, I'd say it's almost Indian.
Oh, amazing.
The garlic aioli with the lemon zest.
It's got a punch, huh?
Mm-hmm.
Big punch.
Mm.
Oh, I just love cauliflower.
I love the taste.
It's very creamy, but at the same time very earthy because you have the cauliflower.
Nice crunch.
It is crunchy.
Mm-hmm.
Because of the almonds, probably.
Mm.
All right, so we're trying El Sole.
This is an American beer, but Mexican-style lager.
So we want to try something Mexican, right?
Salud.
And the reason we're trying a Mexican beer here is because this place is called Xela.
And the Mexican word for beer or the slang Mexican word for beer is Xela.
You want a Xela?
Yeah, I want a Xela.
Xela.
It's funny, we're drinking a beer before we go to a brewery.
Just to get our engines going.
Yeah, we just need something to get the flow moving.
Big taco belly.
Wow, that was really filling.
As you can see, downtown, it's really nice.
It reminds me a little bit of our downtown in certain areas.
This is a lot cleaner.
Yeah.
Am I crazy?
Well, it's just more organized.
It's more organized.
And behind us, we have the Plaza Cinema Cafe.
And there is also a movie theater.
Movie theater right there.
You have some pizza places around here.
You have very old buildings.
A few different skyscrapers.
So Church's right here, and that's one of the main streets here in downtown.
And right up this way is Orange County Brewers.
And there we're going to try some delicious craft beer from Orlando.
I actually have never tried Orlando craft beer.
Have you?
Never.
And here we go.
Orange County Brewers.
It's located on Orange and Jefferson.
And it's right here, as you can see.
I'm excited.
I haven't had craft beer in a while.
Here we go, here we go.
Oh, and they also have pizza inside.
My name is Kent.
I am the head brewer for Orange County Brewers and Brew Theory.
A new contract facility we're opening.
But right now, we're here at Orange County Brewers.
Trying to keep a bunch of different styles of beers on.
Keep everyone happy.
From IPAs to a nice light blonde and coffee stouts.
Yeah, we got Pizza Bruno in here, which is a huge thing for us.
Great partnership with Orange County Brewers and him being in our space.
Generally, we'll have anywhere from, depending on the season,
have 8 to 12 different beers on tap made right here in-house.
Playing around with different treatments and having fun with that as well.
On a Monday afternoon in Florida.
So here at Orange County Brewers, we are having two flights.
Two different flights.
They have a lot of beers.
I think they have around a dozen.
So we got actually 11.
He brought us an extra one over here.
And what I love about this place so far,
the flight board is the state of Florida.
So it's the state of Florida board.
Amazing.
And you hold the beers by the pen.
You gotta be careful.
I mean, this is the double IPA right here.
So where do we start?
You start with the first one.
There, I start here.
Okay, okay.
Cheers.
Monday at 3.09pm.
I know, but it's so good.
This is amazing.
What do you think about yours?
It's smooth.
It's not heavy at all.
It's just very smooth.
Kind of silky, actually.
Black hops down, the Schweissburger.
And it feels like a dark,
like a dark IPA in a way.
Way less hoppy.
So it's like a dark pale ale.
What does hoppy mean?
You don't know what hoppy is?
No.
Go on, you don't know.
Not bad, not bad.
You got the bleach blonde right there.
Bleach blonde.
And I have the Bock.
Okay.
Bock that ass up right here.
Cheers.
Very light.
This is different.
I've never tasted anything like this.
What's this one?
That's the blonde.
Blonde.
Yeah, mine tastes more like a,
almost like an amber.
Good?
Very good.
No, you have the Ultimate Warrior Citrus,
so it's like a citrus beer.
Okay.
I have the Dankster Paradise East Coast IPA.
Cheers again.
So.
This is great.
Citrus, very citrus.
That one?
Very citrus.
Very good.
Refreshing.
This IPA.
It's like a lemonade.
Beer lemonade.
Mine has like a,
so it's an IPA,
light on the hops.
It's an East Coast style.
It's very,
there's like two different styles
of East Coast and West Coast.
Yeah, this one also tastes a little citrusy.
You want to try it?
What is that?
The green tea IPA.
Not that bad.
6%.
Alright.
And then mine's the West Coast.
This is a 9%er,
so this is like a lot stronger.
I don't remember anymore.
I know more about your time.
I don't remember anymore.
Mmm.
Wow.
I like this one a lot though.
I think this is my favorite so far,
but I feel like my favorite
will be the last one
because I love styles.
I like probably the first one better.
Yeah?
So we both have styles.
My father's is the Percolator
and mine is the Lower Country style.
Cheers.
Salud.
Oh, it's the winner for me.
Let me try yours.
Mine's very milky.
Yours is more like coffee.
Yours is like straight coffee.
Mine's like coffee.
Oh, that one's awesome though.
That's like espressos,
like that's all you need.
We don't need to have espresso.
We just have this one.
This one's more like Guinness
and this is more like
a Guinness with espressos.
Mmm.
This is amazing.
This has coffee overtones.
Yeah, yeah.
The tones is like...
It's like you're having a beer
and you're having coffee.
Yeah.
Wanna see the brewery?
The brew house?
What happened to the double IPA?
Oh, we have a double IPA here?
Yeah, let's try it.
Okay.
Salud.
My favorite of all.
Yeah?
Your favorite?
I'm an IPA guy.
I like it.
This is my favorite beer
of all of them.
It's well balanced.
I'll take your espresso beans.
You can have my espresso.
But yeah, so after this,
we're gonna go inside
and see the brew house.
Let's go inside.
Let's go.
It's famous.
This is a seven barrel,
two vessel brew house there.
We got five conical fermenters,
uni tanks we call them,
and one bright tank.
So this is our brew house.
Like I said, two vessels,
seven barrel.
Come up and see the rakes inside here.
This is how we mash in.
We crack that grain.
Disposing the starch in it.
Heat that grain up
and heat that starch up
and convert that starch
to fermentable sugars,
which makes potential fermentable sugar
and yeast eats that
and that's what creates alcohol.
We brew about three or four times a week, Kim.
I'm loving the brewery here.
This place is awesome.
Some of my favorite beers
were for sure the espresso,
the double IPA,
the style espresso, double IPA,
but you know that Bach was really good.
Back that ass up.
Bach that ass up.
Okay, so we did it.
We ate some delicious Mexican food.
Tacos, queso fundido, cauliflower, mezcal,
and then we went and tried some delicious beers.
Oh wow, that sun is bright.
We had some delicious beers
at Orange County Brewers
right here in the heart of downtown Orlando.
What'd you love the most?
The beers.
The beers?
Yeah, I still feel the beers.
The beers.
The beers, the beers.
My dad's a lightweight, guys.
Yeah.
My favorite taco was the fish,
the drunken fish taco.
Favorite one, cauliflower.
The mezcal, I think the first one
from the Little Towns.
That was awesome.
And then from here,
I think that the espresso style
and the double IPA.
That was the best.
That was like an espresso coffee.
That was?
That was amazing.
Yep.
Love it.
Well guys, if you love this video,
give us a thumbs up,
leave us a comment below,
subscribe to my channel,
follow my father on Instagram,
and definitely come down
to downtown Orlando.
And yeah, forget the theme parks.
