If you’ve travelled to the USA before, chances are that you’ve come across Baja Fresh before as it’s a popular American Mexican chain store. Now Baja Fresh has opened a store in Singapore at the Rendezvous Hotel Gallery. I noticed it when I attended the Watsons Beauty Day out at the Full House last year but it wasn’t until recently that I managed to check out the offerings.
The setting feels really casual, a lot more fast food styled rather than restaurant even though it is sitting in front of the Rendezvous Hotel. I’ll be first to admit that I don’t know much about mexican food can can’t differentiate my burritos from my Fajitas but thankfully, the staff at Baja Fresh were very friendly and patient at explaining the different dishes to me.
As you can tell I had a whole lot of mexican food that day which is less sinful than most fast foods as Baja Fresh serves the freshest and high quality food with lots of vegetables. Baja Fresh focuses on ‘Fresh Living’ which means that all their food is handmade and not processed. The meat used are all natural and their ingredients are farm fresh, not tin-canned. I also love the bright, clean environment with their contemporary, intimate décor.
We ordered from an array of tacos, burritos, salads and fajitas all featuring fresh and flavorful ingredients. Although burritos, fajitas and tacos are all basically wraps with different ingredients, the biggest difference is in the combination of ingredients and textures that give each one a totally different feel. I’ll try my best to put them in words but the best way to understand the difference is actually to taste them.
Burrito consists of a wheat flour or corn flour tortilla, but in cylindrical shaped with completely wrapped form. The filling in fully wrapped tortilla may be different like Baja rice, beans, meat, Monterey Jack cheese and guacamole. In different combination of ingredients and styles, Baja Fresh offers about 20 different choices ranging from S$12.95 to $15.95.
Fajita is the name of a Tex-Mex dish recipe that is equally famous in Mexico and Texan. Fajita is a form of Mexican Taco, but essentially consists of grilled meats or seafood as a fillings and lots of fresh vegetables are added as well. Baja Fresh offers 6 variety of Fajitas and you have a choice of ordering it in 2 sizes – regular or grande.
Taco also consists of wheat or corn flour tortilla, but in half wrapped form with different filling materials. At Baja fresh you have a choice of ordering taco platters or single tacos. You can further specify if you like it Baja (corn) style or Americano style so the choices are endless for mexican food lovers.
The salads are gorgeous and must try. Offered in 3 styles – Caesar, Baja Ensalada, Tostada and in 5 different choice of main fillings – Chicken, Char Siew (pork), Veggies, Shrimp, Mahi Mah. This gives you a total of 15 different possible combinations. That’s a wide range of salad choice that is rarely found anywhere else.
Quesadilla is probably the Mexican dish that I recognized the easiest. Baja Fresh quesadilla is made by using grilled flour tortilla as a wrapping material and Monterey Jack cheese guacamole, sour cream and your choice of meat as filling materials. The specialty of quesadilla is its half moon-like shape that is made by half wrapping the tortilla around the filling. This also comes in two sizes.
As you can tell, the portions of the food are really generous and I highly recommend sharing when coming to Baja Fresh.
In their simplest form, nachos are tortilla chips covered in cheese, sour cream, guacamole and/or salsa. At Baja Fresh, they have 4 different salsas which is free flow and you can use them on any of your orders.
Surprisingly, despite it’s fast food feel, this place serves alcoholic drinks and their cocktails are pretty good.
Another surprise was that this place actually serves one of my favorite snacks – churros. I don’t normally associate churros with Mexican food but since they are one of my favorite food, I really can’t complain.
Overall, I would say that the food here is really delicious and very fresh. I don’t take mexican food very often but this is probably one of the better ones I’ve tried in Singapore.
Baja Fresh
9 Bras Basah Rd
Singapore 189559
Tel: 6337 7300
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Outfit of the day
I went for a swim before heading to Baja Fresh that day which explains my rather casual outfit. I felt a little underdressed that day especially since I went for coffee with the always immaculate Elaine at Rendezvous Hotel Cafe after the tasting session.
Top: Ginger Snaps
Shorts: China (super comfy and a great holiday purchase)
Earrings: Chanel
Bracelet: Hermes
Bag: Alexander Wang
Crystal flats: Singapore