We have been wanting to go to a Cease & Desist special dinner at Culture for a long time now. When the Oaxaca-themed dinner, a fun nod to Taco Bell, made its return, we jumped at the chance to snag a reservation. This exclusive menu, curated by guest chef Luis Martinez, promised bold flavors from Oaxaca with a playful twist that “rings a bell” in the most delicious way.

Four courses included

1. Late Night Cravings Box
2. 2. Oaxacan Pizza
3. Barbacoa chicken
4. Cinna Twist Corn Mochi and Huitalacoche Ice Cream

Describing this meal as underwhelming would be an understatement. The first course consisted of a variety of items: quesadillas, tacos, crunch wraps, and potatoes. While the potatoes were decent, they were notably lacking in flavor, particularly salt. Fortunately, the delicious salsas provided helped remedy this shortcoming. However, my chicken quesadilla contained a sizable chicken bone—something that might be forgiven if the food were exceptional, but unfortunately, it was not. The crunch wrap and taco also fell short in the flavor department, again only salvaged by generous amounts of salsa.

The second course was a tortilla pizza. I’m surprised to read chorizo in the description because I definitely did not get any of that flavor in this bite. Bland beans was pretty much the only flavor that came through in this dish. And that hint of… ‘these are probably old’ beans was thrown in there, just for fun.

The third course was beautifully presented, featuring roast barbacoa chicken, white beans, pickled veggies, and homemade tortillas. The tortillas were excellent, but unfortunately, the rest of the dish fell flat in terms of flavor, leaving us craving more—though not more food, just more taste. A comment was even made that our local grocery store offers a better rotisserie chicken, which I find hard to dispute, especially given its much more reasonable price. Interestingly, a recent review of this restaurant mentioned the chicken was excessively spicy. In contrast, the chicken we had was completely devoid of flavor. Perhaps the restaurant adjusted the seasoning to avoid previous complaints, but at the very least, a bit of salt could have made a difference.

The real fail for me was the dessert, The texture of the ice cream was like stringy rubber that was sticky and gummy. The flavor, I can’t even tell you. It was absolutely off putting. A blend of silly putty and mushroom and cane sugar. I can’t remember the last time I actually spit food out of my mouth… maybe it was a cake I made with baking soda instead of baking powder… dunno. I was so excited about the corn mochi “churros” because I LOVE mochi. After tasting so many different types in Japan, I was hopefully that these at least would redeem the disappointing dinner. However, they were grey in color and sadly grey in taste.

Needless to say, we left more food than we actually ate. A lot of it was excessively oily. All of it lacking in flavor. The dessert was just so wrong. And please hear me, I will try ANYTHING and my food repitoir is VERY broad. These thoughts were not put down by people who have shallow palates and limited food allowances. I would like to try Cultura when the regular chef, Eric Morris, is cooking, but I’m not sure even that will tempt me to return anytime soon.

Sorry Cultura. Huge miss for me.