Mad Mex STL has opened inside Mad Art Gallery in Soulard

Mad Mex STL, the newest lunch pop-up inside the Soulard gallery, catering and event space Mad Art Gallery, opened Saturday, Feb. 5, at 2727 S. 12th St., as reported by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Owner and head chef Ron Buechele, who also owns Mad Art Gallery, is the former head chef of Capitalist Pig, the barbecue joint that occupied Mad Art Gallery from 2012 to 2018. His newest culinary venture shifts focus to Mexican-style barbecue and street food. “The menu contains stuff you’d get from a street vendor in Mexico, not necessarily traditional restaurant-style things,” Buechele said.

With birria, a Mexican stew, as the centerpiece, the menu itself is truly mouthwatering. Traditional goat birria, lamb birria and, eventually, jackfruit birria will satisfy all varieties of birria cravings. Other menu highlights include Buechele’s take on the wildly popular quesabirria tacos with consommé, a birria ramen, which consists of ramen topped with diner’s choice of birria meat and taco toppings like sliced radish and cilantro, and sincronazados, which are tortillas with hand-sliced ham and Jarlsberg or white cheddar cheese.

Buechele added that the drinks menu is still in the works, but he is carefully curating a slew of beverages imbued with traditional Mexican flavors and spices. Diners can expect a bloody maría, a bloody mary that substitutes tequila for vodka, along with various tequilas and mezcals. Buechele also plans to offer alcoholic versions of traditionally non-alcoholic drinks such as tamarindo, and he will incorporate popular spices like chamoy and tajin into the drinks menu, which will likely accompany a weekend brunch that is tentatively planned for the restaurant’s future.

For Buechele, Mad Mex STL is a return to his Mexican roots. After unexpectedly reconnecting with his estranged father, Ron Lee Ochoa, in 2015, Buechele was able to retrace his family history, from his paternal grandfather’s long journey from a railroad station at Davalos, Mexico, to Cleveland, Ohio, all the way back to his family’s indigenous origins in Mexico. Buechele’s paternal grandmother was a descendant of the Mexica tribe. “The ‘Mex’ in Mad Mex STL is really more of an abbreviation of Mexica,” Buechele said. 

Buechele’s new lunch pop-up will occupy about 2,000 square feet of the 19,000-square-foot building, which is designed to quickly convert from a bustling lunch hotspot and gallery by day to an event space by night. With space for about 100 guests indoors and roughly another 50 on the patio, there are plenty of spots to savor some Mexican street food while gazing at beautiful art. 

Mad Mex STL is open from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Wednesday to Saturday, with dine-in and carryout options available. Within the next few weeks, online ordering and delivery within 15 minutes should be available.