What do you actually eat in Sherman on a weeknight when you don’t want chain food and you don’t want a scene?
I’ve asked myself that more times than I can count, and for the past couple of years my answer has usually been Beto’s Mexican Restaurant on N. Travis Street. It’s not glamorous. The parking lot is small, the sign is sun-faded, and the dining room looks like it was last redecorated sometime during the Clinton administration. None of that bothers me anymore, because the food is consistent in a way that matters more than décor ever could.
I usually go on a Tuesday or Wednesday evening, when the dinner rush has thinned out and you can actually hear yourself talk. Weekend lunches get busy, especially after church on Sundays, so expect a short wait if you roll in around noon. Weeknight dinners, though, are calm. You get your chips and salsa quickly, and the salsa here has a little more heat than the mild, ketchup-adjacent stuff you get at a lot of places in town. It has actual chile flavor — smoky, slightly chunky, and not sweet.
What I order almost every time: the beef enchiladas with chili gravy. This is Texas-Mexican cooking in the old sense, not Tex-Mex in the chain sense. The chili gravy is rich and earthy, the tortillas hold together through the whole plate, and the cheese is melted completely through rather than sitting in a cold clump on top. It runs around ten dollars, sometimes a dollar or two more depending on the combination you build. The carne guisada is worth ordering if you’re hungrier than usual — big portion, tender beef, and a sauce that’s been cooking long enough to taste like it.
The tamales are solid, though I’ll admit they’re better on some visits than others. When they’re right, they’re really right — tight masa, moist filling, the kind that don’t fall apart when you pull back the husk. I’ve had them on an off night too, a little dry in the middle. Ask when they were made if you’re particular about it; the staff is friendly enough that it won’t seem like a weird question.
The margaritas are nothing complicated — house mix, decent tequila, served in a wide-rimmed glass with salt if you want it. They’re priced fairly, around seven or eight dollars, and they do the job. I wouldn’t drive across town specifically for a cocktail, but I wouldn’t turn one down either.
What I keep coming back for is the consistency and the fact that the place is genuinely local. The same faces work there year after year. The menu doesn’t reinvent itself. You know what you’re going to get, and that reliability is its own kind of quality. In a city where restaurants open and close with frustrating speed, Beto’s has been holding its ground on Travis Street for a long time, and regulars in Sherman know it for a reason.
Park on the side street if the lot is full, get the enchiladas, and don’t skip the chips. It’s a solid weeknight dinner for two that rarely runs over thirty dollars before tip.
