My friend Deb put it the best way I’ve heard: “Port Fonda is the kind of Mexican food that makes you realize how much bad Mexican food you’ve been eating.” She said it after her first bite of the al pastor taco, sitting on the patio on a warm October evening, and I’ve been quoting her ever since.
Patrick Ryan opened Port Fonda back in 2012 in Westport, and the place has moved and evolved since then — it’s now on Southwest Boulevard, which feels right. Southwest Boulevard has long been Kansas City’s actual Mexican food corridor, a stretch of taquerias and bakeries that don’t need to advertise because the neighborhood already knows. Putting Port Fonda there was either a bold statement or a quiet confidence, depending on how you read Ryan.
I’ve talked to Ryan a handful of times over the years, mostly because I keep ending up next to him at events where chefs gather and talk shop. He’s restless in the way that good cooks often are — always tinkering, always sourcing something new, never fully satisfied with what’s on the menu. That quality shows in the food. This is not a place where dishes calcify into fixtures because changing them would risk a Yelp revolt. The menu moves. Sometimes things disappear that you loved. That can be frustrating, but it means the things that are there right now are things he actually wants to be cooking.
What I keep coming back to: the tacos are built on handmade tortillas, and that single decision separates the restaurant from about ninety percent of its competition in this city. The masa is fresh and slightly thick, with enough structural integrity to hold a proper filling without splitting, and enough corn flavor to actually taste like something. When the al pastor is right — and it usually is — it has that specific sweetness from the achiote and pineapple, with enough char from the trompo to give it edge. Get two. Get three.
The queso fundido is worth ordering early, before you’ve filled up on chips. It arrives in a cast-iron skillet, molten and serious, and you should ask for the chorizo mixed in. The margaritas are made with real lime juice and decent tequila, not triple sec from a speed rail, and they’re priced at about twelve dollars, which is fair for the quality.
Dinner for two with drinks will run you somewhere in the fifty to seventy dollar range depending on restraint, which neither of us usually shows here. The patio fills up fast on weekends, and there’s typically a wait by seven on Friday nights. Going at six on a weekday is the move — the kitchen is fresh, the room isn’t roaring yet, and you can actually hear yourself think.
What I appreciate most about Port Fonda, after all these years, is that Ryan never tried to make it the most Instagram-ready taqueria in the city. It’s just genuinely good at what it does. The space is warm without being precious, the staff knows the menu, and the food tastes like someone in the kitchen is paying attention. In a city that has a lot of fine dining ambition and a lot of cheap-and-fast options, this particular middle register — real craft, real ingredients, real price points — is harder to find than it should be.
Deb still talks about that first taco. So do I.
