Sobremesa replaces Session Taco Joint with a brand new Mexican idea in St. Charles

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

Consumers’ eating habits are altering, however our love of Mexican meals remains to be going sturdy. The newly opened Sobremesa within the Streets of St. Charles (1650 Beale St., Unit #130) faucets into the spirit of the occasions with an off-the-cuff eating expertise that includes flavors impressed by the California-Mexico border.

With Sobremesa, the Tilford Restaurant Group has changed the long-running, bar-focused taco joint with a welcoming eatery the place households and pals can pause and linger over favorites similar to fajitas, enchiladas, and quesadillas—with build-your-own choices for entrées and margaritas alike.

Here’s what to know earlier than you go.

The Atmosphere

The Spanish phrase sobremesa describes the apply of sitting round a desk after the meal is completed, having fun with dialog and good firm. Adam Tilford and his brother, Jason, had this in thoughts after they redesigned the Session Taco Joint location in St. Charles.

“We were looking to make it a very comfortable space that plays into the Mexican comfort food menu,” Adam Tilford says.

In collaboration with SPACE Design and Construction of St. Louis, the Tilfords and their group opened the bar space, added colourful tiles, hung new lighting fixtures, sanded down tables, and changed a stable wall with a see-through divider stuffed with eclectic finds from Gringo Jones Imports in South City. Sobremesa’s house owners and workers did a lot of the work themselves, from inserting tiles to portray.

The result’s a sunny nook restaurant with brighter colours, decrease seating preparations, and refreshed paintings. Even the adjoining arcade space, The Streets Arcade (now managed by ECL Gaming, which owns the video games) has been up to date, with common choices similar to Whack ‘N Win and Down the Clown obtainable for household enjoyable—and providing youngsters who would possibly get antsy throughout a sobremesa the prospect to win prizes whereas burning off somewhat power.

The Menu

The Tilford brothers fell in love with Mexican meals throughout three childhood stints in San Diego whereas their father was within the navy.

Adam Tilford says one of many largest advantages of the transition away from a taco-centric menu was the prospect for Jason, the restaurant’s head chef, to get again to his roots. “We’ve owned and operated Mexican restaurants since 2004,” Adam Tilford says. “There are many more authentic experiences available now than there were when we started Tortillería and Milagro Modern Mexican.”

Jason Tilford and Matt Quintero have been capable of play into clients’ deeper data after they developed the menu. They take full benefit of the wood-fired grill—the kitchen’s most original function—to cook dinner the margarita rooster for the towering sandwich and strip steak to be drenched in chimichurri butter. The fajitas come straight from the grill to a scorching platter, then go straight to the desk with peppers, onions, and all the same old fixings plus tamarind pasilla butter, a stylish Mexican-inspired seasoning mix of candy tamarind, delicate pasilla chiles, and spices similar to paprika, coriander, and onion powder.

The cooks have additionally put some playful touches on the menu. One is the volcan shrimp, a pile of crispy rock shrimp and fried jalapeño rings tossed in Cholula aioli. Another is the chilito rellenos, jalapeños full of chorizo and cheese, then calmly battered and deep-fried to tender-crisp perfection.

Asked for his favourite consolation meals, Adam Tilford is fast to say that he thinks of enchiladas as a go-to dish for Sunday night time dinner. But he’s additionally a fan of a riff on two classics merged right into a singular appetizer of spinach-artichoke-queso dip: “You marry those two together, and it’s so good,” he says.

Taco-lovers have a alternative of fish tacos with crispy wild hake, floor beef tacos in crunch corn tortillas, or avenue tacos with onion, cilantro, and a alternative of steak al carbon, pork carnitas, rooster asada, or chimichurri Harvest Shreds (an area plant-based protein).

The Sobre Your Way menu part permits clients to assemble a combo platter with those self same protein choices in crispy or mushy tacos, quesadillas, tostadas, enchiladas, burritos, or mini chimichangas.

Cocktail favorites similar to margaritas, mojitos, and sangria are approachable however high-quality, utilizing all recent juices and high-quality spirits just like the Withered Oak Amburana rye whiskey from 4 Hands, says Josh Laney, director of operations at Sobremesa and beverage director for Tilford Restaurant Group.

Laney is happy to supply simple-yet-fresh choices similar to machine-mixed frozen piña coladas and N/A daiquiris, in addition to a choose-your-flavor margarita journey through which clients can decide the flavour (strawberry, pineapple, passionfruit, mango, jamaíca), rim (salt, sugar, Tajín, black Hawaiian salt, pink Himalayan salt), and tequila or mezcal.

Cocktail carryovers from Session Taco Joint embrace the signature paloma, made with private-label agave spirit, recent lemon and lime juices, agave nectar, grapefruit bitters, and Urban Chestnut Brewing Co.’s grapefruit Radler. The N/A menu additionally has some acquainted mocktails, together with a Soberita, Pretty in Pink, and the Piña ‘Not Quite’ Lada.

The restaurant has a totally stocked bar and a number of beers on faucet, together with native craft brews from 4 Hands and Urban Chestnut. And those that love the custom-brewed Session Taco IPA from 4 Hands can relaxation assured, Laney says, that it’s going to nonetheless be on faucet.

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

The Big Picture

Courtesy of Sobremesa

Courtesy of Sobremesa

Sobremesa is a component of a bigger refocusing for Tilford Restaurant Group throughout 2026. Adam and Jason Tilford have retained three areas of their authentic idea, now often called Session Taco Joint, in Soulard, the Delmar Loop, and suburban Kansas City. The joints are bringing again a few of their most-requested menu objects, together with barbecued duck tacos, braised brisket tacos, huitlacoche empanadas, and Mexicali cheese curds.

They additionally lately rebranded a former Session Taco location within the Central West End to Lapez Mod Mex, highlighting Mexican delicacies via trendy interpretations of conventional dishes. (A equally rebranded location in metro Kansas City closed in May, and the corporate elected to not renew the lease on an area in Kirkwood.)

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

Sobremesa marks an ideal midpoint between the high-end Lapez and the bar-style Session Taco Joints, Adam Tilford says.

On a current afternoon, Sobremesa group members assembled forward of a mushy opening have been relaxed and jovial. Many have deep expertise with Tilford Restaurant Group. For instance, Laney, who was employed as a bartender on the CWE taco joint in 2016, lately returned to the corporate after a quick time away. During his first stint with the corporate, he employed Jianna Calvillo, who’s now the assistant normal supervisor at Sobremesa.

A newcomer is normal supervisor Steve Sarver, who says he has labored in loads of full-service eating places—sufficient to acknowledge when his mindset aligns with the house owners’ mentality, because it does with Sobremesa.

“It’s been a challenging few years,” admits Adam Tilford, alluding to a 2022 fireplace at their Central West End restaurant and a trademark lawsuit over their taco eating places’ earlier identify. “But Sobremesa complements the nearby businesses in St. Charles—and with the upscale food at Lapez and bar food at Session, Sobremesa hits the right balance.”

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

Photography by Amy De La Hunt

Sobremesa
📍1650 Beale St, Unit #130, St. Charles
📞636-442-1620
⏰11 a.m.–9 p.m. Sun–Thu, 11 a.m.–10 p.m. Fri & Sat