sounds like a Hawaiian type dish to me.

https://www.tasteandtellblog.com/chicken-and-pineapple-supreme/

Sounds like Hawaiian Chicken...? Does It look like this?

https://www.tasteandtellblog.com/chicken-and-pineapple-supreme/

That's two votes for Hawaiian.

I've never had pineapple with chicken, ham, or cheese in Mexico, but I did have pineapple empanadas in Campeche, and they were a dessert.

If not Hawaiian... maybe Malibu Chicken?

https://www.perrysplate.com/2010/10/grilled-malibu-chicken.html

No, the chicken and ham were much thinner and the cheese is melted. Also served with rice. I think it was based on a recipe from a restaurant in the NW because I looked it up once a long time ago.

No salsa or some kind of mole involved? If not, doesn't sound very Mexican.

Some type of Verde dish?

https://keviniscooking.com/open-faced-chicken-cordon-bleu/

So was this dish seasoned? With what? Was there a sauce, what did it taste like? What kind of cheese was it?

Hawaiian and Malibu chicken have the cheese melted... you can make the chicken and ham as thin as you like.

Thanks everyone. I just remember I liked it. I'll probably try to make it again some day. It probably was just a house dish. Thanks!

Well your description has certainly gotten my attention! Please share if you find the recipe!

I'm in the PNW and have lived on the west coast for forty years and have never seen anything like that. You might try it with homemade pineapple salsa. The cheese would be a Mexican melting cheese, which is similar to mozzarella, or Monterey jack.

Haha, if you want more authentic Mexican food, you need to be closer to the border (and not the Canadian border).

What......there is no authentic Mexican food in the PNW?? We have a huge Hispanic community here, as many agricultural centers do, and it is not hard to find very authentic Mexican food here. Or all the necessary ingredients at a local bodega to make your own.

The dish sounds vaguely like a deconstructed al pastor recipe. At least it has all the ingredients for al pastor with the addition of chicken as well.

jkayd, seems like most restaurants have facebook or web pages. Maybe comment to ask if anyone else remembers this dish, and/or email the management to ask if they might still have the recipe available.

I guess things have changed in the PNW because when I went there in the 1970s, I could not find authentic Mexican food at all. I did find frozen tortillas at a supermarket in Vancouver and a Texas BBQ restaurant in Seattle, but not any authentic Mexican food.

The first time I went to Seattle was August 1976 (on my way to Vancouver), after having spent the month of June 1976 in Mexico City and Nayarit. Seattle was very depressed at this time, as Boeing had recently laid off a lot of employees there. There was also an American Legion Convention in Seattle while I was there - during an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease. So my first impressions of Seattle were not good at all.

"there is no authentic Mexican food in the PNW?"

My experience, admittedly during fleeting exposure as a visitor but on very many occasions, was that many "Mexican" restaurants in the Seattle area seemed not to be real authentic and to be owned and run by gringos. Maybe that wasn't representative.

If you want the real thing in greater numbers (I did say "more"), you need to be much closer to the source. Just as an example, there are many in SoCal and also in the Bay Area too. San Diego has too many terrific Mexican restaurants (many very plain and some a bit grungy but with a delicious diversity of regional Mexican cooking) than one could ever sample.

Well, the good, authentic Mexican food in the PNW is not going to be as easily found in the urban, touristy areas, but in the areas away from the cities in the smaller towns and in agricultural areas, like Mt. Vernon/Skagit County in the north, Lewis county in the south and just about every area in eastern WA....where the largest apple crop in the US is grown, as well as the largest sweet cherry crop, plus many, many other fruits are grown and processed. Lots of wine growing regions in WA and Oregon. Yakima has a huge, majority Hispanic population. Walla Walla and the Palouse and other wheat growing areas also have a large Hispanic population. While not what some of you would call "authentic" I remember the best taco I've ever had was a Walla Walla sweet onion taco from a Mexican run taco truck in Walla Walla. The taco was authentic, just the Walla Walla onions were a later addition not found in Mexico.

If a person is of Mexican heritage and makes Mexican food, is that not authentic, too? Funny, white people arguing about authentic Mexican.

I would guess the same could be true in BC, but they'll have to respond to that.

If it helps any.... Malibu chicken originates from Sizzler, a restaurant chain in California and the NW...

olychick, are you sharing your experiences or guessing? Yes, agricultural areas tend to have higher Hispanic populations because of the work many do. Minimum wage and often itinerant farm workers don't tend to eat in restaurants. And when they do, at least in my area, many really enjoy Chinese food.

"If a person is of Mexican heritage and makes Mexican food, is that not authentic, too?"

It depends on the style of food, what dishes they make and how they make them. There is such a thing as what I'll call Americanized Mexican and that's all most people know and that's mostly what you find. That's not authentic Mexican cooking and I used that word purposefully.

The same is true for most kinds of ethnic food. If you think you know and like Chinese food from eating in conventional Chinese restaurants in the US, you're in for a shock should you ever visit an ethnically Chinese area - China, or Taiwan, or Singapore, as examples. In my area, there have been enough ethnic Chinese immigrants in the last few decades that there are authentic Chinese restaurants to be found and perhaps some in the PNW area too. But to really experience authentic Chinese food (which is also very different regionally), you need to go to such a place with a Chinese friend because usually the English menus show only the Americanized stuff and the authentic dishes are on menus written only in Chinese.

There is no shortage of authentic Chinese restaurants in Washington state.

Oh Elmer.......

Yes, Lars, as well as outstanding Thai, Vietnamese and Japanese. You can find more of those restaurants in the more urban areas than authentic Mexican. We once had a governor of Chinese descent. His brother was my neighbor. I remember talking to him about Chinese restaurants in the PNW. He said that when Chinese immigrants would settle in an area, they would pool their resources so a family member could open a business and restaurants seemed to be the ticket to success. Once the restaurant was successful, they would help fund another family member to open another restaurant, but in another community so as not to compete. That's why you can find great Chinese (and some not so great) in so many little towns across the PNW. Really remote towns with no real Chinese community, except the restaurateurs and their families.

I've had really good Thai and Vietnamese food in Seattle, as well as Greek and Lebanese, which is normally only found in port cities, since Greece and Phoenicia are known for their ships and shipping.

Seattle is also very good for seafood, which I love. Food and restaurants are what I liked best about Seattle, and I didn't care whether it had Mexican food when I was there, since for me, that is more common. Greek and Lebanese food are more difficult to find, and they are my favorite cuisines.