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The Search for Tacos Dorados (Part 2)
Posted on Tuesday, June 16 @ 12:17:20 PDT
Topic: Mexican
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In Part 2, we take a look at The Loon, Pepe's & Mito's, El Fenix, Luna de Noche, and Manny's. On to the food...
The Loon. 3531 McKinney Avenue.
The Loon offers tacos dorados under the name "tacos fritos." Classic "closed" style tacos with the meat fried inside. Visibly greasy, but nicely crisp, the ground beef was flavorful and well seasoned. Lettuce, tomato, and cheddar came on the side. Despite the bar setting and the yellow corn tortillas, the tacos were actually pretty good. Unfortunately, they weren't served with anything other than the salad/garnish. No rice or beans were included or even available separately. Three tacos to the order. $7.95 (which is a little pricey, given the lack of sides).
Pepe's & Mito's. 2911 Elm Street.
The fried tacos at Pepe's & Mito's appear on the appetizer menu. Called "crispy taquitos," they are "open" style fried tacos--not rolled, as the name might lead one to believe. However, their use of the diminutive is apt given the small size of the tacos. Each taco held maybe a tablespoon of seasoned ground beef, plus some shredded iceberg, cheddar, and diced tomato. The small, crisp shells were unusually thin. As I ate them and was puzzling over how to describe them, the first expression that came to mind was "chip-like."
I looked to the chip basket and noticed a more than passing resemblance. Diameter, thickness, texture...everything appeared to match (as shown above). It's an interesting idea--using a specialized chip tortilla for crispy taco shells. Personally, I like corn. Whether we're talking chips or tortillas, I don't consider thinner inherently better as some people do (especially when "thinner" involves frozen, specialty tortillas). But I can see how the chip-like shells at Pepe's & Mito's might appeal to some. The tacos were three to an order. Without sides, they were $5.25. (Beans and rice ordered separately were $1.75 each.)
El Fenix. 1601 McKinney Avenue.
El Fenix--that monument to the inscrutability of popular taste--offers tacos dorados under the name "old-fashioned fried chicken tacos," adding ominously that they're "An El Fenix Favorite." Poor, yellow corn tortillas were used for the "closed" style tacos. The shells were crisp in places, chewy in places, soggy in places. The chicken consisted of dry white meat--a painful study in flavorless texture. The tacos came with a small mound of limp iceberg and some pallid tomato niblets. No rice or beans.
In a repeat visit, I thought the tacos might be improved by subbing El Fenix's "picadillo meat." Take those as scare quotes. Within each taco rested a glob of something apparently intended to pass for meat. It wasn't shredded or even ground, but had the texture of cheap beef pureed with mashed potatoes. (Less delicately, my notes read, "Like warm canned dog food.") The textural monotony was broken a couple of times by bits of what appeared to be bone. The shells were less soggy this time, but still short of ideal. I can't recall ever eating a worse taco than El Fenix's old-fashioned taco with "picadillo meat." Three tacos (too many) per order, with no rice or beans. $8.95.
Luna de Noche. 2300 Victory Park Lane.
Tacos dorados weren't on the menu at Luna de Noche, but the waiter said he'd check with the kitchen to see if they could do them. They could. He asked if I preferred ground or shredded beef, so I told him to give me a mix. The tacos arrived in proper "closed" form, the toothpicks having been removed. Typical yellow corn tortillas were used (pictured at the top of this report). Texturally, the shells were moving past crispness to crunchiness, but not so much as to be a serious flaw.
The ground beef filling (in two tacos) was meaty and not over-seasoned. (It tasted like beef!) Shredded beef (in the third taco) was very tender and juicy, allowing surplus flavor to flow down into the rice and beans below. Everything about the plate was big. Three tacos, more meat in each compared with most, large portions of rice and beans, and a better than average salad/garnish with romaine, cheddar, and pico. At $14, Luna de Noche was more expensive than average, but reasonable for the quality and portioning. (As with any off-menu item, pricing and availability may vary from visit to visit. Also, I haven't tried to get tacos dorados at any other location of Luna de Noche.) [UPDATE: Luna de Noche in Victory Park has now included tacos dorados on the printed menu, under the name "old fashioned tacos." No more "off menu" complications. Shredded pork is a filling option, in addition to shredded beef and chicken. Two tacos per order--$7.50 on the lunch specials menu and $13 on the dinner menu. (The latter feels a little steep, except when compared to other pre-game options within walking distance of AAC.)]
Manny's. 3521 Oak Grove Avenue.
Though the availability of old-fashioned tacos at Mia's and Mi Cocina would seem to make Manny's a cinch, it was another damp squib. The waiter insisted they didn't do any off-menu tacos. The only crispy tacos were the ones on the menu. When I asked about those, he said they weren't old-fashioned (i.e., "closed"), but were fried to order. When the tacos arrived, it was apparent the shells had been made earlier in the day. Cool to the touch and having lost crispness, the yellow corn shells held lightly seasoned ground beef. Salad consisted of romaine, cheese, and a little tomato. Rice and beans were the best things on the plate. While a shell fried before service beats a commercial pre-fab shell, it's not what I'm looking for. Two tacos to an order. $8.50. Disqualified.
The Search for Tacos Dorados: Introduction, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5....
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