Los Tacos

Restaurant: Los Tacos
Cuisine: Authentic Mexican
Last visited: August 7, 09

Area: San Gabriel, California
504 W. Las Tunas Drive
Price Range: $10 or less

1: Poor 2: OK 3: Good 4: Very good 5: Excellent 6: Tres Excellent!!

Food: 3
Service: 2
Ambiance: 1
Overall: 3
Additional comments:

• Located in San Gabriel, California
• Famous for "The World's Greatest Tacos"
• Cheap, but authentic Mexican
  
• Family owned and operated
• Hole in the wall - local favourite
• Serves big breakfast and lunch platters
• Big portions
• Nothing gourmet, super casual
  
• Offers authentic Mexican drinks and desserts

**Recommendation: Carnitas soft tacos, drink -Horchata. I bet their breakfast burritos are amazing, but I didn't get to order one, I saw some locals order the Tortas too, which looked delicious...and are very big.

The tortilla shells are all made in house and are really fresh. Each taco is double wrapped with these soft tortilla shells. Good tortilla to filling ratio. An authentic Mexican hole in the wall eatery that is familiar to locals. The tacos all come in miniature form - the traditional way - and its great! No sour cream or guacamole in these traditional tacos, just well-marinated and cooked meat. Cheap, good Mexican food - not the best, but it's real Mexican.

On the table:

• ** Carnitas soft taco 5/6
• Pulled pork
• This was my favourite taco out of the bunch. It was flavourful, tender and saucy.
  
• It was the first plate of tacos gone. Each plate comes with 4 miniature soft tacos, and each taco is double wrapped in their homemade tortilla shells. So your tortilla won't break while you're in mid-bite, although the filling might overflow and spill out the top.
• Barria soft taco 4/6
• Marinated beef
• This was my second favourite soft taco.
• Pretty good, but not the best. Nice pieces of marinated beef, its good with their chile verde salsa.
• Chicken Mole soft taco 2/6
  
• Pulled chicken smother with mole sauce and pablanos
• This was a close second. The mole aka sauce, is a rich deep brown colour and it had a smoky cumin flavour. It's made with ground chilies, but the chilies don't add heat, it just added an intense smoky taste.
• Al Pastor soft taco 1/6
  
• Marinated Pork
  
• This taco was my least favourite out of the bunch. It was the only one left over too, if they were good we could have finished them, but it wasn't really worth it. They were a bit dry, and bland and just had no kick.
  
• Quesadillas 1/6
  
• Nothing special here. What you'd expect for a cheap fast food quesadilla. Just a generous amount of melted cheese on tortillas. But they use big tortillas, which are still really fresh.
• Hard Shell Tacos 2/6
  
• I prefer the soft tacos to the hard shell tacos. The soft ones just taste fresher. The shells are the best part and don't need to be deep fried. We had it with thin slices of roast beef aka asada and they top them off with cheese, tomato, and lettuce. Nothing out of the ordinary.
• Nachos with Asada 3/6
  
• A big plate of nachos covered with thin cuts of roasted beef, melted cheese, tomatoes, onions, and topped with heaping scoops of guacamole and sour cream.
  
• Super greasy, but pretty tasty...again not the best. But expected from a place like this.
• **Breakfast Burritos
• Didn't try it, but I will if I go back. They have a whole section just for breakfast burritos so I feel like they would be really good there. They're really really big too. Saw a lot of Mecxican families ordering these for lunch.
  
• ** Tortas
• Didn't try this either. But I saw a few local Mexicans guys ordering the "Torta" as I was leaving. It looked really delicious. It's a grilled roll with your choice of meat, lettuce, tomato, and guacamole.

Authentic homemade Mexican desserts

Drinks

• This place serves up authentic Mexican drinks: Horchata, Tamarindo & Jamaica
• The most authentic and best one is the: Horchata - made of rice milk, and has a nice almond flavour. Nice and sweet, it has a little cinnamon and vanilla flavour to round it all up.