Recently, my good FOY (Friend of Yoso) TammyC requested a "taco crawl" something that I've done a couple times before…once even with this group of folks. This time, YY and her husband MrQ had to be done by 1230, so this would mean a fairly close proximity…..I pretty much had the plan done. I knew this small group would be game, after all we already had done a smaller Chula Vista taco crawl and had both the Mira Mesa Banh Mi tasting and the Amazing Graze behind us….but with a short itme period this could turn out to be pretty brutal.
First stop was a restaurant. It would be nice for the five of us to get to a relaxing start. I chose….
***Birrieria's la Guadalajara has closed.
We started with a Tacos Rojo – Borrego:
I also ordered the Borrego a la Plancha, Birria de Chivo, and Cabeza en su Jugo, which MrQ absolutely loved. Folks were encouraged to pace themselves and here leftovers would be ok. TammyC had never been a fan of lamb or goat….until now.
Of course, the food here is major roll back into bed food, so it was kind of a tough start….all of those fresh tortillas just sit in your stomach.
Birrieria's la Guadalajara
1310 Third Ave
Chula Vista, CA 91911
Next stop was a double whammy…first was:
Mariscos el Pescador:
The consomme here always delivers.
I only went with a fish taco…lots more to come up after this. The fish taco here beat El Peito's hands down on this day. Nice portion of better flavored fish. The only thing El Prieto had on this was the crunchy batter.
Mariscos El Pescador (In the parking lot pf RTA/Toys R Us)
1008 Industrial Blvd
Chula Vista, CA 91911
The next stop was right across the parking lot…..
El Gallito Tortas Ahogadas:
I'd been here a couple of times and while I loved the bread had never really been impressed.
However, the #1, traditional Tortas Ahogadas had been pretty spicy and MrC really loves spicy food….I mean he eats Ghost peppers for fun. So we got the traditional at a heat level of 10.
I had a fourth of the sandwich, TammyC a fourth, and MrC half. I gotta say, this was much better than I recalled. The bread was great as always, but the pork had fine flavor. MrC's verdict, "not bad, the heat does creep up on you."
YY and MrQ, who often order Thai food at heat level "1" (is there such a thing?) had the #2 at heat level 5, which they had no problems with.
I also had a fourth….I prefer the more traditional sandwich.
By the way, based on all the photos around the truck, I guess Andrew Zimmern stopped by and the place will be featured on one of his shows. So if you're curious, get there before the show airs and all the "Zimm-heads" blow the place up.
El Gallito Tortas Ahogadas
1008 Industrial Blvd
Chula Vista, CA 91911
We jumped back in our cars and headed down Industrial and onto Main for our next stop:
Mariscos Y Tacos El Kiki:
I just recently posted on the place and things are pretty much the same. So here's a photo of the Taco Perron I ate along with more consomme:
Mariscos Y Tacos El Kiki
Corner of Main St and Hollister St.
We decided to take a breather and headed across the street to a shop that sells spices, chilies, and snacks called….
El Ruisnor:
I'd noticed this place the last time I ate at El Kiki.
You can smell the spices when entering the shop…there are bags of the stuff lining the shelves.
There are also bulk beans and snacks sold.
Interesting shop.
El Ruisenor
2260 Main St
Chula Vista, CA 91911
Then it was back across the street, into our cars and we were off east on Main, stopping at the final "double whammy" location…..
Birrieria El Prieto:
I'd noticed this truck, parked right across from the Mariscos El Prieto truck a couple of weeks ago and had been waiting to check the place out. This El Prieto "twin" did birria, quesotacos, al pastor, and the like. The sold is "res", beef.
I ordered a birria and cabeza taco to try things out. YY, MrC, and MrQ had hit the wall and were not participating…..
The birria was dry and rather tough and short on flavor. The cabeza was very moist and tender, but a bit short on the condensed beefiness I expect from rendered cow head.
Of course right across the way is the El Prieto Mariscos truck.
Even though MrQ could not eat another bite of a taco, he still had room for more consomme.
Another funny thing I noticed……El Prieto now has a parking attendant….for eating at taco trucks! I just found this amusing.
In the end, only TammyC (one) and myself (two) could manage to finish the three tacos ordered.
While we both loved the batter, very nice and crisp, the tacos had only little slivers of fish in them. This wasn't the way it was on previous visits. I'm hoping this was just a fluke.
Mariscos El Prieto
and
Birrieria El Prieto Trucks
3031 Main St
Chula Vista, CA 91911
I noticed that it was just past 12….YY and MrQ had to get going. We'd done pretty good with regards to both time and calories. Whew……I went home and had a two hour nap to recover. Still, it was great fun as always, friends and food just go together so well.