Category: Food Trucks/Carts

Until this past weekend, I hadn't been back down to Chula Vista in a while. On Saturday I made a trip to Hogetsu Bakery and since I had a bit of time took a drive around. I saw at least three trucks that I hadn't seen before. One of them was of particular interest, so I made some time to return the next day. In the lot of the liquor store where Third becomes Beyer and intersects Main was this truck.

Just the barbacoa sign would usually be enough to lure me in. I did enjoy the sign for some of the more "interesting" tacos and though fish tacos were priced at a dollar on the sign, they were going for 75 cents on this day!

So I placed my order and received a cup of consomme of the barbacoa type. Hot and soothing.

And of course I had to try the Barbacoa de Res Taco. It was worth the $1.75 as there was quite a bit of meat.

Loved the fact they brushed one side of the tortilla with consomme and put it on the griddle….I still haven't bought into having beans in these though. The salsa roja had some kick and the lime added some nice acid, but as a whole, the barbacoa was a bit too mild in flavor for me.

Still, I was really here because I saw this sign on the previous day:

In this case Caguamanta, a soup made with re-hydrated, dried manta ray. I love the intense, briney, ocean flavor of mantarraya, ever since I first had it while visiting Ed in Yuma back in 2005. It's not something very common; Mariscos Godoy sometimes serves Manta Ray Machaca, but other then that it's pretty slim pickings….

I ordered a "chica", the small size, not cheap at three bucks. I had it with cilantro and onions with crackers instead of tortillas. It arrived steaming hot.

The broth was pretty straight-forward and nothing fancy. I loved the addition of avocado which added an interesting creaminess to the whole deal. I was surprised at the amount of shredded mantarraya in this little cup! The flavor is not what you think; think of less salty bacalao meets less intense dried scallop. I've been told that mantarraya is a good substitute for sea turtle dishes…..though I can't really say from experience if that is true.  As Ed from Yuma says, there a "Manhattan Chowder-ry" flavor to this.

I ended up buying the large size….which was a bargain at six bucks for the Missus who loved it.

 The woman who took my order was quite nice as was the rather serious looking young man who replaced her. It seems like this is a family operation. It's good to have some variety amongst all the taco trucks in the area and I hope they keep the mantarraya on the menu.

 Barbacoa & Frutas El Vaquero Truck

On the corner of Main and Beyer.

Current hours are from "about" 830 to as late as 5pm. The nice woman told me that they are currently in this location daily, but are thinking of taking Sunday off.

I've been shopping at the Northgate Market on the corner of 54th and University quite a bit. The Missus bought a new juicer and has been some interesting concoctions, several of which use nopales. The most disturbing one was nopales and beets which looked like bloody snot….but I digress. One day, Instead of heading just getting back onto 54th and my way home, I took a right on University and saw a pretty busy taco truck.

The selling point seemed to be the 99 cent fish tacos…which is quite cheap since most trucks, including my favorite have raised prices north of a buck. The seating area is a very small – four chair and no table makeshift looking set-up. So you really will be eating on the hood of your car here! The folks here were very friendly. One of the women started chatting with me….talking about favorite taco trucks…hers being El Kiki, while lamenting the crazy price of gas. The menu is interesting, the top half is in Spanish, the bottom half is the English translation.

I went the cheap route, two Tacos de Pescado.

The batter was on the soft side, with a hint of sweetness, a bit too spongy for my taste. Not much fish in this at all, but what do you expect for 99 cents? The crema had no taste and the tortillas….eh…

So that was it, right? Well, maybe not. I went shopping again this past weekend and was just plain starving. I decided to try some of the other stuff at El Jefe.

By the way, if you're ever looking for the cebollas, limes, and salsas, they're behind the gobernador door!

Speaking of gobernador, I got one of those and one of the spicy shrimp tacos. These looked quite a bit more hefty.

Both of these had things in common, both had cheese melted on the base of the tortilla to prevent the tacos from disintegrating. Both had some kick, though the spicy shrimp was surprisingly spicy. Both were two tortilla jobs, you could tell much more care was taken with these. The gobernador was the better of the two, but nowhere as good as others. The shrimp in both tacos were on the overcooked side as well. The spicy shrimp taco was interesting….I wasn't fond of the very finely diced cabbage mixed with crema. Though it served to buffer the heat, it was like dumping coleslaw all over a taco.

The shrimp were spicy, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they use habaneros for this. The overall flavor was pretty one dimensional.

I'd say that El Jefe, wasn't quite "the boss" of Mariscos trucks in San Diego. Probably not in my top five. But like the woman said, "the price of gas now is so high, we have to find alternatives to driving to South Bay."

Mariscos el Jefe Truck
5599 University Ave

In a recent morning I'd just finished a quick bite at one of my favorite stops in the Chula Vista area and was headed  to another. As I was about to make the left turn on Main street and the Industrial boulevard I glanced to my right and noticed at Taco Truck…….

Even though I recall seeing a Birria truck next to the El Prieto Mariscos truck, I decided to put that off and see what was up here.

The name of this one is Mariscos Y Tacos El Kiki and though there's everything from Birria de Res to Quesatacos on the menu, this fit the profile of a mariscos truck to a tee…..and by glancing around at what others were eating, this was a mariscos truck.

I placed my order and was handed a cup of consomme….this one was fairly light, with a mild briney flavor, boosted by a lot of celery.

Since the fish tacos here were only a buck (even El Prieto is now $1.25), I decided to try that and order the Perron #1 taco as well.

The fish in the tacos de pescado was really buried in there. It was pretty bland, the batter not very crisp. Yes, I guess it's worth a buck, but nothing especially good.

The perron is a combo of marlyn (smoked fish) and camarones (shrimp) sauteed in a chipotle based sauce which added some kick. The shrimp were ok, nothing special and a bit rubbery, but I really enjoyed the marlyn, which was smokey and salty……almost driving me to bacon-bliss.

To me it was worth the four bucks. I noticed how firm the taco was and turned it over….it's SOP for these type of tacos to have a layer of cheese on the bottom to protect the tortilla, which is then placed on the griddle allowing the cheese to melt.

This was nice….I'll probably get a tacos de marlyn the next time. And perhaps a gobernador too. One thing, there ain't much room in this parking lot……

The fellow working the counter told me they were at this location from 8am to 7pm seven days a week. So we'll have to see. He also spoke perfect English, which saved me from doing my usual butcher job of the few Spanish words I know.

Mariscos Y Tacos El Kiki
Corner of Main St and Hollister St.