Category: Food Trucks

At last! Clayfu’s…ummm, La Princesita Taco Truck

Food Trucks, Mexican Restaurants, Taco Shops

Several months back, my good blogging "buddy", Clayfu, sent me an email telling me about a Taco Truck located in the parking lot of Joe's 99 Cent Store on Linda Vista. Now understanding Clayfu's, ummm, how shall I say it, rather "frugal" ways, when he described this Taco Truck as being really good, well I had to check it out! I did find the Taco Truck to be pretty good, though sometimes a bit inconsistent. I had a few meals, and took a few photos, and decided to wait until Clayfu did a post on the Taco Truck, since it felt like the right thing to do……and waited, and waited, and waited. Until finally Clayfu did his post on Friday the 13th of all things. You can read his post here. Now I won't pretend to be like the His Royal Highness of Taco Trucks, Bandini, but I did develop a fondness for Taco Truck cuisine during my little road trip to Yuma, thanks mostly to the one and only, Ed from Yuma.

Recently, the old Taco Truck has been replaced with a updated version. But luckily the food is the same.

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Few things beat the smell of Carne Asada grilling at sunset! The drill is you walk up to the window and place your order. In addition to tacos, the truck also makes burritos. Once you get your tacos, you load up with Pico De Gallo, Salsa Roja, Salsa Verde, Lime, among other things……

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This Guy is always very nice, and cracks me up!

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On this night, the Missus and I were after a snack, and ordered Cabeza(beef head/cheek), Lengua(beef tongue), and Al Pastor(marinated, and in this case grilled, pork – all tacos $1.50). Lest you think this may be a bit expensive for Taco Truck fare, the tacos are loaded with meat.

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Laprincesita06 The photo to the right is kinda odd, I guess I was focusing on the last taco in line, so it came out bright and clear, and the rest blurred…oh well, back to the tacos. On this night, the Lengua was numero uno! Very moist, with a nice beefy punch, and a mild gamey aftertaste. The Cabeza, was very moist and fatty with nice bits of gelatin, but lacked the condensed beef flavor of really good cabeza. The Al Pastor had a nice bit of caramelization, and was on the chewy side, with only a mild chili flavor. What you'll notice with these tacos, are that there's a lack of saltiness, so the true flavor of the meat comes through.

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Here's a photo from way back when. On this evening, they were out of Cabeza and Lengua, so I settled for 2 Carne Asada and 2 Al Pastor.

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I brought these home with me, with all the various garnishes and salsas in little sandwich size bags which are sometimes available. I started dressing my tacos, than remembered to take a photo, after these two photos, I was too hungry, so I just said the heck with it, finished loading up my tacos and ate them.

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The Carne Asada was decent, fairly moist, with a nice salty, slightly citrus flavor. The Al Pastor on this evening was on the very chewy side, but had a really nice chili flavor.

So if you're in the Linda Vista area during the evening, and want some better than most Taco Shop tacos…just follow your nose!

Laprincesita09 La Princesita Taco Truck(well trailer actually)

In the Parking lot of Joe's 99 Cent Store
6882 Linda Vista Rd
San Diego, CA 92111
Clayfu has told me that the hours are from 6pm to 11pm daily, but I've seen the trailer there from as early as 5pm…as to when they close, hey at my age, I'm usually done for by 11pm!

Thanks again for the recommendation Clayfu!

Yuma Part 1 – The “Taco Truck” Tour

Food Trucks, Mexican Restaurants, Road Trip, What Ed Eats -You too can be like Ed!, Yuma

*** Ed from Yuma has an update on Yuma Taco Trucks, you can find it here.

Earlier this year Ed from Yuma, and I were having one of our dinners and I broached the subject of a possible visit. At first Ed's response was, "huh"? But after pondering this for a while, Ed had come up with an idea. Ed has enjoyed some of Yuma's best Mexican Food at various Taco Stands and Trucks, and thought we should do a "Taco Truck Crawl". Ed's been wanting to this for a while, but couldn't find any takers. This sounded really good to me, I know next to nothing about Mexican Food, other then the "something" – Berto type Taco Stands we have here in San Diego.

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We scheduled the visit during an open weekend on Ed's schedule; and so here I was fulfilling a very strange fantasy. You see, I often pass the 161 miles to Yuma sign on the 8 Freeway,  always tempting me to "just keep driving" until I get "there". The drive took a shade over 2 hours, and was not what I expected. I'd assumed that El Centro, and all of the points East of San Diego was just desolate desert, but was changed as I passed all the fields of green. I got to Yuma at about 1115, and Ed picked me up in the Best Western Motel parking lot at 1130, and we were off.

It seems that there is an abundance of Taco Trucks in an area down 8th street in Yuma. There are literally empty lots lined with trucks around the perimeter. Many of these "shops" don't open until after sunset. Probably because most of their clientele works during the day, whether in the fields, or other manual labor, we also joked that the Dept of Health closes at 5 as well. Not very many "Gringo's" here. Ed wanted to take me to a specific Truck. So we drove down 8th avenue, which is being repaved. I thought the rough dirt road added a definite ambiance to the whole "event".

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Yuma12 The specialty here is Caguamanta – Stingray Soup. Ed explained that dried salted Manta ray fillets are rinsed and re-hydrated I'd imagine much like bacalao, and cooked in a tomato based broth, with onions, celery, and other vegetables. The taste is somewhat briny and oceany; Ed describes it as a sting ray Manhattan Chowder. The stingray meat is slightly dense, not as tender at a fish fillet, but much more tender then the usual piece of rubbery clam that you'd get in a chowder. There is a nice bit of spice, and the cilantro and onions equate to a somewhat bracing flavor. You get a 12oz cup of soup, and either 2 corn tortillas or tortilla chips with your soup. ActuallyYuma13, I'd have loved a bowl of rice with this!

While waiting, I took look around the lot. There were several other trucks; some of them looked mobile, others looked like they were towed and left on the site. All of them were painted with the "specialties of the house". I turned to Ed and told him, "I know what this is, it's a food court!"

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None of these "shops" were open; some were grilling meat in preparation for the "dinner rush". We came up to a truck on the corner of Eleanor and 8th that was open:

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Yuma15 Unfortunately, they were out of everything that Ed tried to order. So we settled for 2 carne asada tacos. These were just ho-hum, I've had better before. But the one thing I noticed was that shredded cabbage was used instead of lettuce, and everything is with corn tortillas, not flour.

As we drove up 8th Street, Ed saw this sign and made a sudden turn into the gravel lot:

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In this lot was a trailer, a counter with seafood in ice alongside a concrete "pad" covered with a tarp. Ed placed his order, and in a few minutes, this was delivered:

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Yuma18 This large chalice contained a wonderful seafood cocktail. If it's in the ocean, it was in this. Chock full of shrimp, squid, octopus, scallops, great tasting oysters, cucumbers, celery, onion, all in a refreshing  clamato and tomato water broth. But the item that surprised me the most was this:

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In case you're not sure. Yep, that's abalone, there were at least 5 slices of nice sweet abalone in Yuma20 this goblet, amazing! The broth was just mild enough to add a little taste to all of the seafood. This was fabulous! I also discovered a hot sauce that I really enjoyed, Bufalo Jalapeno Hot Sauce.

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Needless to say, we left with smiles on our faces. And lunch isn't over yet! And there's still dinner! STAY TUNED.

To Be Continued…..