Tacos La Balita

mai pham Scout

Joined 6 years ago

Doesn't get more authentic than this. From the outside of this little stucco building, neon signs promoting authentic Mexican tacos "con sabor de Mexico" and painted windows advertising items like aguas frescas have been beckoning me to try to this place for a long time now. Around 9pm last Saturday evening, I finally gave it a try and what a wonderful experience it was.

Upon entering this tiny little diner (think Johnny Rocket's style but much smaller, with a counter and stools and some brightly colored booths), you feel like you are entering into foreign land. While the patrons (all Spanish-speaking except me!) tried not to gape at the strange sight of a broken-Spanish speaking Asian ordering food to go, I observed several facts:

1) if you order a whole bunch of beers, they are served in bottle, in a brightly colored tin bucket full ice;

2) the sizzling plate of camarones (shrimp) being eaten at the counter by one of the patrons looks super yummy

3) the decor is bright and festive, and the atmosphere is family-like. I bet if I come here often they will recognize me and know my name.

4) people like to stop here after work, as I observed several patrons in their work uniforms sharing a beer and some rowdy conversation

Tasty pictures of the food offerings are blown up and displayed to help you choose what to order, but I go with the basic taco, only $1.25 each for corn, and $1.50 for flour tortilla. I ordered one each of the pastor, lengua, barbacoa and chicharon, as well as an aguas fresca de melon, to go. I get to see the cook prepare my meal on the grill behind the counter and within minutes, voila! I have my tacos to go. I enjoyed the barbacoa and the lengua tacos immensely - they were flavorful, tender, juicy, excellente! The pastor and chicharron were not so good so pass on those. Next time I'll just ask the server what is good and order that. She steered me away from the carnitas and nodded her head when I ordered the lengua, so she knows what's good!

All in all, I am excited by this new discovery and will definitely be back to sample some more of their authentic Mexican items! Ole!