Taco Bar (Gaithersburg, MD)

I'm a sucker for good, authentic Mexican food--the more hole-in-the-wall the location, the better. The only exception is for someplace like Papa Joe's, which I wrote about in a previous post (though it's still acceptably out-of-the-way, hidden facing the back parking lot). So when I got a Mexican food craving while visiting my family in Gaithersburg, I figured I'd give a new place a try.

Taco Bar definitely has the atmosphere down, which I could tell before even going there because of its appropriately no-frills name. But when I got there, I realized it was an authentic Mexican taco bar, inside a liquor store. Which was attached to a gas station. Facing out onto the highway. If that's not hole-in-the-wall atmosphere, I don't know what is.

I ordered 3 tacos: 1 pastor, 1 suadero, and 1 lengua. I honestly couldn't tell which is which in the picture, since they all looked uniformly like meat on top of more meat. The tacos came out with just the meat in the tortillas, and there was a toppings bar inside where you could dress your taco up with 4 different sauces (2 mild and 2 hot, a red and green version of each), tomatoes, onions, and a mixture of the two. There may have been other toppings there as well, but those were the ones I used. These tacos were very good, but quite greasy and very filling. I still prefer Papa Joe's for overall quality, though I'd visit it again in a heartbeat when I'm in Gaithersburg.

My sister got a veggie burrito, which I think was a more American-style preparation. I only had one bite of it, but it was very good. She definitely enjoyed it a lot and is eager to go back here and eat more burritos.










Tacos here are $2.69 each, which is a pretty good price for Montgomery County. Of course, I'm used to $1 taco Tuesdays when Noah and I lived in Kansas City, but I recognize that's hard to find most places. They also have a selection of tortas I'm eager to try, as well as sopes, pozole, and empanadas. For such a small, slightly unsavory location, it's usually doing great business. I'll have to go back again and try more things!

Taco Bar Washingtonian
10003 Fields Road
Gaithersburg, MD 20878
(301)-987-0376
http://www.tacobarwashingtonian.com/index.html

Mon.-Thurs. 9-9
Friday 9-10
Saturday-Sunday 10-9

Taco Truck Thursday: Better Start with the Best

Of course, the "Thursday" up there is misleading; just about any day could be a taco truck day around here. The stretch of Roosevelt Avenue in Queens between 75th and 83rd Streets houses at least seven taco carts trucks, along with several other carts purveying various other (mostly) Mexican delicacies. They're all worth at least one try, but the best of the taco vendors is Tacos Mi Mexico Lindo, located at the SE corner of Roosevelt and Baxter in front of a bank. There's usually a crowd, although if you go on a cool night (or in the winter, but eating at a cart is really not fun in the winter) it is generally quieter. This is not fast food, but it is very, very good food.

What's to like? Start with the vendors themselves: three Mexican ladies, possibly sisters or possibly not, who will assume that you speak Spanish until proven otherwise. They do speak a bit of English, but make the effort - it's fun ordering in the appropriate language, and your vocabulary really won't be tested much. As a crash course, "para llavar" means "to go", "para ca" means "to stay", and "con todo" means "with everything" (usually referring to cilantro, onions, and guacamole on your taco). Tacos can be had with several meats: steak, chicken, chorizo, carnitas, and al pastor are all options, as well as a few more interesting and better ones I'll get to shortly. The tortillas are briefly heated on the griddle, which really brings out their flavor, and they meld with the tacos much better than a regular corn tortilla right out of the bag. They're also double-wrapped, which I've always been a fan of - especially when you're dealing with the kind of somewhat-overstuffed tacos to be found here.

Back to the meat: we'll start with the losers. The pollo, bistec, and cecina are probably not worth your time, unless you like your meat dry and chewy. I know cecina is supposed to be dry and chewy, so maybe it's just not for me. The other two? Just skip them. The carnitas was not crispy enough the first time I had it, but I had another one a few days ago and it was absolutely perfect: crisp on the outside, the larger pieces softer on the inside, and smoky from the initial frying and the reheating on the griddle. For me, the top choices are the chorizo, lengua (beef tongue), and oreja (pig ear) - all are superlative, really the best I've ever had anywhere. The chorizo is rich but not too rich, generally crispy from the griddle, not too salty, and has great pork and chili flavor. The lengua is very fatty but incredibly flavorful - like the carnitas, it's crispy outside and softer inside, but the pieces are bigger to give you a better contrast. The oreja is somehow the richest of the bunch, although I suspect it's rich in the way that tendon is, since I didn't think there was a whole lot of fat in a pig's ear. They cook it so long that the cartilage almost melts away - if you've had pig ear as an appetizer in a Chinese restaurant, this is nothing like that. It's not crunchy at all, more silky like tendon is when it's cooked well. The standard toppings are cilantro, onion, and very good guacamole - on the bar, there are also two chili sauces (the red is garlicky and particularly good), lime wedges, onion and jalapeño relishes, dried red chilies (sensing a theme here?), and radish slices - these seem to be typical accompaniments at all the carts and trucks in this neighborhood.

If you don't want tacos for some reason, the quesadillas are equally good - this is a Mexican-style quesadilla rather than an American or Tex-Mex one, so it is one larger tortilla crisped up on the griddle and folded in half over a filling of meat, cheese (I think it's Oaxaca cheese), and crema (basically Mexican creme fraiche, as far as I can tell). Other toppings are up to you from the same list as the tacos'.

If you're feeling vegetarian, the sopes are great as well. They used to use regular corn tortillas, but they switched a few months ago to thicker masa "cakes" that are ridged at the edges to avoid the filling falling out. The price went up too, but it's worth it. You can get these with meat, but I like them "regular" - with beans, creme, and a grated hard cheese of some sort.

As I noted earlier, this food is not fast even though it's from a cart - 15 minutes was a routine wait when it was warm last fall, and for all I know it could be even longer in the summer. You can get your food in 5 minutes in the winter, but it's best to eat at the cart, and food gets cold really fast in the winter. It's more than worth the wait, though.

Tacos Mi Mexico Lindo
Southeast corner of Roosevelt Ave and Baxter Ave (in-between 83rd and 84th Sts)
Open every day of the week, from midmorning to at least 11pm

Current prices
Tacos: $2 each
Quesadillas: $3 each
Sopes: 3 regulares for $5

Papa Joe's (Westminster, MD)

It has come to my attention that, despite having lived in Westminster for almost a year and a half, I have yet to review my favorite restaurant here! This must be remedied, especially since I'm home from work today with some yucky feverish achy illness and have nothing to do but write restaurant reviews, catch up on lesson planning, and watch back episodes of "Glee".

In a town where almost every restaurant features an practically-interchangeable menu of traditional American fare that one would expect from a small rural area, Papa Joe's is an anomaly. This little Mexican restaurant faces the back entrance of Westminster's historic Main Street, fairly well-hidden unless you're coming through the back parking lot. Noah and I happened upon it last year when we were looking at Westminster apartments, and though we didn't expect it to be any good, we were tired and hungry and decided to take our chances.

Luckily, Papa Joe's is a pleasant surprise! Apart from lettuce and sour cream-laden American tacos and the like, Papa Joe's does a nice variety of traditional Mexican standards. Their Mexican-style tacos, with just meat, cilantro, and onion, are a standby order for me. I also tend to order their tortas, particularly the egg and chorizo laden down with jalapenos and avocado and all manner of other goodies. It's hard to even eat the thing without bits of everything falling down on the table (and, in the winter, down your sleeves--my least favorite thing about long-sleeved shirts).

The real time to go to Papa Joe's, however, is on the weekend when they have off-menu weekend specials. Here's where the real traditional food comes out, like pozole and menudo and more authentic tostadas than the ones featured on their regular menu. Here's an example of some tostadas we had over the summer:





Although I don't see nearly enough people ordering the more authentic dishes, the restaurant is extremely popular and frequently has a wait, especially on weekends. The real test of its excellence? Noah currently lives in Jackson Heights, the hotbed of traditional Latin American food in Queens, and he still looks forward to going to Papa Joe's when he comes here. What higher praise could you ask for?

Papa Joe's
27 E. Main St. (in rear municipal parking lot)
Westminster, MD 21157
(410)-871-2505
Mon.-Thurs. 11am-10pm
Fri. and Sat. 11am-11pm