Street tacos: what the small ones are, and how to order at a truck

Overview

A street taco is small — the tortillas are about four inches across, and two of them are stacked under every one, because a single one tears. On top goes chopped meat, and then, in the orthodox version, exactly two things: raw white onion and chopped coriander. A wedge of lime on the side, salsa from a squeeze bottle or a tub, and that is the entire object. No lettuce, no grated cheese, no sour cream, no hard shell.

Everything else follows from the size. Three or four make a meal; they are eaten standing at a truck or a folding table, in two or three bites each, with a paper plate held underneath because the second bite always drips.

The tortillas are corn, and they are warmed on the flat top in the meat fat rather than dry — that is why they are pliable and slightly translucent at the centre, and it is the first thing to look at. The double tortilla is structural, not generosity, and the bottom one is meant to be sacrificed.

This is a regional dish that belongs to Mexico and to the enormous Mexican presence in this city, which is not a diaspora footnote here but a founding population. What Los Angeles has is scale and specialisation: whole streets of trucks, individual stands that make one meat and nothing else, and a taco culture with more variety than most cities in the country will ever see. The neighbourhoods east of the river — Boyle Heights and out through the eastern districts — are where that density is highest, and it runs right across the county.

One fact worth having, because it changed the streets visibly: sidewalk vending was decriminalised across California in 2018 by the Safe Sidewalk Vending Act, which replaced criminal penalties with a permit system. Vendors who had operated informally for decades became legal businesses. It is a documented, dated piece of legislation, and it is the reason the taco stand you are standing at has a permit taped to it.

What to order

You order by meat, by the piece, and by number. Dos de asada — two of asada — is the entire grammar you need. The meats worth knowing:

• Al pastor — pork marinated in chilli and achiote, stacked on a vertical spit and shaved off, usually with a slice of pineapple. The spit itself is the descendant of Lebanese shawarma brought to Mexico in the twentieth century, which is a real and traceable lineage rather than a story.
• Carne asada — grilled beef, chopped. The default, and the one most trucks are judged on.
• Suadero — beef from between the belly and the leg, confited in fat. Soft, rich, and the connoisseur’s order.
• Carnitas — pork slow-cooked in its own fat, then crisped.
• Lengua — tongue. Tender and mild, and the least frightening of the offal cuts.
• Buche, tripas — stomach and intestine. Chewy, strong, and not a beginner’s order.

Two phrases that do work: con todo — with everything, meaning onion and coriander — and sin cebolla if you would rather not. The salsas are usually two, red and green, and which is hotter varies by stand, so the honest question is cuál pica más, which one is hotter.

Order two to start, taste, and go back. That is what the queue in front of you is doing, and it is why the line moves in both directions.

What to avoid

The stand with no queue at nine in the evening. This is a business that turns over meat constantly and holds nothing overnight. A truck with no customers has meat sitting on the flat top, and it will be dry.

A spit that is not turning. Al pastor is shaved to order from a rotating trompo. Where the pork arrives from a steel tray beside the grill, it was cut hours ago and reheated, and the crisp edge that is the whole point of the meat is gone.

Flour tortillas and a hard shell. Neither belongs to this dish. Flour tortillas are legitimate in northern Mexican cooking and in burritos; on a street taco they mean a kitchen serving a different tradition to people who do not know the difference.

The upsell at a sit-down restaurant. A plate of three “street tacos” for the price of a main course, arranged with a swipe of purée, is the format arriving somewhere it did not come from. There is nothing wrong with a restaurant taco, but paying five times the street price for the word “street” is a specific kind of joke.

One safety point, plainly: the risk at a busy stand is low, precisely because the turnover is high and the meat is cooked in front of you on a hot surface. Where care is warranted is at the quiet stand, at the end of the night, with the ceviche or the raw garnishes rather than the grill.

Practicalities

Reckon on roughly $2.50 to $4 a taco at a truck or stand, a little more for al pastor or suadero at a specialist, and $5 and up at a sit-down taqueria. Four tacos and a drink is a meal for around $15 in most of the county. At a restaurant, expect three tacos on a plate for $18 to $25, which buys a chair.

Hours are the thing to plan around, and they are unusual: many of the best trucks do not open until the evening and work until one or two in the morning, because the trade is people leaving work and people leaving bars. Others are lunchtime only, parked outside a building site by eleven. A stand’s hours tell you who it is feeding.

There is no season and this is a city where that is genuinely true — outdoor eating works in February — so the useful timing note is the day of the week rather than the month: weekend nights are when the specialist stands come out and when the queues are longest and the meat freshest.

Cash is still worth carrying. Most stands now take cards or phone payment, but some are cash only, and a cash tip in the jar is normal. Order at the window, pay when the food comes, take your salsa from the table yourself, and eat standing up — there is rarely anywhere to sit and the food is designed for that.