Al and Bea’s is a Boyle Heights institution. Cops, kids, old people, and everyone else in between all seem to find an excuse to make a mid afternoon snack stop on 1st street. The history of Boyle Heights is the story of Los Angeles itself; a constantly changing landscape of immigrants, trying to live the American dream through hard work and molding and shaping this city with their respective cultures and traditions. What was once the home to the original Canter’s is now an oasis of famous Mexican eateries. The food at Al & Bea’s is classic Mexican American: comforting bean and cheese burritos, vintage hard shelled tacos, fast food french fries effusing guilt ridden grease and of course, burgers.

(Continued)

The mole masters of the Lopez family at Guelaguetza show you how to make mole with this video from Kashi.

Over the years, I’ve heard a lot about Loteria Grill, and all of it was good. I’d seen their location atFarmers Market the last time I visited, but I had a different target in mind that day. So when I visited again earlier this week, I was pleased to find no line and plenty of seats. I decided on tacos, allowing me to taste more than one thing. Onecimo, the person behind the counter, was very helpful in giving me the rundown of what was available. Oh, the choices!

After some thought, I decided on one pollo blanco and one calabacitas taco. Later, I also got a chicharron(not shown). The chicken taco was fantastic. Really great. Deceptively simple, it is all about the chicken, as it should be. The light marinade only enhances the flavor of the meat. And it was the right size, allowing for three or four good bites (okay, two for some folk). The hand-made tortilla’s held it all together without getting in the way.

(Continued)

Jaliscience Inc. ~ 5900 Clara St. ~ Bell Gardens

(Continued)

Photos by cyan79.

Apaseo El Alto ~ Guanajuato ~ Mexico

Long before Los Angeles’ food truck fetish with Asian-fusion tacos, Pueblans had already traveled down that road.There are many incorrect stories about the Lebanese influence in the taco arabe, or arab tacos, but actually the original creators of these Pueblan curiosities were of Iraqi descent.

It was in 1933, that the Tabe Mena family first served what is now known as the taco arabe, an adaption of the Greek gyros sandwich, which lept from lamb and a yogurt or tahini sauce to pork loin and chipotle. Other families of Iraqi heritage dispute the Tabe Mena family’s claim, but the Tabe Mena family maintains that their grandfather Jorge Mena, who had fled the Turkish invasion of Iraq in the late 1800′s, was the first to set up shop.

The Tabe family is still behind the spit of one of the largest tacos arabes chains in Puebla, Antigua Taqueria La Oriental. There are currently over 300 taquerias in the city of Puebla that produce this iconic taste of Pueblan cuisine.

Read the entire article and review of Antigua Taqueria La Oriental on Street Gourmet LA

The ceviche de camaron in particular is one of the best I’ve had

For geographical reasons that are beyond me, a 10-minute drive south of LAX will land you in a section of town that holds one of the best collection of Mexican seafood restaurants in Los Angeles. Draw a small circle on a map where the nebulous borders of Inglewood, Lennox and Hawthorne cross and you will find it includes such solid marisquerias as El Puerto Escondido, Mariscos Moni, and the highly-regarded Mariscos Chente, roughly forming a Bermuda Triangle of mariscos inside of which many others are hidden. One of my current favorites is the tiny La Sirena Azul, which lies in a quiet stretch of Century Boulevard located in South Inglewood. It’s not so much a restaurant as a kitchen with few tables out front, flanked on either side by a dusty jukebox and a beer cooler.
(Continued)

The first time I ever heard about Cacao Mexicatessen was from reading an article somewhere about their duck carnitas tacos. Those tacos sounded so delicious that I filed the name of the restaurant in the back of my mind as a place to hit up when I got a chance.  A year later, I finally got a taste of those Duck Carnitas Tacos (duck confit, avocado, vinegar, onion, radishes and chile oil) at the 2010 East LA Meets Napa Event and in the process also sampled their Wild Boar Chorizo Verde Taco (ground boar, Mexican spices, avocado and pico de gallo) as well. Wow! They were absolutely delicious and I loved the thickness of the handmade tortillas. I can’t believe I waited a year to try their food.

A month later, I finally made a trip Cacao Mexicatessen’s actual restaurant in Eagle Rock and in fact, I went there 3 times within a month and a half.  That’s pretty unusual for me because generally, it’ll take me months before I re-visit a restaurant, let alone weeks.  Walking into Cacao, I could see it really was also a working deli.  Available for purchase were prepared foods, cheeses, tortillas and various other Mexican foods.

Ordering at Cacao means perusing a menu near the counter before placing your order.  Since I already tried the duck carnitas and wild boar tacos, I opted to order 3 other tacos from their menu along with a couple of other items.  One of those items was a Cucumber Agua Fresca.  It was just a tad sweet, but still very refreshing and I loved the added touch of the fresh cucumber slices added to the drink.

The other item was their Mexican Corn on the Cob (grilled white corn, queso cotija, lime aioli and powdered chili).  The sweetness of the corn and the tart, spicy, salty flavors of the condiments really made this corn sing on my palate.  If you’re planning on eating the whole corn, I’d limit myself to just one or two tacos because it’s quite filling.

Now let’s talk tacos.  The three I ordered all came on one plate. I took a bite out of the Tocino  en Chocolatado Taco first.  Made with house cured bacon, salsa de cacao, creme, bean puree and Serrano chilies, I thought these ingredients made this a more unique taco.  The salsa de cacao had a slight bitter and sweet taste to it which went well with a little bit of heat from the Serrano chilies, but then the creme did a good job of softening all the flavors together.

Second to receive my undivided attention was the Chicarron de Pato (fried duck skin, cabbage, radish, onion, cilantro and salsa verde).  The funny thing about this taco is that if I hadn’t known ahead of time, I may not necessarily have identified the skin as fried duck skin.  The skin didn’t taste “ducky” per se, but regardless, crunchy skin, crunchy cabbage, radish and everything else made for a delicious taco.

Third but not least was the Venison a la Yucateca (shredded venison, achiote, habanero, red onion and cilantro)  The ingredients were quite complimentary to the venison with the achiote providing a hint of earthiness, the habanero with a bit of heat, the cilantro adding some pepperiness and finally, the red onion with just a hint of sweetness.

(Continued)

Head over to the adjacent park and have yourself a picnic starring some of the best fried pork this city has to offer.

Throw a stone anywhere in LA, and your bound to hit somewhere that serves carnitas. Even Taco Bell, currently involved in a lawsuit contesting that its beef is actually beef, tried their hand at a rendition of the carnitas taco. Despite the many bastardized and sanitized version that are available, there remain places in this city that serve carnitas that truly pay homage to what you’ll find in Central Mexico. One such establishment is the family-run Zamora Brothers Carniceria, located just north of Belvedere Park in East Los Angeles; not to be confused with a unrelated Zamora Bros. further west on Cesar Chavez Avenue, nor with another in Pico-Union that closed briefly last year due to a fire. This particular Zamora Brothers serves food ‘”estilo Iripuato”, or originating from the Mexican city of Irapuato in Guadalajara. The building’s exterior is decorated in regal red and blue colors crowned by a slightly disturbing mural of a teary-eyed pig ready to be cooked.

(Continued)