Mexican Food Near Me

In Mexican Spanish, "taco" means a light meal or snack of a filling folded into a tortilla. One widely cited theory traces the food name to 18th-century Mexican silver miners, who used "taco" for the paper-wrapped gunpowder charges they packed into rock.

By most everyday definitions, no: a sandwich has two separate slices of bread, a taco has one tortilla folded around the filling. Legally it has been argued both ways (a 2006 Indiana zoning case treated a taco as "Mexican-style sandwich"). Cladistically, some argue a taco is a "single-slice" sandwich. In practice, people treat them as different things.

It depends entirely on the build. Two or three street tacos (corn tortillas, grilled meat, onion, cilantro, salsa) are a balanced, moderate-calorie meal with good protein. Large flour-tortilla or hard-shell tacos loaded with cheese, sour cream, and fried fillings are much higher in calories, saturated fat and sodium.

In Mexico, well before Spanish contact: people were folding tortillas around fillings for thousands of years. The word and the modern street taco date from the 18th-19th centuries. The hard-shell taco and the Tex-Mex versions were developed later in the United States.

The taco is Mexican. Several popular US versions (the pre-fried hard shell, the "walking taco", Tex-Mex ground-beef tacos with cheddar and lettuce) were created or popularised in the United States and are American takes on a Mexican dish.

Mexican rice and refried or charro beans are the classic pair. Elote (street corn), a simple slaw, guacamole and chips, a green salad, or grilled vegetables all work. For a crowd, set them up as a build-your-own bar.

A Mexican eatery that specialises in tacos and a short list of related items: quesadillas, tortas, sometimes birria, menudo or aguas frescas. It is usually independent and counter-service, as opposed to a full-menu Mexican restaurant or a chain.

A Mexican restaurant serves a broad menu (enchiladas, fajitas, combo plates) often with table service, chips and a bar. A taqueria is narrower and faster: tacos are the point, the menu fits on a board, and you usually order at a counter.