It is no secret that I adore tacos more than most foods on this earth. I have definitive opinions about them and I’ve eaten them in various cities and places. And, while I might be biased, I firmly believe that in Patterson, we’ve got some of the best tacos— anywhere. In fact, I’d be willing to stack our hometown tacos against any big city taco joints. I don’t care how fancy or hipster those other places may be.
This is why, five years ago, my high school friends and I conducted The Great American Taco Challenge by sampling some local taco spots. The results were published in my column in The Patterson Irrigator. Never before had tacos been examined with such scrutiny and, frankly, love. In fact, each time we’ve seen each other since, my friends and I talk about that day and how much carne asada we managed to consume. It was glorious.
So, this last Saturday, we decided to do it again. Given the large number of taco joints in Patterson and the fact that our stomachs can only hold so many corn tortillas, we had to limit our sampling to just six— Taqueira Zamora, Morelia’s, Taqueira Barajas, El Paisa, El Portal, and Ernie’s Taqueira. Believe me, if we could have eaten from more places, we would have. But, my cardiologist said no.
We sampled them blindly— meaning we wrote the names under the plates, mixed them up, and didn’t reveal the origins until after the tasting and scoring was complete. We judged the tacos on flavor, spice, texture, tortilla quality, and even presentation (yes, we watch The Food Network!).
I’d like to tell you that this was an easy process. But, this time it was much harder to judge the tacos than it was five years ago. The taco scene in Patterson is truly at a high level. As we sat around my dining room table, a slight sheen of sweat tickled our brows. And it wasn’t just because the tacos were spicy. It was because selecting the winner was nearly impossible.
In fact, it got to the point where we felt like parents being forced to choose a favorite child. Everyone knows this is a painful and treacherous thing to do. Unless you are Donald Trump, of course. Because, then, it’s Ivanka.
We nearly abandoned the whole enterprise because the margin between each taco score was so slim. Mere decimals separated them, and we even tried computing the results in different ways to make sure we were correct. But, this had a Vladimir-Putin-Election-Rigging feeling to it, so we stopped.
In a straight average, El Portal’s “juicy” taco edged out a win over Taqueira Zamora’s “meaty and smoky” taco by a minuscule 0.37. An even smaller margin separated the other establishments— which were huddled evenly together in the rankings. It was like a photo finish in the Olympics— where you can’t tell if the guy from Barbados, Ghana, Jamaica or Cleveland had his toe over the line first.
In fact, each sampling had something of note about it. Ernie’s Taqueira took the award for “spiciest taco,” while El Paisa had the “best corn tortilla.” Morelia’s included some of their amazing homemade chips in the order, which was like getting a surprise from Santa Claus. And, lastly, the presentation of the plate from Taqueira Barajas was so beautiful that it should have been featured in a food magazine. Seriously, it was so pretty. Those hipsters can just kiss our ass.
To be honest, it was a great day to be eating tacos in Patterson. And these were just a small sampling of what this town has to offer. I do apologize if we didn’t make it over to your particular taco establishment, though. This doesn’t mean that we don’t like your tacos, only that my arteries can only handle so many at one time.
My cardiologist thanks you for your forgiveness.
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