Detroit - More sink teeth into taco truck cuisine

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More sink teeth into taco truck cuisine
freep.com
May 8, 2010
http://www.freep.com/article/2010050...-truck-cuisine

Thousands of visitors every week come to dine at the long-established restaurants of Mexicantown or to search out the dozens of colorful eateries and tiny taquerias that dot the rest of largely Hispanic southwest Detroit.



But an increasing number of food lovers are trying a different option: taco trucks.

Roughly a dozen of the licensed kitchens-on-wheels pull into strip-mall lots or onto neighborhood streets daily to serve tacos, burritos and more to hundreds of customers -- many of them regulars.

Detroit's first taco truck appeared in the mid-'90s, brought from Los Angeles, where they've been part of the culture since the early 1970s. Their numbers began increasing in Detroit about three years ago, operators say. And word about them is spreading.

With their fast service, real-deal tacos for around $1.25 and some of the best salsas around, it's easy to see why the trucks have fans such as Charles Diggs, 61, of Wayne, a supervisor for SMART, the Suburban Mobility Authority for Regional Transportation.

"I don't know how they do it so cheaply, but I love it," Diggs said recently, picking up dinner from Tacos el Toro on Michigan Avenue. "To me, they're better than any restaurant."
Detroit's meals on wheels gaining fans

Every morning, Joe Jesus Gomez pulls his silver-and-white truck into the parking lot of a corner strip mall at West Vernor and Lansing in southwest Detroit, raises the side panel and starts another workday at his restaurant on wheels.

Mouthwatering aromas drift through the open windows, and customers walk up to order plates of authentic Mexican tacos, overstuffed burritos and quesadillas thick with cheese.

Gomez used to own Taqueria Mi Tierra restaurant at Oakwood and Schaefer, he says, but he opened his El Paisa Taqueria taco truck seven months ago and likes it even better than his old place.

"The cooking is faster," and he has a wide range of customers. "Everybody comes," he says.

Business might be even better if more people knew about the estimated dozen trucks like his that dot the streets of southwest Detroit.