Carmen and I headed a few blocks past Hollenbeck to Sam\u2019s Tacos on Soto near Whittier. Sam\u2019s is evidently a near relation of Carnitas Michoacan #3<\/a> nearby. If you study the image closely, you will see that they share not only the horizontal-hearts banded graphic motif, lending the entire complex a subdued dynamism, but the supersized cheeseburger-fries-and-a-drink thing on the roof as well. Sam\u2019s Tacos is smaller and emphasizes hot dogs. Note the hot-dogged mansard.<\/p>\n Sam\u2019s Tacos is a bit like Mies van der Rohe\u2019s Barcelona Pavilion, a flexibly enclosed indoor-outdoor-hybrid space defined by a floating-roof plane and ground plane rather than enclosing walls. The main roof, cantilevered in all directions, spans a drive-thru pass-through with a smaller service or storage room across. To the north, a trellis extends the roofline over an outdoor dining area, and supports a giant cheeseburger-fries-and-a-drink sculpture. The dining trellis frames a view across a reflecting pool of black asphalt toward a contrapposto lamppost-signpost<\/a>. The marble tables beneath the trellis make for an elegant, cool surface on which to dine.<\/p>\n I ordered one each of the al pastor and carne asada tacos, cheap at $1.09 each. Not surprisingly, the tacos were unsurprising and hewed close to the platonic taco standard. The tortillas were bilaminated, nicely leathered with a slight oiling and grilling. The al pastor was orange and black, in pleasingly irregular strips \u2013 somewhat saucy, with a good toothy texture and cinnamon and other spice flavors prominent. The red salsa provided with both tacos is pretty hot and really good. The carne asada is somewhat grayish in appearance but tastes exactly like carne asada taco. The seasoning is spare and the beef flavor somewhat buttery. The quintet of tortilla, steak, salsa, onion and cilantro weave together a timeless and essential harmony. Sam\u2019s Tacos is 100% a taco stand.<\/p>\n 51 Sam\u2019s Tacos October 10, 2010 715 S Soto St, Los Angeles, CA 90023 Boyle Heights Today was the inaugural \u201cCicLAv\u00eda\u201d event, in which the city shut 7 \u00bd miles of streets to automobile traffic from 10:00 AM till 3:00 PM so that cyclists and other non-motorized road users could take over the roads. People […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[13,38,12],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":286,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions\/286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/51tacoA.jpg\" "\\"51")
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