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<\/p>\n09 Taqueria Alvarez<\/p>\n
February 12, 2010<\/p>\n
5577 W Adams Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90016<\/p>\n
West Adams<\/p>\n
Garrett and I made the most of a leisurely Friday afternoon by visiting Taqueria Alvarez on Adams, not too far from our respective homes at the Village Green. I have driven by Alvarez before and was enticed by its old-timey looking sign, but when we arrived I was surprised to see the lightbox sign missing and a vinyl banner claiming \u201cGRAND OPENING\u201d. New management?<\/p>\n
Things started out rocky. After a harrowing bike ride up La Brea, we arrived to find the signage in chaos! They did not have Mexican Coke, and they were out of al pastor! Then we waited a long time to be served!<\/p>\n
But it turned out fine. It was a beautiful day for standing around outside a taqueria; I enjoyed a Jarritos Mandarina; and settled for a chicken taco, which turned out to be quite pleasing. Alvarez has a pleasant (if you like sitting at outdoor tables near a boulevard while traffic drives by, as I do) outdoor dining area. As Garrett pointed out, the fact that it is depressed a few inches from the surrounding pavement makes it feel like its own outdoor room.<\/p>\n
I had three tacos, one each of carne asada, carnitas, and chicken. They were quite large \u2013 second largest so far this year \u00a0\u2013 and $1.85 each. Three of them left me feeling bloato (in a good way).<\/p>\n
I started with the chicken taco. I noticed effective bilaminated tortillas, above average in size and with good sturdy feel to the mouth and fingers. There was a ton of marinated dark meat chicken chunks, and a lot of fairly spicy and good tasting salsa. The chicken was reminiscent, and I mean this in the most complimentary way, of the chicken served in tacos and burritos at Del Taco. I had the thought that this chicken would make for a fine burrito; but nay, I know better, because Garrett had a chicken burrito (the meat-rice-beans-salsa affair) and found it good but somewhat lacking in chickeny-ness. The taco was abundantly chickeny, so there you have it, chicken lovers \u2013 go for the taco.<\/p>\n
Next I moved on to the carne asada taco. Heaping with meat that was a nice dark color and cut into appropriate small bits and with ideal texture, this taco was handsome. I took the first bite and was struck by winning flavors \u2013 first a slight buttery\/fatty flavor, then salty, then the flavors of carne asada seasoning. The red salsa was fine. This taco was quite good. For once I can be certain it\u2019s not just me, because a woman dining at the next table struck up conversation with us, telling us it was her first visit to Alvarez and she loved her carne asada burrito.<\/p>\n
Finally, the carnitas taco, which was also good. A few weeks ago after going to Don Jorge, I was on the brink of renouncing carnitas tacos altogether in favor of guts, but I am back from the brink. Fine taco carnitas twice in a row, so carnitas and I are on friendly terms again (when will I find the time (or courage) for tasting tacos made from guts and tongues?). The carnitas at Alvarez had that quality of contrasting texture between tender bits and dry almost-crunchy-ish bits that is the hallmark of a worthy carnitas. There was a ton of it on my taco, and a ton of salsa as well, as you see in the picture. The meat was good, with excellent tooth feel, and a bit gamy in a good way. The flavor of the meat was mild, and I was glad for lots of tasty spicy salsa.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s counterproductive to the cincuenta taquerias project to return to local favorites for comforting tacos, rather than explore new venues to add to the roster; but I suspect I\u2019ll be back to Alvarez a few times in 2010 nevertheless. Such dalliances cannot be avoided.<\/p>\n
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![\"\"](\"http:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/02\/09tacoB.jpg\" "\\"09")
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09 Taqueria Alvarez February 12, 2010 5577 W Adams Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90016 West Adams Garrett and I made the most of a leisurely Friday afternoon by visiting Taqueria Alvarez on Adams, not too far from our respective homes at the Village Green. I have driven by Alvarez before and was enticed by its […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[12,14,17,4],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74"}],"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=74"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":182,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions\/182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tacos.architectureburger.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}