Shon's Take - Taco Tour Stop #21 - Taqueria El Fogon - S Bluffview and Harry

We've been hitting a bit of a random assortment of late - some fairly mediocre places sandwiched between some excellent (Pollo Express!) places. And of course, it seems like every time I pick, we end up with mediocre. Since Travis and Chris are slow learners, they left it to me to pick again (mainly because eating with them is like going to dinner with your spouse - they never want to just pick a place.) We had a few people recommend El Fogon, so we decided to give it a try.


Now, they say you never get a second chance to make a first impression, right? Well, the owner probably ought to keep that in mind and think about what his restaurant says to people as soon as they pull up. I mean c'mon.... we've been to some dinky joints, and I really love those kinds of locations. But this one just seemed...... dumpy. This is definitely not a "first date" kind of place. Travis was there when I got there and I could tell he was already cranky. I assumed that he had gone to the counter and placed an order, but apparently that's just for picking up food to go. So we were confused at first..... were we supposed to sit, not sit, order, not order? Eventually someone did get to us and we placed our order. I decided to go with 4 tacos - Asada, barbacoa, al pastor, and carnitas.


Once the teeny bopping restaurant crew got their act together, we did FINALLY get our drinks, then later, our tacos. New first impression - the tacos actually looked pretty tasty. My tacos came with the standard dress - onion and cilantro, with grilled onions and a couple of peppers on the side. We also got a random plate of cucumbers and radish slices ahead of time. One of our guests said that's a pretty standard "authentic"..... thing. To me, it was just random and a waste of cucumber and radish. All of the meat on the tacos had a nice hint of seasoning to them. Not too spicy, but also not terribly memorable. The Al Pastor would probably be my favorite of the four - you could see the red seasoned ring on the meat and it was really pretty good. The other three tacos were decent tacos as well - tasty, but lacking a certain "WOW" factor to them. My biggest complaint - I had 4 tacos and I was still hungry. For the size and the price (1.75/each) I got a fair amount of meat. But without chips and salsa, this is definitely the kind of place where you need 6 tacos or more to make a complete meal. Chris and I actually debated - do we order more here? Or go somewhere else? If we were some place with decent service I would say the tacos were probably good enough that we would've ordered more. But since we weren't in the mood for their shenanigans (and Brett was with us and interested in trying another place) we actually bolted down the street to take Brett to Pollo Express.


Overall, I'd say this place definitely is the epitome of "middle of the road". If I'm in the area and NOT in a hurry, I would probably stop in again. You can still get a fair plate of a half dozen tacos for just over 10.00. But I definitely wouldn't go out of my way as there are plenty of better places between my office and them. My overall rankings on the 5 Taco Scale are below.


Food Quality - 2.5 Tacos
Price - $
Value - 3.0 Tacos
Cleanliness - 1.0 Tacos
Service - 1.5 Tacos
Overall Experience - 2.5 Tacos
Likelihood to Return - 2.0 Tacos