There is no question that Los Angeles has the best taco scene in the United States, and it just got better, with two new vendors that specialize in carne asada. Both operators point directly to Hermosillo, the hotbed of mesquite-grilled carne asada in the heart
of the Mexican state of Sonora, which raises the most cattle in the country. While we’ve had plenty in the way of Sonoran-style carne asada over the past decades, including Sonoratown (an Eater 38 favorite), Tacos Los Cholos, and Tacos La Rueda, it’s clear that Asadero in Hollywood and Tacos Royale in Silver Lake promise to bring Los Angeles’s grilled beef game to new heights. Given the city’s unending passion for tacos, I’m hoping this new rivalry brings even more vendors of their kind to the city’s streets.
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Asadero landed first, drawing attention from the Infatuation, who already dubbed it “LA’s most exciting new taco stand” for its thin rib-eye gaonera modeled after Mexico City’s Michelin-starred El Califa de Leon. Then Bill Esparza reported on Tacos Royale’s June 5 opening in Silver Lake for Eater Los Angeles, discussing chef and owner Saúl Pérez García’s Hermosillo-style stand that churns beautiful mesquite-grilled steaks on tallow-infused flour tortillas. García, who worked at Enrique Olvera’s short-lived Venice outpost of Atla and manned a Chinese Mexican food truck called La Hija de Marondo, partnered with his cousin Eloy Aluri, an accomplished chef in Hermosillo who was featured on Netflix’s Taco Chronicles.
On opening night, I stopped by Tacos Royale to see a well-branded tent and a substantial mesquite grill churning out prime-grade chuck roll (called diezmillo). The result is a gently blackened but still very much medium-to-medium-rare steak, portioned to 3 ounces. The standard asada taco comes over a thin flour tortilla (as is traditional in Sonora) with a heavy smear of beans. These aren’t just simple beans — they call them frijoles de fiesta, or party beans, and they’re infused with the subtle heat of chile colorado, and fortified with Monterey Jack, cheddar, and pickled jalapeños. If you peek over the counter, you can see chefs carefully slicing meat into uniform cubes and sprinkling on flaky salt (though you can and should add more salt to taste).
The overall package flies well above anything else available in Los Angeles right now: meaty, juicy, smoky, and tremendously satisfying, especially with the party beans. I also love the tidy sauce bar where you can spoon over salsa tatemada (fire-roasted), salsa habanera (for a piquant heat), salsa macha (chile oil), shredded cabbage, and pico de gallo (which they say isn’t a typical topping). The tacos are $7.50 each; two are probably good for a meal, or three for big eaters. At under $25, that’s still reasonable for a dinner portion of steak served with all the appropriate salsas and fixings.
Over at Asadero, the hype train has already arrived. Placed next to a Pavilions grocery store parking lot, the lines are constant over at its more central Hollywood location. When you arrive, a worker will ask if you want the gaonera, which is grilled over charcoal, or the other tacos, which are cooked on a standard plancha. The night I was there, they’d run out of the charcoal-grilled flank steak. The incessant business also means the salsa bar here is less organized. I ordered the gaonera (thinly sliced rib-eye steak), which are quickly seared over open flame on flimsy Home Depot-sourced grills (which are probably easier to transport). The meat gains a modicum of smoke flavor, but the taco works best with a spoonful of chopped blackened chiles, and dollops of the modest salsas (which don’t stand out like they do at Tacos Royale).
Even though the original gaonera was seared on a plancha at El Califa de Leon, here the smoke actually rounds out the taco, which is also served on tallow-made flour tortillas. The conceptual problem might be that the gaonera isn’t really an Hermosillo dish (El Califa de Leon is native to Mexico City), even though it might be Asadero’s most celebrated taco. I would order it again, and pray the flank steak isn’t sold out (a friend went this past weekend and said it was great). I also had the standard street taco on heirloom blue corn tortillas, and the tortilla kind of fell apart. The meat was also a bit tough — so skip these.
In an era when steakhouses are more popular than ever, I embrace the arrival of two ambitious Hermosillo-influenced taco spots. As wonderful as Los Angeles’s taco scene is, it’s still miles behind Mexico’s major cities, and Angelenos need to accept that not all tacos are created equal, and that regional specialization like this greatly improves our standard for carne asada. While I applaud Asadero for grilling its meat over charcoal, I give the nod to Tacos Royale for a more comprehensive experience: nice branding, clean salsa bar, and steakhouse-level cooking. Who knows, maybe it’ll even earn Los Angeles its first Michelin-starred taqueria.
Asadero. 723 Vine Street, Los Angeles, California. Thursday to Sunday, 6:30 p.m. to 11 p.m. https://www.instagram.com/asadero.losangeles/
Tacos Royale. 2511 West Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California. Thursday to Sunday, 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. https://www.tacosroyale.com/
