Even before his brief cameo during Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl LX halftime performance shot him into the worldwide spotlight, Victor Villa had already built a taco empire and cult-like following feeding Angelenos. That appearance only further accelerated his skyrocketing
career, helping kick off a busy year of expansion, including the opening of Villa’s Tacos first shop outside California.
Villa’s latest location takes the taqueria’s mesquite-grilled meats and blue corn tortillas across the Mojave Desert to a food hall in Las Vegas inside Durango Casino and Resort — an off-Strip neighborhood casino in the city’s southwest valley. New locations are also planned closer to his California home in South Pasadena, Atwater, and Hollywood. “From the beginning, Villa’s Tacos has been rooted in family and tradition, with a deep respect for the ingredients and flavors that define our food,” Villa tells Eater, adding that he’s looking forward to serving “great tacos and making memories here in Vegas.”
With a mariachi band playing at the August 15 opening, Las Vegans got their first taste of what makes Villa’s Tacos so compelling. Villa’s signature queso tacos start with freshly pressed blue corn masa tortillas topped with refried beans, onions, cilantro, crema, cotija, and guacamole. The tacos are then filled with a choice of four mesquite-grilled meats: chicken thighs, skirt steak, marinated pork, or pork chorizo. Order in mulita form and the fillings get sandwiched between two crispy blue corn tortillas. Three vegan options are also available and include tacos packed with lightly salted potatoes, piled with sweet pineapple and onions, or filled with black beans and a cactus salad. All can be doused with homemade salsas — from the classics to originals like mango habanero.
For first timers, Villa suggests trying the Villa’s Trio, a sampler of sorts consisting of three queso tacos: one asada, one chorizo con papa, and one black bean con pollo. “Then I would also throw some tacos al pastor right in the mix,” he says.
Villa, who got his start selling tacos out of the backyard of his grandmother’s Highland Park home before opening his first restaurant in 2023 and being recognized as a Michelin Guide’s Bib Gourmand destination, says Villa’s Tacos is his love letter to Los Angeles. He noticed that every region in Mexico has its own tacos, but that Los Angeles didn’t have any one style to call its own. So he created what he thought could be the contender.
“Eight years ago, when we were starting the business, I wanted something that was true to Los Angeles and something that hadn’t necessarily been done in Mexico before,” Villa explains. “So I came up with a recipe for what we call tacos Estilo Los Angeles. You can expect organic, hand-pressed blue corn tortillas and mesquite-grilled meats that are all marinated and prepared in house, ” he says, noting that even chorizo gets made fresh at Villa’s.
The idea to use blue corn came out of curiosity. Villa says as a first-generation Mexican American, he had never tried blue corn tortillas until he was a young adult, and once he had he wanted to share that experience with other Angelenos.
“At first, it was a roll of the dice,” Villa says. “But after I put the recipe together and tasted it, it was like that moment where the angels come down and the light shines. It was like, ‘Aha!’ So then blue corn tortillas became something that we use exclusively.”
Villa’s Tacos is located in the Eat Your Heart Out food at Durango Casino and Resort taking over the space formerly occupied by Fiorella.
