Some days, even the most chunkily be-scarfed among us is hit with a wave of seasonal affective downer, the need for a little sunshine. Sure, there’s light therapy, but it can’t hurt to try tacos.
Taco Town Fruteria (320 F St., Eureka) opened in July, in the former home of Chuchi’s and before that Masaki’s Kyoto. Vitamin D fairly bounces from the walls in the form of bright murals of whimsical sea creatures crossed with fruit, not to mention the neon highlights on the menu above and below the counter.
At your left, find soft street tacos, among which the cabeza ($3.50) is the star, the beef tender enough to pinch apart in your fingers, and topped with cilantro and onion. (Psst: The mild avocado and spicier red salsas are in the little fridge to your right.) Consider, too, the humble gordita ($10), its thicker masa shell split and filled with meat, cheese, salsa, cilantro and onion.
On the rest of the menu, an endless summer of beachy parfaits and raspados glow with icy sweetness. Their sweet, spicy, tangy queen is the mangonada ($10), layered with chunks of fresh mango, mango sorbet and rivers of deep red chamoy. The heat from the chamoy sauce plays against but isn’t dulled by the fruit in its fresh or frozen forms and, if it’s possible, it gets better as you work your way to the bottom, lighting up every part of your palate like oceanside fireworks.
“We make our own mango sorbet at the mall,” says owner Samira Ayala, whose family also runs the Fresh Fruity Grill in the Bayshore Mall’s food court. “It’s technically fresh fruit,” she says, explaining how the fresh lime, strawberry, mango and guava sorbets are made by freezing and blending, sometimes with sugar, depending on the batch of produce. The mangonada is her favorite, though the Mango Delight (a whipped cream version) and the house-made horchata come close. Keep an eye out for specials, like the Mazapan de la Rosa milkshake ($8) made from the Mexican peanut candy with the rose on the wrapper.
Ayala’s family also owns La Patria Mariscos and Grill in Fields Landing, and she says she started helping out at the restaurant when she was 15. “I always told them they weren’t allowed to close because the restaurant was mine, but I realized I wanted to do something of my own.”
Everything on the menu is takeout-friendly but if the skies are gray, pulling up to a candy-red table and sitting amid all that color might do you some good.
This article appears in Ballot Measure Soup – A look at all those local revenue proposals coming before voters.
