57 Fun Facts About Taco

Traditionally, a taco tortilla is made from which grain?

Corn: tortillas were traditionally made from nixtamalized maize ground into masa; wheat-flour tortillas are a later, Spanish-introduced habit.

Aside from food, what does the Spanish word 'taco' also mean?

The Real Academia Española lists wedge, wad, billiard cue, ramrod and even 'short, stocky person'.

One popular theory says the culinary word 'taco' was coined by which Mexican workers?

Silver miners: the popular theory holds that 18th-century Mexican silver miners called their paper-wrapped gunpowder charges tacos, and the name passed to the wrapped food.

Before the Spanish arrived, what did people of the Valley of Mexico reportedly fill their tacos with?

Small fish: anthropological evidence shows lake-region people of the Valley of Mexico folded tortillas around tiny fish; Bernal Díaz del Castillo later described the taco feast Cortés gave his captains in Coyoacán.

Which region's local name for the taco was 'codzito'?

Yucatán and Quintana Roo knew the rolled taco as a codzito; in Guanajuato and Michoacán the same snack was once called a burrito before 'taco' became the national word.

In 2024, El Califa de León in Mexico City became the first taco stand to receive what?

A Michelin star: in the first Michelin Guide Mexico, in May 2024, the tiny Taquería El Califa de León, open since 1968, became the first taco stand ever starred.

Tacos al pastor are cooked on what?

A vertical rotisserie: marinated pork is stacked on a spinning upright spit, charred on the outside and shaved off in thin slices to order.

Which Mexican state is considered the home of tacos al pastor?

Puebla is considered the cradle of al pastor: Middle Eastern immigrants there adapted spit-roasted shawarma in the 1930s, and local cooks later swapped lamb for chile-marinated pork.

What does 'al pastor' literally mean?

Shepherd style: pastor is Spanish for shepherd, and the name recalls lamb roasted shepherd-style on a spit, the meat first used before pork took over in Mexico.

Where did fish tacos originate?

Baja California: battered fried fish folded into a corn tortilla with cabbage and crema was street food in Ensenada and San Felipe before the style spread north into California.

Which U.S. chain is credited with first popularising fish tacos north of the border?

Rubio's: Ralph Rubio opened his first walk-up stand in San Diego in 1983, selling the battered fish tacos he had eaten on trips to San Felipe, and is credited with popularising them in the U.S.

What are tacos dorados better known as in the U.S.?

'Golden tacos' are rolled and fried; the flauta gets its name from its flute-like shape.

Why are tacos sudados called 'sweaty tacos'?

The same tacos are sold as tacos de canasta, basket tacos, by bicycle vendors in Mexico City.

Tacos de lengua are made from what?

Beef tongue: lengua is Spanish for tongue, simmered for hours until tender, then peeled, chopped and griddled before it goes into the taco.

What is a mulita?

Meat and cheese pressed between two tortillas: mulita means 'little mule', and the cheese melts between two corn tortillas like a small quesadilla, usually around al pastor or carne asada.

Birria, the stewed meat now famous in dipping tacos, comes from which Mexican state?

Jalisco: birria began around Cocula, near Guadalajara, as goat slow-cooked in a chile adobo, and it remains the state's signature dish.

The quesabirria, a cheese-stuffed birria taco served with consommé, was first developed in which city?

Tijuana: the city's beef-birria taqueros, who had swapped goat for cheaper beef, began griddling cheese into the consommé-dipped tortillas, and the quesabirria spread north from there in the 2010s.

How is traditional barbacoa prepared?

The pit is lined with agave leaves; the Nahuatl called the method nakakoyonki and the Maya píib.

Carnitas, 'little meats', are traditionally made by cooking pork in what?

Lard: carnitas are pork simmered three to four hours in rendered pork fat in a copper pot, then crisped with a burst of heat, much like French rillons.

Corn for tortillas is soaked in what before being ground into masa?

Limewater: soaking the kernels in an alkaline solution of slaked lime, called nixtamalization, loosens the hulls and frees the niacin that plain cornmeal cannot deliver.

Populations that ate untreated maize without nixtamalization risked which deficiency disease?

European settlers in the American South skipped the lime soak as unnecessary, and pellagra became endemic among the poor there.

What does the word 'tortilla' literally mean in Spanish?

Little cake: tortilla is the diminutive of torta, a cake or round loaf; in Spain the same word means a potato omelette, to the confusion of many tourists.

Flour tortillas are typical of which part of Mexico?

Wheat arrived with the Spanish and took root in the arid north, which is why Sonora is famous for its enormous flour tortillas.

What is the traditional stone used to grind nixtamal into masa called?

Metate: a sloped slab of volcanic stone worked with a rolling stone called a mano; the molcajete is the salsa mortar and the comal the griddle.

Where did the hard-shell, crispy taco tradition develop?

The United States: pre-formed U-shaped shells were a Mexican-American invention; appliances for frying them were on sale by the late 1930s, and New York restaurateur Juvencio Maldonado patented a shell fryer in 1950.

The first U.S.-published cookbook with a hard-shell taco recipe came out in 1949 in which city?

Santa Fe: Fabiola Cabeza de Baca Gilbert's The Good Life: New Mexican Food, published there in 1949, printed a hard-shell taco recipe more than a decade before Taco Bell opened.

Glen Bell got the idea for his tacos by watching queues at which restaurant across from his hot dog stand?

The Rodriguez family's San Bernardino café was famous for its tacos dorados, and Bell sold a simplified version.

In which California city did Glen Bell open the first Taco Bell in 1962?

Downey: the first Taco Bell opened on Firestone Boulevard in March 1962, a walk-up stand with mission-style arches; the building was moved to company headquarters in Irvine in 2015.

What did Glen Bell sell before tacos?

Hot dogs: Bell's Drive-In, opened in San Bernardino in 1948 after his Marine Corps service in World War II, sold hot dogs and hamburgers before he added tacos.

How much did Glen Bell charge for a taco at his early Taco-Tia stand?

19 cents: Bell first sold tacos from a side window of his San Bernardino stand at 19 cents each, the shells fried in a wire basket built by a local chicken-coop maker.

Which company bought Taco Bell from Glen Bell in 1978?

PepsiCo spun its restaurants off in 1997 as Tricon, which later renamed itself.

What was the name of the Chihuahua in Taco Bell's late-1990s ads?

Gidget: the female Chihuahua, voiced by Carlos Alazraqui, fronted the 1997–2000 campaign with 'Yo quiero Taco Bell' and 'Drop the Chalupa'.

In 2001 Taco Bell promised free tacos if which falling object hit a floating Pacific target?

Mir missed; the later 'Steal a Base, Steal a Taco' World Series promotion had rather better odds.

The 2012 Doritos Locos Taco first used a shell flavoured like which Doritos variety?

Nacho Cheese: the first Doritos Locos Taco, launched in March 2012 with Frito-Lay, used a Nacho Cheese shell; Cool Ranch followed in 2013 and was cut in a 2019 menu cull.

Which Taco Bell item debuted as a limited offer in 2005 and went permanent the next year?

Crunchwrap Supreme: introduced as a limited-time item in 2005, it sold so well that Taco Bell made it permanent in 2006; a vegan version was tested in three cities in 2023.

Which 1993 film used Taco Bell as a plot device, presenting it as the only restaurant left in the future?

Demolition Man: in the 1993 film's San Angeles of 2032, Taco Bell has won the 'franchise wars' and is the only restaurant left; overseas cuts dubbed it Pizza Hut instead.

Businesses have advertised tacos on Tuesdays since at least what year?

1933: an El Paso cafeteria advertised tacos on Tuesdays that year, decades before restaurants fought over who owned the phrase 'Taco Tuesday'.

Which chain, born in a Cheyenne trailer, held the federal trademark on 'Taco Tuesday' from 1989 to 2023?

Taco John's finally gave up 'Taco Tuesday' in July 2023 after Taco Bell petitioned to have the mark cancelled.

Which state was excluded from the 'Taco Tuesday' trademark because a local restaurant owned the phrase?

New Jersey: Gregory's Restaurant & Bar in Somers Point, New Jersey, had run Taco Tuesday since 1979 and registered the phrase with the state in 1982; it surrendered the mark in October 2023.

Which NBA star's 2019 attempt to trademark 'Taco Tuesday' was rejected as a commonplace phrase?

LeBron James: his 'Taco Tuesday' Instagram videos went viral in 2019, but the USPTO refused his trademark filing as a commonplace term that merely conveys a familiar concept.

In Norway, the tradition of eating tacos is attached to which day of the week?

Fredagstaco is a national institution; Sweden's Friday-night fredagsmys often means tacos too.

Taco John's signature side dish is called what?

Potato Olés: bite-sized rounds of fried potato dusted with the chain's seasoning salt are Taco John's trademark side, sold by the cup and even stuffed into its Meat and Potato Burrito.

The Choco Taco ice cream novelty was invented in 1983 in which city?

Philadelphia: Alan Drazen of the Jack & Jill Ice Cream Company invented the Choco Taco there in 1983 for ice-cream trucks; Klondike discontinued it in July 2022.

Indian tacos, popular at pow-wows, are built on what instead of a tortilla?

Navajo tradition dates frybread to government rations issued during the Long Walk of the 1860s.

Henry's Puffy Tacos, which popularised the puffy taco, is in which Texas city?

San Antonio: Henry Lopez opened Henry's Puffy Tacos there in 1978, dropping raw masa discs into hot oil until they balloon; his brother Arturo opened a puffy-taco shop in Whittier, California.

Pico de gallo is also known as salsa bandera because its colours match what?

The Mexican flag: red tomato, white onion and green chile mirror the flag's three stripes; the name pico de gallo itself, 'rooster's beak', may refer to the pecking motion of eating it.

The word guacamole comes from the Nahuatl for what?

Avocado sauce: āhuacamōlli joins āhuacatl, avocado, with mōlli, sauce, the same root as mole; Spanish speakers softened it into guacamole.

Nachos were invented in 1943 by Ignacio Anaya in which Mexican border city?

Piedras Negras, across the border from Eagle Pass, Texas: Ignacio 'Nacho' Anaya improvised fried tortillas with cheese and jalapeños at the Victory Club for a group of U.S. officers' wives in 1943.

A traditional chalupa from central Mexico is shaped like what?

A small boat: chalupa is Spanish for a small boat, and the dish is masa pressed around a mould and fried into a shallow crisp cup, unlike the fried flatbread sold under the name in the U.S.

Which garnish is typically set out alongside the tacos at a Mexican street taco stand?

Sliced radishes and lime, with salt; grilled cambray onions, pickled chiles and cucumber slices often join them.

Tacos de cabeza are cooked how?

Steamed on a punctured metal plate: the whole cow's head sits over a perforated plate so steam cooks it through, yielding cachete, lengua, sesos and, for the brave, ojo.

Tricon Global Restaurants, Taco Bell's parent company, took what name in 2002?

Yum! Brands: Tricon Global Restaurants, spun off from PepsiCo in 1997, renamed itself Yum! Brands in 2002, the same parent as KFC and Pizza Hut.

One theory traces the word 'taco' to the Nahuatl word tlahco, which means what?

Half or in the middle: tlahco means half or middle in Nahuatl, the idea being that the filling sits in the middle of the tortilla before it is folded.

What is the vertical spit on which marinated al pastor pork is slowly cooked called in Spanish?

Trompo means 'spinning top'; in Nuevo León and Chihuahua the dish itself is often named after it.

Tacos árabes, a 1930s cousin of al pastor, are traditionally topped with which salsa?

Chipotle salsa: the Puebla taco árabe pairs spit-roasted pork on a soft flatbread with a smoky chipotle salsa and lime, the combination sold at Antigua Taquería La Oriental since 1933.

Al pastor served with cheese on a flour tortilla is called what?

A gringa: al pastor and melted cheese folded in a flour tortilla, a Mexico City taquería staple said to be named for the American women who first asked for it.

Which Texas city is sometimes claimed, to the annoyance of its neighbours, as the home of the breakfast taco?

Austin; writer Gustavo Arellano countered that San Antonio never had to brag, because folks there just call it 'breakfast'.