This Tuesday our search for the best taco in Chatt Town continues with a stop at Tacos El Cuñado.
This eatery has been around for a decade. It’s located at the Airport Plaza strip mall on Lee Highway.
Once again this is another authentic Mexican food restaurant, not your average brother-in-law’s tacos!
Well, they might be, kind of, sort of.
Cuñado means brother-in-law in Spanish. However, it has been used as slang, meaning your least favorite, and not the sharpest tool in the box, cuñado.
Whatever the case, this cuñado is worthy of a visit.
Inside, the walls are painted bright yellow. The interior exudes Mexican Ranchero vibes from wall to wall. The entire restaurant is decorated with Mexican sombreros, cowboy spurs, cattle ropes and art featuring fruits and vegetables.
Each booth is painted in bright colors and features the painting of a horse or horse head (not in the Godfather way. These are cute and artsy).
The sun is drawn on two different spots on the walls. In the Mexican culture the sun symbolizes life-giving energy, power and good luck. Their table menu is just as colorful, and they have a life-sized menu pinned to their wall. You can’t miss it!
The top right of the wall menu displays their antojitos Mexicanos (Mexican Street foods). That’s where you’ll find the typical tacos, sopes, tostadas, tortas, quesadillas and so on.
I’ve eaten at Tacos El Cuñado before. I tried their tacos al pastor (marinated pork) and tostada de pollo (chicken). They serve the tacos we’ve become accustomed to like the al pastor, and barbacoa, but on this visit something caught my eye.
Tacos de chicharrones! Pork rind tacos – yes please!
I ordered a taco de chihcharrones, a sope de pollo, and of course, guacamole.
Chicharrones, deep fried pork skin or pork belly, are popular in the Hispanic communities. They are made in a variety of ways. Most people are familiar with the store bought chicharrones, which are pillowy and light, but crunchy, and sometimes seasoned. In most Hispanic stores here in the city, the pork rinds are more like the ones I grew up eating in Little Havana in Miami, Fla. They are big chunks of pork belly, with some meat still on it, deep fried. The outer skin is salty, hard, and crunchy, while the center is tender and juicy and full of pork flavor.
My plate arrived. The chicharrones were slivered cut pieces of pork belly, fried but still pillowy soft. I was expecting a crunch-fest, but they were easy to chew while retaining the familiar flavor of the chicharrones, I am used to. The onions and cilantro accented the flavor without overpowering the chicharrones. My brain was confused. The flavor was there but the crunch was not. What kind of wizardry was this? I think the waitress noticed the puzzled look on my face. She came by and asked if everything was okay.
I assured her everything was better than okay, it was a delicious taco, one I never had before.
“If my brother-in-law cooked liked this, I would say he is my favorite cuñado,” I said to the waitress.
A sope is a traditional Mexican dish consisting of a fried corn masa, the same masa used to make tamales. Mine was topped with chopped cooked chicken, lettuce, tomatoes and lots of queso fresco. The edge of the sope was crispy, the center a bit more tender but still held in all the toppings without falling apart.
I will try their other protein topped sopes on future visits.
The guacamole was chunky! The flavor profile was carried by the avocados and the cilantro (luckily for me, I don’t suffer from cilantro-soap-syndrome). It didn’t detect any lime or lemon at all.
Most taco places in town charge $3.25-$3.50 per taco, but at Tacos El Cuñado, tacos are $2.99 each. The sope was $3.49. They have platter meals and combination plates, and soup specials on the weekends. I noticed they have a plate where a whole fish is deep fried, head and all, served with sliced avocados, vegetables and a side of rice.
I’m going back for that one!
Tacos El Cuñado
- 5813 Lee Hwy. Suite #4
- (423) 244-0281
- Facebook: facebook.com/tacoselcunaochattannooga
- $-$$
What’s your favorite taco place and why? Send me an email at Pattyl@brewermediagroup.com