El Paisano Taco's
2429 W Division St
(between Artesian Ave & Campbell Ave)
Chicago, IL 60622 (773) 292-1002
- Price Range: $
- Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
- Attire: Casual
- Good for Groups: No
- Good for Kids: Yes
- Takes Reservations: No
- Delivers: Yes
- Take-out: Yes
- Waiter Service: No
10 Reviews for El Paisano Taco's
I really like this place.
Great Mexican food (as well as American food).
Quick delivery. Friendly staff.
Fantastic chips and salsa...I like the roja... that earns it four stars.
I also like the tacos and the enchiladas.... but seriously... often I just stop by and pick up chips and salsa.
Okay, this place is solid, and I'm a card carrying member of the "Chicago Taqueria Scene is Bullshit" crew. Yes, we have Rick Bayless and the absolutely delicious Frontera, but my Metropolitan Mexican scale lives and dies in the trenches that are the Taquerias. Now before writing this off, let it be known I grew up around Los Angeles and the Central Valley of California, as well as lived in the Mission District of San Francisco. I know enough about great Mexican food to hold a weighted opinion.
This place, overall, is not very good. The burritos are pretty weak and they cut them in half. Why the midwest cuts their burritos in half, I'll never understand. It should be packed and wrapped as tightly as possible, like a newspaper, but instead they cut it in half, thus compromising the structure. If you can't get the wrap right, the burrito is flawed from the start, no matter what you stuff in it.
Hamburgers and hot dogs? Come on, guys. The Bistec Mexicana? Okay, at best. Really great flavor, but the steaks themselves are butchered too small. The breakfasts? The chorizo is a good effort, what with being made in house and spiced just right, but they continually burn the eggs. Bad news.
So what makes this place four stars? The tacos.
They have these down to a science, except for the chicken tacos. For some reason, they cast these aside, but the others pull up the weight. I do believe it's because there isn't much flavor in chicken to start with, whereas the rest of the tacos derive the majority of their flavor from their own rendered fat. Flavor in, flavor out.
The carne asada is amazing. Diced and sauteed pieces of ribeye that didn't make the cut for the Bistec. They have an awesome adobo spice they use on these, then topped with lettuce and tomato--and I do avocado--all while sprinkling the crown jewel: soft Queso Blanco over the meat. The flavor of the Mexican cheese with the adobo spices and the meat, absolutely rock and roll.
The lengua (beef tongue) tacos, pastor, and carnitas are amazing as well. The same adobo spice, topped with cilantro and onion. Squeeze a little lime on these bad boys, and the rendered pork with the carnitas and pastor really come through and leaves the meat extremely juicy. The pastor has a little more kick to it, but man alive is it good.
The chile relleno taco is great due to perfectly roasting the peppers, leaving a sweet hint to the heat. Stuffed with cheese? Can't go wrong.
The one thing that throws people about this place is the salsa. It's not straight up, traditional pico that most people are used to. This isn't Chi-Chi's or Uncle Julio's Hacienda, it's salsa roja and a Puerto Rican twist on a verde. The roja is roasted red chile peppers with a few slivers of habanero thrown in, then blended into a puree, made every day from scratch. How do I know? I asked and watched one Saturday morning while nursing a hangover. The little black bits? Charred skin left from the peeling process. While not a great dipping vehicle for the chips, the roja is amazing drizzled on the tacos.
Beans are refried with lard, old school style. Doesn't come out seeming like a canned ordeal. I dig the rice, but then again, I have nothing against papas in my rice. Pretty middle of the road.
Three carne asada, pastor, lengua, or carnitas tacos, with rice and beans, and a horchata? All for $5? Beautiful.
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i had a few steak tacos, guac and chips, a huge horchata and rice and beans.
it was delicious, showed up super fast and hot, and was an all around killer meal, delivered.
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There is no such thing as good Mexican food in Chicago. The. End.
Okay, but it would be enough for me to say that, right? No, I must explain. And I will start with El Paisano's. Now, my ex loves this place up and down. He'd eat here every night if he could. He fell in love with the carne tacos when he first moved to Chicago and his love has yet to wane. The several times I went there, though, I just couldn't hop on the bandwagon. The chicken tacos were disgusting and the carne talks were equally gross. The only taco I did half-enjoy was the pepper version, which was a stuffed pepper of sorts in the taco. But it's the kind of thing where you can only eat one.
The first few times I went, their chips and salsa did impress me. But after a while I realized that the salsa was watery and almost tasteless, like they were diluting it the way my mom used to do when we were almost out of ranch dressing. The chips were hit or miss, too. And the enchiladas? They weren't *that* bad, but they're the kind of thing you could get from any Banquet dinner from the grocery store, and I'll admit I have a soft spot for Banquet dinners that have the cheese enchiladas (it's a holdover from when I was little and that's what mom heated up and called "dinner").
But overall, despite being incredibly inexpensive, this place is worth passing. You can get the same stuff at any Taqueria in Chicago, no lie. So hit up the Taco Bell or go to Chili's or something. This place isn't worth the disappointment you can get elsewhere.
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El Paisano has hand's down the best chips and salsa in Chicago. They are made fresh daily, and after the burns have healed, the verde sauce leaves a pleasant taste. The usual fare is top-notch (tacos, burritos) and honestly, I haven't yet tried anything else. I usually pig out on the chips and all I have room for is a steak, tongue, or beef taco.
**For table service, if you just sit down, they will bring you complimentary chips and salsa (red and green) and water.
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This place is awful. The food is bland and tasteless. They put huge chunks of potatoes in everything (and that's not clear on their menu) which makes the texture weird. The delivery guy got lost, acted like it was my fault. The food was cold and soggy. The chips were stale. Just a really bad experience overall.
II went here on a very frustrated whim, after hunting down some Pepcid AC for my cat. Ordered chicken tacos to go...the food was very bland, not at all what i had expected for Mexican. I washed the remainder of my tacos down with a Corona purchased at the local CVS and sighed at my decidedly tasteless cuisine.
Wow! Just went there today for the first time. The steak burrito was so, so good! Really fantastic steak, I mean really, really good! I got the superburito, so they put on sour cream and all that. Not a ton of toppings, but great meat, great hot sauce, really fresh tasting, very yummy! Great rice and beans too. Friendly service. I'll be back!
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the best mexican food in the neighborhood. good prices & big portions. a breakfast of chilaquiles & a strawberry licuado is perfect for a hangover.
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