291 North Tustin St.
Orange, CA 92867
Life has slowly gotten back to normal for Katie and myself. We have been out to dinner with friends way more often than we did last year, we have planned a vacation for next month, and we have been able to attend Ducks games, which is something that we could not do last year because of the pandemic. Going back to the Honda Center means we have more opportunities to try new restaurants on our way to the games, instead of paying the ridiculous prices at the game. It was on our way to a recent game that we stopped in at Taqueria Hoy.
Taqueria Hoy is situated at the corner of Tustin and Palm Avenue in Orange. Yes, this used to be the former home of Taqueria De Anda, but has now been rebranded as Taqueria Hoy. It's managed by Rafael De Anda and his two sons. The reason for the rebranding was vaguely explained as a way to correct inconsistencies that had been made here when it was Taqueria De Anda. They also wanted to put an emphasis on quality and the authentic favors of their native Jalisco, Mexico. It sounds like there's a bit more to this rebranding, but I haven't been able to find out much about the split of these two restaurants online.
There are three locations of Taqueria Hoy open for business now, with a fourth coming soon in Tustin. The Orange and Santa Ana locations are open 24 hours a day, while the Anaheim spot is open until 10pm on weeknights and 1am on weekends. The menu is pretty simple to navigate with only tacos, quesadillas, and burritos offered, with your choice of any of their seven meat options. Ordering is done at the counter, and the food is prepared right in front of you as you pay at the register. A very streamlined process, which was good since we were pressed for time since we were on our way to the Ducks game.
We started off with a cavalcade of Tacos ($1.85). Both Katie and I picked three to start with. She had the Chicken, Pastor, and Carnitas, while I had the Carnitas, Buche, and Pastor. With the exception of the pastor taco, which came with red salsa, these tacos came dressed with green salsa, onions, and a little sprinkling of cilantro on two street sized corn tortillas. My favorite was the pastor, which included some very flavorful marinated pork shards and little bits of pineapple to add a tinge of sweetness to some bites. The buche, which is pork belly was one of the better versions I have had. The carnitas were okay, as they kind of lacked the depth of flavor that the other two had. I also would have liked a little crispiness to the pieces of chopped pork. Katie was very fond of her selections, calling them delicious. She also got a Side of Rice ($2.75) which helped round out her meal at Taqueria Hoy.
Three street tacos each were not going to get us through a hockey game, so we split this Al Pastor Quesadilla ($7.05) as well. The large flour tortilla was cut into quarters and was plenty for the both of us. It was a little light on the cheese, or at least it seemed that way because there was a good amount of pork here. Nicely crisped on the flattop, each bite had a little crunch to it. We should have gotten a side of crema to go along with this.
Just for good measure I got an Al Pastor Burrito ($7.05), which I was going to eat half here and then half at home after the game. The burritos at Taqueria Hoy include your choice of meat, beans, rice, onions, and cilantro. I opted to forgo the rice, which I kind of regret. I'm usually not a fan of rice in burritos, but I think it would have made this one better by giving it a little more stability, as it needed a bit more structure to the insides of the burrito. The burrito was good sized and made for a nice late night snack when I got home from watching the Ducks get hammered by the Maple Leafs.
Taqueria Hoy kind of reminds me of this years Ducks team. They are a young, fun team to watch, but you know that they are not going to make a playoff push this year. Taqueria Hoy is kind of the same. The food here is good, but there is way better out there that is playoff worthy. I do like the fact that Taqueria Hoy is open 24 hours, so if you have a taco craving at 2 in the morning you can cure those hunger pains. Orange County is seriously lacking when it comes to 24 hour dining options, so when a place offers it, we should make a point to patronize it, even if I've been having a hard time keeping my eyes open past 8:30. Service was prompt, and they got our food prepared and on our table rather quickly. Now that we are getting back to normal and going to hockey games again, I can totally see us coming back here before another game soon.
Out of five five cups of coffee, (because this restaurant sits on Palm Avenue, and the largest palm tree ever measured was found in western Colombia, the major coffee growing region of this South American country), five being best to zero being worst, Taqueria Hoy gets 3 cups of coffee.
For more information about Taqueria Hoy, head to their website by clicking here: https://www.taqueriahoy.com/
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