Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh,
Speaker 1: and there's Chuck and Jerry's even here, and this is
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know. One of the best episode topics
Speaker 1: I think we've ever come up with, I agree, ironically,
Speaker 1: recording on a Thursday. You know where it's Taco Thursday.
Speaker 1: But I ate tacos for lunch. Dude, I want a
Speaker 1: taco so bad, but I'm holding out until I see
Speaker 1: the next like good taco truck. Yeah, so what I did,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to shout out my favorite taco places
Speaker 1: at the end. But um, tacos is most people know
Speaker 1: are aren't the best delivery food because that you know,
Speaker 1: so you should eat right after assembly basically is your
Speaker 1: best taco. That's why when you go to a taco
Speaker 1: truck or a taco area, they're putting those things together
Speaker 1: right in front of your face. But there's a place
Speaker 1: in Atlanta called Bar Taco in Edmond Park, which they're
Speaker 1: kind of fancy, swancy tacos. Uh, but they have a
Speaker 1: couple of really good ones, and they deliver a little
Speaker 1: taco kit like a little Bento box. Almost you got
Speaker 1: your meat, separate from your tortillas, separate from your fixin's,
Speaker 1: and then you put it all together there at home
Speaker 1: and it's Uh. I got the the pork belly that's
Speaker 1: flavored with pineapple sauce. It was sort of an l
Speaker 1: past store kind of flavor sounds like and then like
Speaker 1: a shredded beef, and boy did it hit the spot.
Speaker 1: After researching this for the past day and a half,
Speaker 1: I can imagine Deli turkey sandwich was weeping while I
Speaker 1: was eating it. I could not have tacos. I tried
Speaker 1: to think of something else, but I got my tacos.
Speaker 1: I think that was the right thing to do. I'll
Speaker 1: tell you what else was the right thing to do?
Speaker 1: Chuck asking Dave Rouse to help us out with this one, right,
Speaker 1: because it turns out that Dave Ruse was apparently born
Speaker 1: to write this episode. So so, just a little bit
Speaker 1: of backstory, Um, Dave and his wife moved to Mexico
Speaker 1: looking for adventure years and years ago, and while he
Speaker 1: was down there, he'd being the journalist he was uh
Speaker 1: and and meeting up with like really really good, authentic
Speaker 1: tacos for possibly the first time in his life, he
Speaker 1: decided he wanted to write a story, an article about
Speaker 1: how we got from authentic, you know, real good Mexican
Speaker 1: tacos like the ones you just described, to the kind
Speaker 1: of tacos we had in America as kids outside of
Speaker 1: Texas and California, which is like that crispy hardshell, little
Speaker 1: ground beef, little taco, seasoning, iceberg, lettuce, tomatoes and just
Speaker 1: shut up and eat it and don't ask for anything else, which,
Speaker 1: by the way, I do love those. I think it
Speaker 1: could be good. There's a place for them, but it's
Speaker 1: the same place that that grilled cheese occupies. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: or your square pizza. Yeah well, well, well said so. Um.
Speaker 1: The thing about Dave, though, is when he when he
Speaker 1: started researching this, he he found out, like I guess,
Speaker 1: he reached out to a guy named Jeffrey Pilcher as
Speaker 1: a source. Jeffrey Pilcher's a Latin American or he's in
Speaker 1: a story and of Latin America. I don't think he's
Speaker 1: Latin American. Um, And Jeffrey Pilcher realized that he didn't
Speaker 1: know actually, with the answer to that question, how we
Speaker 1: got from authentic Mexican tacos to kind of blandish American tacos,
Speaker 1: right yeah, and it seems like he might have even
Speaker 1: like Dave may have possibly been an inspiration for what
Speaker 1: ended up being the Jeffrey Pilcher book Planet Taco, a
Speaker 1: Global History of Mexican Food, because he's even listed in
Speaker 1: the acknowledgments. Right yeah, he thanks Dave um directly for
Speaker 1: helping come up with this idea. And I can't remember
Speaker 1: exactly how you put it, so okay, So then now
Speaker 1: we fast forward to one we asked Dave to help
Speaker 1: was with the tacos article, and Dave goes back to
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Pilcher's book that he helped inspire as a source
Speaker 1: for this episode. Yeah, I mean it's pretty great. And
Speaker 1: Dave loved Mexico so much he uh, he ended up
Speaker 1: living there several different times for a total of about
Speaker 1: nine years. The country he found so nice. He lived
Speaker 1: there twice thrice. I think, oh, yeah, that's right. Country
Speaker 1: is so nice he lived there thrice. It still works. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it makes I mean, I've done very little travel in Mexico.
Speaker 1: I've done some of the border town stuff in Tijuana
Speaker 1: and Alcadonis, but I really want to go south, south
Speaker 1: south into central and south Central Mexico. Uh, I just
Speaker 1: gotta do it. It's wonderful. Uh. I worked at Mexicaly
Speaker 1: Girl in college in eight Mexican food literally every day
Speaker 1: for three years, and it's just one of my favorite
Speaker 1: cuisines and favorite cultures in the world. It's pretty good.
Speaker 1: One of the things that really is kind of shocking
Speaker 1: um about all this, though, Chuck, is the taco, the
Speaker 1: thing that pretty much everybody in the world associates with
Speaker 1: Mexican cuisine, is possibly the latest comer of all of
Speaker 1: Mexican what we would identify as Mexican cuisine. It's actually
Speaker 1: fairly recent invention. And that's pretty much what this episode
Speaker 1: is going to be about. How the taco got invented
Speaker 1: and then how we got from an actual authentic Mexican
Speaker 1: taco to the americanized kind of Taco bell version of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and Dave makes a great point that, you know, growing
Speaker 1: up in the seventies and eighties, like we did, we
Speaker 1: had our our what's the brand again, old El Paso. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the old El Paso like Taco kit style tacos. And
Speaker 1: like I said, I still love him. You love them.
Speaker 1: There's a place for that. Uh. If you get if
Speaker 1: you put that pop that taco shell in the oven
Speaker 1: and get it crispy, it's really a beautiful thing as
Speaker 1: long as it doesn't break in half. That you can
Speaker 1: get a little messy. But while there's a place for those, uh.
Speaker 1: Dave makes the point, and I agree that, like we
Speaker 1: are truly in the golden age of tacos here in
Speaker 1: the United States, because it used to be, like you said,
Speaker 1: Texas in California, you could always get pretty good tacos
Speaker 1: once they came on the scene in the nineteen fifties
Speaker 1: or so. But now every major city has world class tacos. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: And I mean not just like taco trucks that somebody
Speaker 1: pulled up and and thank God for those as well,
Speaker 1: but I mean like like multiple taco restaurants Takorea's like
Speaker 1: authentic ones all over the place. Then they're that in
Speaker 1: just about any town in the country. And I don't
Speaker 1: know exactly how it happened, but it happened, and it's
Speaker 1: great that it did, because it's not like people from
Speaker 1: south of the border started showing up in you know,
Speaker 1: two thousand five, and then that was it, you know,
Speaker 1: and they brought tacos with them and in that kind
Speaker 1: of cuisine. Like, there have been plenty of Mexican and
Speaker 1: Central American immigrants that have moved up into the United
Speaker 1: States for a very long time, and they did bring
Speaker 1: tacos with them. But for some reason there those authentic
Speaker 1: tacos just took a while to catch on. I think, Chuck,
Speaker 1: it was America that finally came around and caught up
Speaker 1: to what the the Mexican cuisine actually was, rather than
Speaker 1: being like, no, we don't want that, we want this
Speaker 1: taco bell version. Yeah, I think I agree. And when
Speaker 1: I said every major American city, I'm talking, if you want,
Speaker 1: you know, fifty taco places to choose from, Atlanta probably
Speaker 1: has that many, I've got. I looked on the map
Speaker 1: today out of curiosity. I counted like seventeen taco places
Speaker 1: within literally three miles of my house. And those are
Speaker 1: just places that have taco in the name, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean these were places that I mean they weren't
Speaker 1: I kind of through some generic or not generic, just
Speaker 1: some overall Mexican restaurants in there that have really great tacos.
Speaker 1: But most of those were sort of Tacorea style or
Speaker 1: taco trucks. But you know, forget major American cities, like
Speaker 1: small towns like you can find really good tacos everywhere
Speaker 1: in this country. Now, yes, yeah, the best. The best
Speaker 1: taco I ever had actually was in some little countryside
Speaker 1: rural area outside of Boston. I remember we had a
Speaker 1: show in Boston. Then we had another show somewhere else
Speaker 1: that was within driving distance, and I was driving there
Speaker 1: and no, okay, it was driving from Seattle of Portland.
Speaker 1: Best taco IVE ever had. Driving Seattle of Portland in
Speaker 1: the middle of the like nowhere, and there was a
Speaker 1: taco truck and they had a beef tongue taco and
Speaker 1: it was hands down the best taco I've ever had. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not in love with the tongue. I would you know?
Speaker 1: When I worked at Mexicali and College in Athens, that
Speaker 1: was the guys in the kitchen would they would make
Speaker 1: our food, but then on special days they would make
Speaker 1: their own food for themselves. And Mexicali didn't have stuff
Speaker 1: like tongue. It was a bunch of frat boys and
Speaker 1: stuff that we're eating it, so they weren't into tripe
Speaker 1: and tongue, but they would make that stuff and I
Speaker 1: would always try it don't love the texture of tongue.
Speaker 1: I definitely don't love the texture of tripe um, but
Speaker 1: I gave it a whirl. I did not like tripe.
Speaker 1: I would eat kabeza, which is cheek and jowl meat taco.
Speaker 1: Those are I like those better than the tongue in tripe.
Speaker 1: I've never had beef cheeks, but I've had no Actually,
Speaker 1: I guess I have had beef cheeks, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: in a taco. It was like prepared, like braised beef
Speaker 1: cheeks and they were deish. Yeah, but give me some
Speaker 1: carne asada or shredded beef or carnitas or l pass store.
Speaker 1: I'm down with rizo, but that's probably lower on my list,
Speaker 1: just because I like the others more. Yeah, I'll lead
Speaker 1: a fish taco. I'll lead a shrimp taco. I love
Speaker 1: those seafood tacos. I like it, definitely, definitely. Yeah good.
Speaker 1: A good fish taco with some red cabbage slaw on
Speaker 1: there is pretty tough to beat. Really, Yeah, let's just
Speaker 1: do this. We'll talk about the tacos that we like
Speaker 1: for the rest of this episode. Like the fried fish
Speaker 1: in this Dude Fish, It's all good and so it's
Speaker 1: worth restating again. I think we're living in a golden
Speaker 1: age of tacos here in the United States, clearly, because
Speaker 1: you can find end all these tacos. And if you're
Speaker 1: not out there finding all these tacos and this sounds good,
Speaker 1: make a concerted effort to go find an authentic taco
Speaker 1: place and see what's what, and I'll bet you never
Speaker 1: really go back. That's right. One last taco that I
Speaker 1: love is the Korean taco. Yes, the little fusion tacos
Speaker 1: that are out now that are so delicious. Do you
Speaker 1: know the first time I ever even knew that existed
Speaker 1: was Uh, Chad Crowley, who produced, one of the producers
Speaker 1: on that show, had that catered some Korean taco, Korean
Speaker 1: barbecue taco place somewhere over on the West Side, had
Speaker 1: it catered and cooked Tacorea. My friend, is that what
Speaker 1: it was? Okay? And and I it was like, I
Speaker 1: don't I don't ever want to leave this craft services table.
Speaker 1: I just want to stay in here and eat these
Speaker 1: tacos for the Let's just call off the shoot and
Speaker 1: do this and yeah, that's still go there. Uh, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of houseware places over there, so whenever Emily
Speaker 1: and I go over there to look at those, I
Speaker 1: always pop into handcook for some sesame fries and beef
Speaker 1: bull tacos. And the guy there, dude still recognizes me
Speaker 1: from stuff you should know, the TV show That's awesome,
Speaker 1: that's really cool. He's like, it was no good, but
Speaker 1: I recognize you every time I go and he's, hey, man,
Speaker 1: how you doing. You're still doing the TV show, like
Speaker 1: for the fiftieth time. No, no, he said, get very
Speaker 1: nice guy that went delicious tacos. We gotta shout out though.
Speaker 1: Roy CHOI apparently was the guy who came up with
Speaker 1: Korean barbecue tacos, so he's worth mentioning for sure, at
Speaker 1: least for that. So I guess we should really talk
Speaker 1: about tacos instead of just salivating and talking about our
Speaker 1: favorite tacos. Agreed, because, like I said, tacos are fairly
Speaker 1: recent creations as far as Mexican cuisine goes. But one
Speaker 1: of the things that is essential to a taco, the tortilla,
Speaker 1: is actually very very very old. Yes it is, and
Speaker 1: technically if you put something in a tortilla and eat it,
Speaker 1: you could describe it as a taco. But you know,
Speaker 1: basically since the domestication in southern Mexico of corn about
Speaker 1: eight seven hundred years ago, they have been grinding that
Speaker 1: stuff up, flattening it out, and cooking it near a
Speaker 1: fire usually you know back then, like on a hot
Speaker 1: rock or you know, we saw in Guatemala they were
Speaker 1: still doing this hand every morning. Some of the best
Speaker 1: tortillas you're ever gonna have. Yeah, but that was it,
Speaker 1: Like then you have a tortilla after that. And they've
Speaker 1: been doing this for thousands of years. I think it
Speaker 1: was kicked off by the Maya who figured this out.
Speaker 1: And then there was another really important innovation that the
Speaker 1: old Mec people came up with, and that was to
Speaker 1: take that corn and soak it in hot water with
Speaker 1: wood ash, which made an alkaline solution basically, and that
Speaker 1: actually broke down the um. The I think the pair
Speaker 1: of carb the whole of the corn um and change
Speaker 1: the corn nutritionally like it made a lot of the
Speaker 1: stuff inside more bioavailable. So it took something that was
Speaker 1: already like okay, this is this is fine, we can
Speaker 1: stay alive on this and actually turned it into like
Speaker 1: a really nutrient rich food. So the tortillas you're eating
Speaker 1: um as long as they've undergone a process called Nick's tomalization.
Speaker 1: Um is actually pretty pretty healthy for you. That sounds
Speaker 1: like you said the word tomali in there, I did, Yes,
Speaker 1: would you like to spill the beans? And being KOI
Speaker 1: so in the uh nahuaddle language that the language of
Speaker 1: the Aztecs next teale was means ashes and then tomali
Speaker 1: with an eye means unformed maze dough, which will sound
Speaker 1: familiar if I've ever had a tomali with an e
Speaker 1: on the end. Let me ask you this, do you
Speaker 1: and youumy ever do tacos yourself at home? Yeah? We
Speaker 1: do more like just variations on taco salad typically, but
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, we'll get like some blue corn tacos
Speaker 1: once in a while and fill them up, or else
Speaker 1: we'll make We'll get like some of those like um
Speaker 1: some usually we do flower though, like that this the
Speaker 1: ones you have to refrigerate, we'll get those, the lucy
Speaker 1: goosey ones. Make some fish tacos with slaw that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. Yeah, we do sometimes, all right. If you
Speaker 1: ever want to just kind of take it to the
Speaker 1: next level, I highly recommend making your own tortillas. Get
Speaker 1: a tortilla press. It's a maze or some massa maze
Speaker 1: and just give it a whirl. It's it's they're a
Speaker 1: little tricky, but once you get the hang of it,
Speaker 1: it uh. It really just takes things to a stratosphere
Speaker 1: that I previously did not know. I can imagine I'd
Speaker 1: never really even considered doing that, but I'm going to now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: get maybe I'll buy you a tortilla press. Would you accept?
Speaker 1: I you have to now you've just offered on the
Speaker 1: on the podcast. I will hold you to that. Good.
Speaker 1: I'll send you mind and I'll get into it. Be
Speaker 1: like there's like old crusty dough on this one. Actually
Speaker 1: I worn't in I don't know if there's anything to that,
Speaker 1: but if it's like cast iron, that may yeah like seasoned.
Speaker 1: Sure cool, thanks man? Sure. So um, we've got mixed
Speaker 1: to moll ization, which makes the stuff in the corn
Speaker 1: that was already there like iron and vitamin B three
Speaker 1: way more bioavailable. Right. Yes, it actually sucks calcium into
Speaker 1: the corn, so it adds a lot of calcium. It
Speaker 1: fortifies it with calcium. Just this process of soaking the
Speaker 1: corn in wood, ash and water before you turn it
Speaker 1: into massa and then it also kills off mico toxins
Speaker 1: which can mess you up pretty good fungal toxins that
Speaker 1: can be present on corn. And when you put all
Speaker 1: this together, especially if you added together with some beans,
Speaker 1: you have what's called the complete protein. Huh, that's right,
Speaker 1: And that means you can indulge in those tacos and
Speaker 1: feel good about it. A complete protein is when you
Speaker 1: have the nine essential amino acids and basically equal amounts.
Speaker 1: And here's the little trick to tacos though, that make
Speaker 1: it special. You can have beans and you're not a
Speaker 1: complete protein. You can have corn and not a complete protein.
Speaker 1: But if you put those things together, you do have
Speaker 1: a complete protein because beans have all those essential amino
Speaker 1: acids but one it's called matthionine, and corn does have that.
Speaker 1: So it's it's almost like it was meant to be. Yeah, corns, like,
Speaker 1: I'll help you out with some methionine, no problem, Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: brief red beans. I know there's something about food that
Speaker 1: when you know that they form some sort of like
Speaker 1: natural pattern just makes them even more satisfying and wholesome. Yeah,
Speaker 1: or when things come together to make a greater whole, Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: should we take a break. Yeah, let's take a break
Speaker 1: and we'll get back to the We'll get to contact
Speaker 1: between the Spanish and the Mesoamericans. I want to learn
Speaker 1: about how to take a perfect but on a fractals
Speaker 1: gone that hun the Lizzie Border murders, that they kind
Speaker 1: of all runs on the plane. Everything we should know.
Speaker 1: Word up, Jerry, Okay, So, um, we've got the invention
Speaker 1: of the tortilla. That doesn't mean that tacos were invented yet. Um.
Speaker 1: One of the reasons why tacos you can't say tacos
Speaker 1: were invented is because um, meso Americans used tortillas for
Speaker 1: just about everything. I think the Spanish said that Montezuma Um,
Speaker 1: the emperor of the Aztecs, who was running the show
Speaker 1: when the Spaniards showed up in fifteen nineteen, um that
Speaker 1: he would eat He would basically use his tortillas as
Speaker 1: a as a spoon, much much the same way. Have
Speaker 1: you ever eaten eat the open food? Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I do this with tortillas, but sure you know, so
Speaker 1: those I can't remember the name of the bread, but
Speaker 1: they use that bread for like everything. It's just it's
Speaker 1: just generally a utensil as much as it is a food.
Speaker 1: And apparently that that the Aztecs used to do that
Speaker 1: with tortillas, and I would guess Meso Americans as a whole.
Speaker 1: So Dave points out quite rightly that you can't really
Speaker 1: say what they were eating were tacos, even though they
Speaker 1: might have even been putting stuff in these tortillas. And
Speaker 1: the way that you couldn't say that, you know, whatever
Speaker 1: you were eating was a sandwich because there was a
Speaker 1: loaf of bread on the table or a basket of
Speaker 1: rolls on the table. Uh, in the exact same way
Speaker 1: that that makes sense. Yeah, I remember when I went
Speaker 1: when I lived in Yuma twenty five years ago and
Speaker 1: I went to Algadonis right over the border for the
Speaker 1: first time, and I saw the local Mexican population with
Speaker 1: these big plates like stewed meat, and they had the
Speaker 1: tortillas and I was like, Oh, they're going to assemble
Speaker 1: that to a taco, but no, no, they ripped it
Speaker 1: up and they would just use it to grab the
Speaker 1: meat and put it in their mouth. And I thought
Speaker 1: that's when the lights kind of went off. And you know,
Speaker 1: I still love the traditional taco too, but I also
Speaker 1: love to just put the stuff on my plate and
Speaker 1: use it as a spoon or a grabber. Sure, it's
Speaker 1: like uh oh, I can't remember what it's called. But
Speaker 1: there's a kind of sushi. It's almost like deconstructed sushi
Speaker 1: where they don't bother to turn it into a roll.
Speaker 1: It's just a bed of rice and then they put
Speaker 1: all this stuff you would put in the sushi just
Speaker 1: on top of the rice, so it's technically not sushi,
Speaker 1: even though all of the elements are there. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: I do the same thing with Indian food with the
Speaker 1: garlic non yes, which again is another one of my
Speaker 1: favorite cuisines. To like Indian food. Oh my god, I
Speaker 1: just I love like all food. Human is always saying she,
Speaker 1: she's like it. It doesn't really matter whenever you talk
Speaker 1: about how great a food is, because you think all
Speaker 1: food is good. And it's true, Like I love just
Speaker 1: about all food. There's really not a food that I'm like,
Speaker 1: I don't like that wholesale you know, I know, one
Speaker 1: of my favorite obbies is eating foods seems so good.
Speaker 1: Uh So the taco though, back then, like you said,
Speaker 1: they were using these tortillas spoons and such like that,
Speaker 1: and it was about the late eighteen hundreds that sort
Speaker 1: of the Mexican taco that we're familiar with finally kind
Speaker 1: of comes on the scene. So the word tacos kind
Speaker 1: of up for debate, isn't it. Yeah, I mean, taco
Speaker 1: was a word in Spain, you know, hundreds of years ago,
Speaker 1: but it didn't mean the food. It was meant a
Speaker 1: lot of different things. But one of the things that
Speaker 1: meant that's going to come into play with the food
Speaker 1: was it was like a plug or attack stuffed into
Speaker 1: the barrel of a musket to keep that ball settled.
Speaker 1: It also was like a shot of wine, or a
Speaker 1: hammer or a billiard queue you could call a taco,
Speaker 1: But at the time, none of those words had anything
Speaker 1: to do with the food. No, so the word taco
Speaker 1: predates the food taco. That seems to be the clear,
Speaker 1: the clear aspect of this, the clear upshot, as I
Speaker 1: would say, Um, yes, there's also a there's also a
Speaker 1: rival to the Spanish word taco t a c e o,
Speaker 1: and that's a not huaddle word taco there with an
Speaker 1: L in there, basically t l a h c o,
Speaker 1: and it apparently means middle or half and from everything
Speaker 1: I've seen that is an incorrect etymology for the word
Speaker 1: taco as we understand it today, that it is just
Speaker 1: total coincidence. Right. But you might see some people claiming
Speaker 1: that correct, yes, but they are wrong. From what I
Speaker 1: can tell, that's right. So to get from the muskeet
Speaker 1: plug to the food. Uh. In Pilter's books, he makes
Speaker 1: a a guess that I surmised that other people have
Speaker 1: also made that sounds pretty good to me. With his
Speaker 1: story and Hidalgo, it was a silver mining town, uh
Speaker 1: Rial del Monte specifically, and what the guys and the
Speaker 1: mind would do is they would work in the uh
Speaker 1: they're sometimes daughters and wives wuld bring them their lunch,
Speaker 1: which was something a lot like a taco, like beans
Speaker 1: or that stewed meat or maybe some avocado and wrapped
Speaker 1: in a tortilla. They would put it in a towel
Speaker 1: line basket where they get all nice and steamy and
Speaker 1: bring it down there for lunch. So, while they're working
Speaker 1: in the mine, they're blasting holes in the rock, which
Speaker 1: they do by carving out a hole and then stuffing
Speaker 1: in an explosive, which they call the taco. So it
Speaker 1: might seem like a tinuous connection, but in Mexico City
Speaker 1: in the early twenty century, there was a taco called
Speaker 1: tacos steam and arrow, a minor's taco, and some other
Speaker 1: variations a taco state canasta, Tacos from a basket, or
Speaker 1: tacos sudatos, sweaty, or steam tacos, and that kind of
Speaker 1: draws the line, I think pretty clearly. Yeah, And all
Speaker 1: three of those were basically different names for the same
Speaker 1: preparation where when you fry them and then you stacked
Speaker 1: them all together, you would cover them with like a
Speaker 1: little um, a little like napkin or something like that,
Speaker 1: um in the basket to allow them to to steam
Speaker 1: themselves to finish, right. And to me, that's where the
Speaker 1: word taco comes from, not from the food wrapped in
Speaker 1: the tortilla, but from that kind of food wrapped up
Speaker 1: in that cloth napkin in the same way that they
Speaker 1: were wrapping explosive in cloth and stuffing it in there.
Speaker 1: That to me is the is the correlation rather than
Speaker 1: the food, the fact that was in a basket wrapped
Speaker 1: up in fabric, Yeah, and food wrapped up in the tortilla. Sure,
Speaker 1: I mean, I get it. It's it's they're both possible.
Speaker 1: I'm just putting my own hypoch is out there. Now, Okay, everybody,
Speaker 1: You're like, it's not the tortilla, it's the napkin. That's honestly,
Speaker 1: it makes sense to me when we're talking about explosive
Speaker 1: plugs wrapped in fabric. You know what I mean about
Speaker 1: an explosive delicious food. Well, that's the thing. And I
Speaker 1: totally understand that they could have been, like, there's a
Speaker 1: comb in one hand and a food bomb in the
Speaker 1: other hand, So I get it. I'm like, uh, taco
Speaker 1: and print talking about a taco as food, I believe
Speaker 1: for the first time was in a novel called Los
Speaker 1: Bandidos the Rio Frio The Bandits of Cold River, And
Speaker 1: there's a line in that book where they're talking about
Speaker 1: a celebration in Mexico City and they say cheeto, which
Speaker 1: is fried goat with tortillas, and the children skipping with
Speaker 1: tacos of tortillas and avocado in their hand. Sounds great.
Speaker 1: What an idyllic little bucolic seeing that is. I wish
Speaker 1: I was there. Yeah, anywhere there's fried go being served,
Speaker 1: I wish I was there. I'm not done with the goat,
Speaker 1: but sure I'm with it. Um So Um, so it
Speaker 1: seems to be okay, we've got taco as a food.
Speaker 1: It's appearing in print by at the at the latest,
Speaker 1: which means that if you're if you write something down,
Speaker 1: this is basically true across history. It is we've seen
Speaker 1: an episode after episode. If you write something down and
Speaker 1: you don't explain it, that means to people coming a
Speaker 1: hundred or so years later looking back at this, that
Speaker 1: that that means that this has been around and everybody
Speaker 1: already knows what this is. I'm just refer into something
Speaker 1: that everybody's familiar with. It's not a new invention. So
Speaker 1: somewhere between the time that people were creating these taco
Speaker 1: plugs in the silver mines in the middle of the
Speaker 1: nineteenth century, maybe late nineteenth century, in eighteen tacos became
Speaker 1: a thing. They were invented somewhere in there. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: I mean it was in an actual Mexican dictionary defined
Speaker 1: as taco as the food in Mexico City as its birthplace. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it seems like Mexico City was ground zero for this place,
Speaker 1: and that they believed that. By the turn of the
Speaker 1: twentieth century, Um, Mexico City was starting to become a
Speaker 1: bustling metropolis again, do tell So apparently by nineteen ten,
Speaker 1: Mexico City had become like a huge, huge town of
Speaker 1: a people, of a population about half a million people,
Speaker 1: which is pretty significant, right. This is nine hundred and
Speaker 1: ten when this happens. If you went back to fifteen,
Speaker 1: about fifteen hundred, say, about four hundred years earlier, but
Speaker 1: right before contact with the Europeans, um the same city,
Speaker 1: Tenochtit Lawn, which Mexico City was built on, but the
Speaker 1: Aztecs city that was there before had about four hundred
Speaker 1: thousand people, just under half a million, and that nuts. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean you would think that by they would have
Speaker 1: over a million, right, But they wouldn't. And one reason
Speaker 1: why is because the population took a nose dive both
Speaker 1: between conquest of the Spanish and the violence that broke
Speaker 1: out from that, but also even worse from the smallpox
Speaker 1: that the Spanish brought with them, which wiped out forty
Speaker 1: of the population of ten act Lawn in one year
Speaker 1: the year after contact of the city died from smallpox.
Speaker 1: So it took it took that long to rebound by
Speaker 1: all the way up to it it got. It finally
Speaker 1: surpassed its pre contact population. So nineteen ten, things are
Speaker 1: cooking literally in Mexico City and a lot of people
Speaker 1: from you know, more rural Mexico had moved there to
Speaker 1: get work, to work in the factories, and they were
Speaker 1: living in uh, you know, small tenements basically, and they
Speaker 1: didn't have these big, full kitchens usually to work with.
Speaker 1: So this is where the street taco or the tacareas
Speaker 1: really started to pop up, where you would go outside
Speaker 1: for dinner and you would go down to the street
Speaker 1: and find these delicious mouth watering tacarias. Uh. And they were,
Speaker 1: you know, they were bringing in influences from every corner
Speaker 1: of Mexico, because you know, Mexico is a huge country,
Speaker 1: just like you know the United States has in every
Speaker 1: country has like regional food specialties, same as true in Mexico.
Speaker 1: And all of these different flavors were coming into central
Speaker 1: Mexico City and exploding onto the food scene there. Yes,
Speaker 1: I mean the very in various cuisines that are brought
Speaker 1: by different people's Is not this not the least reason
Speaker 1: why multiculturalism is a great thing. You know, agreed, in
Speaker 1: Mexico City is a melting pot at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the twentieth century. I mean, all these people were bringing it,
Speaker 1: and not just from Mexico or every part of Mexico. Um,
Speaker 1: but there was some influences like outside of Mexico to
Speaker 1: like tacos l pasteur, right, the one you mentioned earlier
Speaker 1: that you've got kind of a deconstructed version of today. Yeah,
Speaker 1: with that pineapple flavor, and that one I think has
Speaker 1: a pretty interesting story which I never knew it was. Uh.
Speaker 1: It originated in Lebanon in uh and specifically in the
Speaker 1: Mexican state of Pueblo. We had these uh or they
Speaker 1: I say, we feel like I'm living in Mexico right now.
Speaker 1: After those tacos you had, I can imagine why. I
Speaker 1: had these Lebanon or Lebanese immigrants settling there in the
Speaker 1: early twentieth century, and they started selling their eros and
Speaker 1: they had those lambs on the vertical spit uh like
Speaker 1: they still have the day, and they were cutting off
Speaker 1: strips of it, putting it on a pede uh uh
Speaker 1: sometimes a flower tortilla. And in Pueblo there were and
Speaker 1: still are known as tacos uh arabis, which is Arab
Speaker 1: like Arab tacos, and the Mexicans there said, hey, they're
Speaker 1: really onto something here with this vertical spit, but let's
Speaker 1: throw a dobo pork butt up there instead, and then
Speaker 1: throw a little grilled pineapple on there as well, and
Speaker 1: they you have what we recognize as tacos l pastor,
Speaker 1: which means shepherd's tacos, which is a reference to the
Speaker 1: Bedouin roots of the Lebanese immigrants who came over. Great story,
Speaker 1: It is a great story. And actually, Chuck, that reminds
Speaker 1: me of another story I was talking about. I was
Speaker 1: boasting about how I love all food. There's actually, um,
Speaker 1: one of the few things I've ever sent back in
Speaker 1: my life was that a Lebanese restaurant in Toledo called
Speaker 1: the Bay Root may still be there and um, a
Speaker 1: little on the nose, but sure. And my family was
Speaker 1: was feeling pretty adventurous and ordered a bunch of stuff
Speaker 1: off the menu. And one of the things we ordered,
Speaker 1: it didn't really sink in what we were ordering, but
Speaker 1: they brought out a bunt, a full size bunt cakes
Speaker 1: bunt pants worth of raw ground meat covered in raw egg.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, and it was just on this big
Speaker 1: plate and it was like dig in and we were
Speaker 1: just like we can't where we can't. We can't and
Speaker 1: I still to the steak feel bad about wasting that meat.
Speaker 1: Do you know what it was like? What that dishes?
Speaker 1: I don't remember what it's called. Someone to let us know.
Speaker 1: I sure, and yeah, I think it was. I don't
Speaker 1: think it was like an invention of of that restaurant's
Speaker 1: owners or the cook, the chef. I should say, um,
Speaker 1: but I haven't seen it very frequently since then, but
Speaker 1: it was. We just were like, no, we're not gonna
Speaker 1: do that one. Well, I mean, hats off to your
Speaker 1: family in the nineteen eighties and Toledo for going to
Speaker 1: a Lebanese restaurant. We didn't. We didn't. We had Chinese
Speaker 1: food and that was about as crazy as we got. Oh,
Speaker 1: we got fancy. Not only did we go to the
Speaker 1: Bay Route once in a while, we also sometimes went
Speaker 1: to in Japanese steakhouse, which is Abachi Stay Cows, so
Speaker 1: we got real ethnics sometimes. Yeah, that stuff was we
Speaker 1: couldn't afford that. I'm not like you were rich or anything,
Speaker 1: but uh, we had a lot at home, so we
Speaker 1: didn't even go out that much. So when we did,
Speaker 1: it was pretty conservative, but it wasn't until my twenties,
Speaker 1: till I left home and got into college that I
Speaker 1: really started exploring foods of the world. Yeah, well, good
Speaker 1: for you for doing that. Some people never do, you know,
Speaker 1: especially if they were raised without being exposed to it.
Speaker 1: So it's good that you did well. So great about multiculturalism, food,
Speaker 1: beautiful babies. Yeah, beautiful babies for sure. Plenty of stuff
Speaker 1: different points of view, but really food. Sure. So you
Speaker 1: want to take another break and then get back to
Speaker 1: tacos continuing on because we finally reached the point where
Speaker 1: we're like, Okay, tacos now exists, but they're pretty much
Speaker 1: being slung out of food carts in Mexico City right
Speaker 1: now at the beginning of the twenties century. Yeah, we're
Speaker 1: going to take a trip to Los Angeles, Los Angeles
Speaker 1: right after this. I want to learn about a terrosortic collegel,
Speaker 1: how to take a prograt move with all about fractal
Speaker 1: get kiscon that's a hun, the Lizzie Border murders, and
Speaker 1: they kind of all runs on the plane every day.
Speaker 1: That's so we should know. No word up, Jerry, all right,
Speaker 1: smoggy kind of already overcrowded, gross Los Angeles in the
Speaker 1: nineteen forties and fifties. Uh was a very segregated place. Uh.
Speaker 1: There were plenty of Mexican residents. There were plenty of
Speaker 1: uh Black Americans, there were plenty of Asian residents. There
Speaker 1: were plenty of people. It was a melting pot. But
Speaker 1: they tended to um. There was a white flight that happened,
Speaker 1: and they tended to live apart. By the nineteen forties.
Speaker 1: It's sort of the suburbs in the valley Orange County
Speaker 1: maybe is where a lot of white people fled to.
Speaker 1: And not entirely, but uh, if you wanted to live
Speaker 1: inside Los Angeles, like maybe East Los Angeles, you may
Speaker 1: have been for Mexico originally. Yeah, like cheech Marin Yeah,
Speaker 1: born in East l A. Yeah, that's right, man. What
Speaker 1: a great song that was so um in in its
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Pilcher, Senior Pilcher, Um he thought to look around
Speaker 1: at the UM. I think he got his hands on
Speaker 1: some phone books from Los Angeles in the forties and
Speaker 1: fifties and started looking up taco joints. Because remember, at
Speaker 1: the behest of one day, Ruse who would become a
Speaker 1: stuff you should know legendary writer Um Jeffrey Pilchers on
Speaker 1: this quest now to figure out how we got to
Speaker 1: the Americanized version of tacos. So he's tracing it from
Speaker 1: Mexico City up to California, as one would do, and
Speaker 1: he did that by by looking at them at the
Speaker 1: phone book. And what he found is that outside of
Speaker 1: East l A, you could find plenty of restaurants that
Speaker 1: were taco joints. But in East l A there were
Speaker 1: only two restaurants in the phone book that had the
Speaker 1: name taco in them, which would suggest Chuck that that
Speaker 1: that they didn't eat tacos in like in authentic Mexican
Speaker 1: Mexican American neighborhoods, But that's not necessarily the case. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think what has been surmised, and I fully agree,
Speaker 1: is that there were plenty of places in East l
Speaker 1: A serving tacos, they just didn't feel the need to
Speaker 1: advertise it as a taco place to make it. Uh
Speaker 1: it was. It was sort of if you were a
Speaker 1: white American or a black American in the nineteen forties
Speaker 1: and fifties in l A. Uh, Mexican food might have
Speaker 1: seen exotic and maybe a little dangerous to try, like
Speaker 1: dangerous for your stomach. That is right, right, So Tacos
Speaker 1: was a safe cell essentially, is what has been speculated,
Speaker 1: Like to put taco on a sign, people are like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: I've heard of tacos. I can try this place out right,
Speaker 1: And so um Peltry came up with some some pretty
Speaker 1: great names that he found in the in the predominantly white,
Speaker 1: predominantly black um neighborhoods in l A that had taco
Speaker 1: in the name. Um. Apparently, the first one in Los
Speaker 1: Angeles that catered to non Mexican um UH customers was
Speaker 1: called Taco House, and that opened up in the early forties.
Speaker 1: It's a pretty legit name, especially if you're saying, hey,
Speaker 1: American people, UM, particularly white people and black people, Taco House.
Speaker 1: That seems approachable, right, you're not afraid of that, come
Speaker 1: meet here. That makes sense. They didn't even say Taco cosa. No,
Speaker 1: that would be well now, that would have blown the
Speaker 1: mines back in the early forties. I like any restaurant
Speaker 1: with town at the end. So Ernie's Taco Town kind
Speaker 1: of speaks to me. Yeah, how about Alice and Bird's places,
Speaker 1: Bert's Taco Junction, Yeah, that's good. I wonder if it
Speaker 1: was an old drink a boose. Yeah, Alice's Taco Terrorists,
Speaker 1: which is fine. Frank's Taco In. That's a good one.
Speaker 1: I've never gotten why you would call a restaurant and in,
Speaker 1: because typically you sleep at and in, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've never gotten that because we had village in Pizza
Speaker 1: and I don't. I never got. I tried to sleep
Speaker 1: there and it never worked. I'm so full. Uh. And
Speaker 1: then in Watts, which is a predominantly historically at least
Speaker 1: black neighborhood, you had Taco Kid and Taco the Town. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a great one for sure. Taco the Town is
Speaker 1: not around anymore. Oh, that's sad. But apparently there is
Speaker 1: a Taco the Town in Maine, I believe. Oh man,
Speaker 1: Maine tacos. I bet you even Maine has some good
Speaker 1: tacos here and there. That would be the least likely state,
Speaker 1: I would say, like Maine in Alaska. Right, So, um,
Speaker 1: we've got we've gotten to the point where now there's
Speaker 1: tacos in Los Angeles, right, they've crept up. People are
Speaker 1: starting to create them and uh cater to non Mexican
Speaker 1: and non Central American palettes. Um. And a lot of
Speaker 1: people say Okay, Well it was actually Glenn Bell, the
Speaker 1: guy who founded Taco Bell. Which did you know that
Speaker 1: there was a person with the last name of Bell
Speaker 1: that founded Taco Bell. I didn't either. It's insane. Like my,
Speaker 1: my whole world view has changed, Like Jimmy Hut's pizza chain. Right,
Speaker 1: I've got one for you, Chuck. Did you know that
Speaker 1: the very first Pizza Hut was in Wichita, Kansas? Really? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And the very first KFC guess what city that was in? Oh,
Speaker 1: please tell me it's Kentucky somewhere. No, Salt Lake City, Utah. What. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's true. The colonel really was from Kentucky. But the
Speaker 1: first Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant was open in Salt Lake.
Speaker 1: I think it's one of those things where it's like,
Speaker 1: if you open a thing based on a regional cuisine,
Speaker 1: the one place that's not going to do well is
Speaker 1: in the actual region that that cuisine comes from. Well,
Speaker 1: they don't have Taco Bells in Mexico. No, we'll talk
Speaker 1: about that later. We'll talk of we'll talk of that later.
Speaker 1: Al Right, So again, Senior Pilcher, I gotta read this book.
Speaker 1: It sounds fantastic. Um. He talks about the fact that
Speaker 1: if you were a Mexican immigrant and you were building
Speaker 1: a restaurant scene in the United States and you wanted
Speaker 1: to appeal to the Americans there, then you might wanna
Speaker 1: like source ingredients that they You're probably not throwing tripe
Speaker 1: their way right out of the barrel, you know, like
Speaker 1: you might want to look at the the ingredients that
Speaker 1: are readily available um that people like and like ground
Speaker 1: beef is one of them. So that ground beef as
Speaker 1: a central ingredient to those American tacos was really early on. Dude.
Speaker 1: I can't tell you how how late it was in life.
Speaker 1: Before I even had a chicken taco. For Pete's sake. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know, I'm with you, it was all ground beef.
Speaker 1: It was like, that's all there was, you know. Even
Speaker 1: if you went to a Mexican staurant that was not
Speaker 1: really a Mexican restaurant like we used to go to
Speaker 1: Cheat cheese, ground beef, ground beef and everything, it was
Speaker 1: just ground beef. And actually that reminds me Chuck. I
Speaker 1: turned up. There's this um Onion article that I remember
Speaker 1: from made that much of an impression on me. Taco
Speaker 1: bells five ingredients used in completely new way. The article
Speaker 1: talks about how you've never had anything like this this one.
Speaker 1: The beef is on top of the beans, which is
Speaker 1: on top of the cheese. Is funny how they do that? Still, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, just make these crazy combinations of the same thing, right.
Speaker 1: But the opshot of all this is that, um, a
Speaker 1: lot of people lay or um credit Glenn Bell with
Speaker 1: inventing the americanized taco, and that's not necessarily the case.
Speaker 1: It was some of these Mexican American immigrants who were
Speaker 1: creating these tacos to cater to American taste, but then
Speaker 1: also based, like you were saying, on stuff that was
Speaker 1: easily obtained cheap. Because everybody knows restaurant margins are so thin,
Speaker 1: it's incomprehensible why anyone opens a restaurant, and if you're
Speaker 1: just trying to make money. Um, And when you put
Speaker 1: all that together, people were making what you and I
Speaker 1: at age ten would have recognized as a taco before
Speaker 1: Glenn Bell came along and started making tacos himself. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and a lot of people say, well, Glenn Bell at
Speaker 1: the very least invented the the technology where you could
Speaker 1: fry up these tortilla, these corn tortillas into these perfectly
Speaker 1: little shaped taco shells, and he kind of did it.
Speaker 1: Seems like it was one of the cases where a
Speaker 1: few different people all sort of had the same idea
Speaker 1: within a few years of one another, without even stealing
Speaker 1: from each other. Because there was a man in nineteen
Speaker 1: forty nine in Arizona name Joseph Pampa who filed an
Speaker 1: application for a deep friar basket that made these perfect
Speaker 1: little taco shells. But a couple of years before them,
Speaker 1: there was another restaurant to our name, uh Drovincio Maldonado,
Speaker 1: great name, and he actually won the patent out of
Speaker 1: New York City in ninety seven. But Glenn Bell also
Speaker 1: created his own version, it seems like independently. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: the reason why everybody was having this kind of same
Speaker 1: idea at the same time is because part of like
Speaker 1: the zeitgeist at the time as far as food went,
Speaker 1: was the idea that fast food was awesome and creating
Speaker 1: food quickly and efficiently was thrilling um. Because prior to this,
Speaker 1: if you made tacos, you made the tacos as you know,
Speaker 1: as order to order, and you took these uncooked flour
Speaker 1: tortillas and then you fried them up and made tacos
Speaker 1: that way. And this was like, no, no, I just
Speaker 1: imagine if you had the shells already ready, it would
Speaker 1: save so much time and knock these Bobby Soccers socks
Speaker 1: off right. And if you happen to break the shells,
Speaker 1: it's a nacho exactly. That's that's what my teacher says. Uh. So,
Speaker 1: Glenn Bell has opened a hot dog in Hamburger stand
Speaker 1: in San Bernardino and San Burdue, California, across from the
Speaker 1: original McDonald's. If you remember that episode, which is pretty fine,
Speaker 1: which started out as a barbecue restaurant, and he was
Speaker 1: doing okay, he wasn't doing that great, but he noticed
Speaker 1: across the street there was a rex a Mexican restaurant
Speaker 1: called I guess it's the Meat La Cafe m I
Speaker 1: t l A that had been open since nineteen thirty
Speaker 1: seven by the Rodriguez family, and it was it was
Speaker 1: not a taco stand. It was like a full, sit down,
Speaker 1: full service restaurant, open breakfast, lunch, and dinner. That was
Speaker 1: killing it. And he was like, I gotta get me
Speaker 1: some of that. Yes, and we've reached the point where um,
Speaker 1: I want to point out that Dave rus is a
Speaker 1: born food writer, because the reason both of us wanted
Speaker 1: tacos so bad in large part because of Dave's really
Speaker 1: great descriptive writing. But he talked about how like the
Speaker 1: Meat Like Cafe, it wasn't a taco joint, but they
Speaker 1: had killer tacos and they had um something called tacos dorados,
Speaker 1: which is a fried taco. And he said that at night,
Speaker 1: young people would show up at the Meat Like Cafe
Speaker 1: craving a quick bite, and the best seller was a
Speaker 1: freshly fried bag of tacos Dorado's, golden fried tacos. That
Speaker 1: is good food writing. It makes me hungry, imagine that.
Speaker 1: And these are essentially Taketo's, right. Yeah. They would take
Speaker 1: a corn tortilla, put ground beef in it, roll it up,
Speaker 1: put a toothpick in it to hold it together, and
Speaker 1: then fry that. And then they would put the cheese
Speaker 1: and the lettuce and the tomatoes on the outside. And
Speaker 1: I shouldn't say would because Meat Like Cafe is still
Speaker 1: there and they still serve um tacos dorados. Yeah, it's taketo.
Speaker 1: So I love it. Sometimes I'll get taketos. Sure, yeah,
Speaker 1: just stop by the racetrack or something or the quick trip.
Speaker 1: Have you have ever seen those? Like they look like
Speaker 1: a taketo and a hot dog, like made love or something.
Speaker 1: I'm not even sure what it is that sounds hot. Uh. No,
Speaker 1: I like taketos in a in a place or flout
Speaker 1: this is another name. Uh. I'm a big fan of
Speaker 1: the chimmy chonga, which is different. That's like a deep
Speaker 1: read burrito, but that's an American invention. Yeah, put anything
Speaker 1: in a fryer basket and I'm all over it. Dude,
Speaker 1: I'm with you. But also that sauce that's peculiar to
Speaker 1: the chimmy chonga is so good man. And plus it's
Speaker 1: just fun to say when you order it. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: haven't found a great one here in Atlanta near me
Speaker 1: because all the places near me are a little more
Speaker 1: authentic and they don't have them. Oh yeah, I was
Speaker 1: gonna say, like you, um, yeah, there places near me,
Speaker 1: but I just don't go there, right but there. But yeah,
Speaker 1: if it's authentic, they're probably not gonna have a chimmy chonga.
Speaker 1: That's an American American Mexican food or it's an a
Speaker 1: Mexican place that's catering to Americans, right exactly. So the
Speaker 1: reason that we're bringing up the Meat Like Cafe is
Speaker 1: because this is where Glenn Bell learned to fry up
Speaker 1: tacos to make tacos. And it's not entirely fair to
Speaker 1: say that he stole the idea from the Rodriguez family
Speaker 1: who were running the Meat Like Cafe and came up
Speaker 1: with the tacos dorados because he Glen Bell, became a
Speaker 1: regular customer there, but he was there not just to
Speaker 1: enjoy the food, but to kind of like spy on
Speaker 1: them and watch the process and figure out how to
Speaker 1: do it. And there is a guy named Gustavo Aorlano Ariano.
Speaker 1: He wrote Taco Usa Colon How Mexican Food Conquered America,
Speaker 1: and he's the guy who seems to be the one
Speaker 1: who really turned up the story about how the Meat
Speaker 1: Like Cafe was the was the basis of Taco Bell
Speaker 1: originally um and that with the when the Rodriguez family
Speaker 1: figured out that that um that that Glenn Bell wanted
Speaker 1: to learn how to make tacos dorados and was kind
Speaker 1: of surreptitiously learning by spying. They invited him into the
Speaker 1: kitchen to teach him how to do it. They just
Speaker 1: showed him how to do it so exactly. So um,
Speaker 1: Glenn Bell went off and he um. Basically he started.
Speaker 1: He went from making hamburgers and hot dogs to making
Speaker 1: tacos based on the taco dorado's thing. But he was
Speaker 1: also combining it with inspiration from the McDonald's brothers across
Speaker 1: the street who had gotten into really efficient fast food.
Speaker 1: So he was trying to forget how to make tacos
Speaker 1: dorados as fast as possible. Yeah, I mean this is
Speaker 1: where he comes up with his uh nineteen one frying contraption. Uh.
Speaker 1: And we should point out when it was a very
Speaker 1: sort of Americanized version of the of the takedo. He
Speaker 1: actually topped his with chili dog sauce from his hot
Speaker 1: dog days. I'm not gonna hate on that. I bet
Speaker 1: it's delicious, That's all I'm gonna say. Yeah, But he
Speaker 1: was looking to open up his first taco restaurant in
Speaker 1: fifty one, and he did so, and a consultant was
Speaker 1: helping out with the naming, and they said, what about Latapatia,
Speaker 1: which is a nickname for a woman from Guadalajara, and
Speaker 1: he said, yeah, Latapatia is great, but how just how
Speaker 1: about just taco tia. They said, that makes taco ant
Speaker 1: That makes no sense. You know, that's fine. Sure, well's
Speaker 1: an Anne who loves tacos. It makes sense to me. Yeah,
Speaker 1: an aunt rather not a not an insect aunt to
Speaker 1: be to be clear. So he had Taco tia um
Speaker 1: and then he went on, He's like, I really like
Speaker 1: this taco thing. I'm going to start another chain with
Speaker 1: a couple of Rams football players. They created El Taco
Speaker 1: and that went well for four years and he sold
Speaker 1: out his portion of that, and then he finally created
Speaker 1: the first Taco Bell in nineteen sixty two and Downey, California.
Speaker 1: Right nineteen sixty two, diarrhea is born for Taco Bell.
Speaker 1: I love Taco Bell. Like we've talked about it before.
Speaker 1: I'd never ever have it, but I had it once
Speaker 1: about four or five months ago, for the first time
Speaker 1: in a couple of years, and it was so good,
Speaker 1: and I had diarrhea. Oh yeah, well that's why you
Speaker 1: associate that with that, huh. It was worth it, though.
Speaker 1: So the first one, they call it Taco Bell Numero,
Speaker 1: you know, the one in Downey, California that he opened
Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty two. It is one of the most
Speaker 1: adorable buildings you'll ever see in your life. The sign
Speaker 1: and is awesome, the front, the the the overhang is awesome.
Speaker 1: It's in a mission revival style. Um. And actually Glenn
Speaker 1: Bell envisioned it as kind of like a community center,
Speaker 1: so like he had fire pits, there was like mariachi
Speaker 1: music and dancing. It was way more than it should
Speaker 1: have been as just a taco joint. A fast food
Speaker 1: taco joined and it took off really quickly. Within five
Speaker 1: years he had a hundred stores open. Yeah. And then
Speaker 1: you know, they still even in the eighties and seventies
Speaker 1: used the similar signage. Like when I saw Taco Bell
Speaker 1: numero uno uh and that's what they call it. By
Speaker 1: the way, we're not just trying to be cute. UM,
Speaker 1: I recognize never I recognized that sign immediately. I was like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, I remember that from when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: and they did have sort of and they still sort
Speaker 1: of had that mission you know, that sort of stuck
Speaker 1: out to the restaurant until the nineties. I ran across
Speaker 1: an architectural digest blog and said we would hit one
Speaker 1: our apartments to look like nineties Taco bells because there's
Speaker 1: a lot of like weird Memphis style mixed in. But um,
Speaker 1: it was. I remember when it transitioned from the old No,
Speaker 1: not really, it's way more slick. Okay, I haven't really noticed.
Speaker 1: There was a there was a big transition. There's actually
Speaker 1: been a couple since that one where they went from
Speaker 1: the ones where we were kids to the nineties versions.
Speaker 1: And it was a sad day. I remember being like,
Speaker 1: something's been lost here. I don't like this new stuff.
Speaker 1: It looks like Zach Morris took over and redesigned the
Speaker 1: whole thing. Uh, well, that's just because the big mural
Speaker 1: of screech on the side, alright, screeching a sombrero. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he died, didn't he He did very sad
Speaker 1: lung cancer and even though he didn't smoke cheese, that's terrible.
Speaker 1: I remember Del Taco to that was the other big one,
Speaker 1: uh growing up, and that went out of business eventually,
Speaker 1: but Del Taco and Taco Bell were the two biggies.
Speaker 1: Taco Bell or Del Taco still around? Is it? Oh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: they'll sit down. I had another's de'll talk. Oh, by
Speaker 1: my house, Um, not very far away from it, and
Speaker 1: it's it's I had not had it until ever, until
Speaker 1: maybe two thousand ninety. I think they slim, though I
Speaker 1: don't see those much anymore. It seemed to be like
Speaker 1: a legit rival the Taco Bell, but Taco Bell squashed
Speaker 1: them with the Tortilla Press. Yeah, because just in the
Speaker 1: US alone, there's seven thousand Taco Bell locations. That is
Speaker 1: a lot, and they're all over the world except Mexico. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they tried in and two thousand seven to open up
Speaker 1: Taco Bells in Mexico City, and they did and they
Speaker 1: just did not go very far, but they there. Um
Speaker 1: and thinking two thousand fifteen, there was a campaign to
Speaker 1: save Taco Bell Numero Uno because they were going to
Speaker 1: demolish it. There was actually a KFC slash Taco Bell
Speaker 1: across the street from it, and um that that lot
Speaker 1: where Taco Bell Numero Uno was was being redeveloped and
Speaker 1: there was a campaign to to save it, and they
Speaker 1: moved it in two thousand fifteen. They moved it I
Speaker 1: think forty five miles from Downey to Irvine, where Taco
Speaker 1: Bell's headquarters is. And yeah, there's uh there's a lot
Speaker 1: of stories on this online, but I would recommend you
Speaker 1: go to pee Wee Herman's website peewee dot com. Uh,
Speaker 1: there's a really really I found the best article was
Speaker 1: there because as all kinds of pictures of the restaurant
Speaker 1: now wrapped up in the parking lot of the headquarters,
Speaker 1: and then there's a video. There's pictures of it going
Speaker 1: down the freeway on a truck with uh you know,
Speaker 1: the extra wide load with a police escort, and like
Speaker 1: there were twenty or thirty cars of like people that
Speaker 1: like took the two hour journey, hawking their horns and stuff.
Speaker 1: So it's really kind of a fun story. Uh. They
Speaker 1: sadly haven't found a place where it's still because I
Speaker 1: saw follow up last year. Um, they're still looking for
Speaker 1: a permanent home for it though. Yeah, apparently it's still
Speaker 1: just like you said, wrapped up in the parking lot,
Speaker 1: um in a tarp on the trailers still just kind
Speaker 1: off in a corner of the parking lot, which is
Speaker 1: a hopefully not the end of the place, I guess.
Speaker 1: And big shout out to the conservation group we are
Speaker 1: the next because there who headed up that whole plan
Speaker 1: to say the building that a lot of people would
Speaker 1: say is not historically significant. Sure you should have send
Speaker 1: me that pee wee Herman link. I would have liked
Speaker 1: to have seen that. I love that. Okay, Oh you
Speaker 1: didn't see it. No, I mean I had all the
Speaker 1: same stuff. It just had a couple of cool pictures. Gotcha. Um,
Speaker 1: you got anything else? I got nothing else? Okay. Well,
Speaker 1: if you want to know more about tacos, go eat
Speaker 1: some tacos, find some authentic ones to see what you think. Uh.
Speaker 1: And since I said see what you think, it's time
Speaker 1: for a listener mail. Well before listener mail, I did
Speaker 1: promise to shout out my favorite taco places. So can
Speaker 1: we do that? Yeah, let's man, and you feel free
Speaker 1: as well? Uh? In San Francisco Taco Bar right there
Speaker 1: in sort of Lower Hate, I'm sorry, not lower Hate.
Speaker 1: Lower Pacific Heights. Uh, Los Angeles, Yuccas and Los Felis
Speaker 1: was one of my favorites. Senior fishing, Eagle Rock. And
Speaker 1: then there was one called Seven Mayors uh in Silver
Speaker 1: Lake that I think closed down but has now opened
Speaker 1: up as Plaita, And it was very seafood focused. Mayors
Speaker 1: like mayors of a town or Mayor's like horses, like horses.
Speaker 1: I think it was El Mades was how you would
Speaker 1: really say, it's very pretty. Seven years you wouldn't know
Speaker 1: that if if it weren't for multiculturalism, they had really
Speaker 1: good uh Sivica, really good seafood. Uh. And then here
Speaker 1: in Atlanta, Altasar on Kirkwood, Mescalito's and oak Hurst, any
Speaker 1: place on Buford Highway, you're gonna get good authentic Mexican
Speaker 1: food in tacos. So those are my shoutouts. Yes, do
Speaker 1: you have any No, I don't. I need to get
Speaker 1: out to more taco places. Apparently, shout out to the
Speaker 1: the food truck whose name I did not get in
Speaker 1: between Seattle and Portland at one time. Yes, later, Kenny
Speaker 1: Tacos is what it's called. All right? Sorry, listener mail,
Speaker 1: listener mail, I'm just gonna call this nice email from
Speaker 1: a nice human. Okay, Hey, guys, wanted to share without
Speaker 1: your show is helpful and enjoyable to me and how
Speaker 1: I used my experience to help a friend. My friends
Speaker 1: started new medication and message me expressing insomnia troubles that
Speaker 1: came on as a result. I empathize and explain how
Speaker 1: I actually use stuff you should know to help me
Speaker 1: fall asleep when my mind is running a hundred miles
Speaker 1: an hour, put on an older episode with a sleep
Speaker 1: timer and let my brain focus on the topic of discussion.
Speaker 1: I also find your voices really calming, probably because I'm
Speaker 1: so familiar with hearing them almost every day for the
Speaker 1: past few years. Of course, I suggested speaking to a
Speaker 1: doctor too, but I encourage encouraged her to look into
Speaker 1: your podcast, even just for the general curiosity and enjoyment.
Speaker 1: Since my husband and I moved overseas for his military obligations,
Speaker 1: to find your show even more important in my life
Speaker 1: because I feel connected h to the routines and the
Speaker 1: life I was used to living before we moved. Thanks
Speaker 1: for all the hard work you put into each episode.
Speaker 1: Your content and enthusiasm truly bring a joy and brightness
Speaker 1: to this world. I'm extremely grateful if you have a
Speaker 1: wonderful new year of two, and I look forward to
Speaker 1: continuing listening for as long as your w like to
Speaker 1: make episodes. That is from Katie very nice. Thanks a lot, Katie.
Speaker 1: I remember I've probably said this before a million times.
Speaker 1: I used to take not a fence, but I used
Speaker 1: to be like what exactly does that mean when people
Speaker 1: said that they use this to fall asleep, and then
Speaker 1: I was like, no, this is that is a high
Speaker 1: honor that you can put people to sleep, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're in bed with somebody and you're soothing them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: especially if they have trouble sleeping, like to a clinical
Speaker 1: degree and you can help them. That is I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm going to have that put on my on my tombstone.
Speaker 1: Should see. And now he's sleeping the big sleep. It's
Speaker 1: a little Bertie workshop. Um, all right, Well, if you
Speaker 1: want to be like Kate Katie, oh sorry Katie. If
Speaker 1: you want to be like Katie and send us a
Speaker 1: great email like Katie did, you can send it to
Speaker 1: us at stuff podcast at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff
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