"Mexican food always wins:" Q&A with José R. Ralat about his new book 'American Tacos'

The crispy tacos at Hank’s in Costa Mesa are exactly what you might imagine the tacos would be a place called Hank’s.  They are classic Cal-Mex crispy tacos layered with soft, shredded beef, iceberg lettuce and cheddar cheese. What makes these a...

Before the geometrically pleasing fruit salad at Amá•cita, before yellowtail ceviche with crisp threads of jicama, and roasted chicken zinged by pico de gallo, and fried tacos extracted from a mass of red cabbage, there is Josef Centeno’s queso to...

Chef Jimmy Martinez might credit California’s In-N-Out Burger as the inspiration for his burger taco at Pour Vida, the gourmet taco bar he operates in Anaheim. And that makes sense. Yellow cheese, griddled hamburger meat, shredded lettuce and...

It has been a radical decade in dining for Los Angeles — a time when once-quiet neighborhoods became restaurant destinations, when voices at every tier of the industry diversified, when culinary spaces decentralized, when a sense of ownership and...

If you don’t love crispy California-style tacos, you probably don’t love yourself. It’s as simple as that. That said, there are good crispy tacos and bad crispy tacos. The shredded beef crispy tacos at La Villa in Anaheim are some of the best...