Cal Taco — Restaurant in Goleta

Used to be good! Now its questionable with a very high price tag. Also, they change a extra service fee either there orders. I ordered a combo cheese burger. They brought to me no fries. They did i had to order them separately. O, brother. So I did .. I ordered some fries to go with your burger but then they were going to charge me another service fee for the fries which was a dollar add on. I ask them if they could wave the service fee since I already ordered my meal and since they forgot the fries I thought it wouldn't be a problem. But they said no its an extra dollar with the price of the single order of fries. I told them that was very unprofessional and never mind on the French fries. However when our group was getting ready to leave they bring out the fries, I asked them o you guys are just giving us fries now. They said no you paid for it they said they didn't hear me cancel the order of fries and they said we already charged your card. I couldn't believe this. Not only did I cancel my french fri order because of the 2 service fees of a one dollar each order. But they changed me anyway and gave us the order as we were leaving. We used to come here twice a week or so. But not anymore. There extra dollar charge cost them to loose thousands from me and all my company workers. I told any of my employees that cal taco is off limits to all of us. Fyi, cal taco that is about 9 people that would have gone there a couple times each. You guys are cheating and scamming customers. My company or employees will not be back. Were all locals and there's way better food and...

Update 11/1/2020: Sad to report that the owners still add a 55c fee for credit card orders. No signs about the fee, no mentions when paying, and literally the total price I was verbally told when rung up was not what was charged on my card. Owner is also far less friendly than previously. Totally distracted my grubhub orders and didn't even acknowledge/respond to my nice hello greeting prior to ordering. No longer a neighborhood place to hit and not meant for locals. I'd go somewhere else. Too bad.

I've been going to this place for many years as a local but the quality and friendliness has been on the decline as prices have been increasing. Food is typically good. My most recent visit was so disappointing. I used an Axxess deal for a buy-one-get-one and paid with credit card. They charged me full price and added a 58c credit card processing fee (for the first this in my 10 years of visits), then oddly gave me $6.50 back in cash for the "free" item. I ended up overpaying tax and paying a fee so the meal was 15% more expensive than it should have been. The owners definitely recognize me by now but still are cold as ever. Maybe it's time to find a new local...

Cal taco to me feels like the epitome of a hole in the wall. Classic, historical, and yet often glanced over in favor of more glitzy restaurants.

But it really shouldn't be ignored. Cal taco is great. Their burgers, burritos, and breakfast options are all consistently solid. I particularly want to shout out their breakfast burrito. Great hangover option. I particularly love their red salsa. It's slightly sweet, and very tomato-y.

There's also some history here as well. Rumors have it that Cal taco was the original creator of the chat burger -- the ones now made famous by the habit.

It's true, it's not the best food I've ever had. It's not Michelin starred or "a brand new take on food", but Cal taco represents the millions of mom and pop stores around the world that in many ways are the backbone of their respective communities. I love it all the same and it's definitely worth...