Taqueria La Mexicana — Restaurant in Long Beach

Oh, how I wanted to believe the hype!! Overall, just okay food.

My friends and I were in search of some BOMB tacos and had opted against good ol’ King Taco because we wanted carne asada fries. Okay, we thought, let’s be adventurous and try something new. Enter: Taqueria la Mexicana.

PARKING First off, this place is on the corner of an intersection where it is basically residential so you will need to park on the street. For us, it wasn’t too hard to find a spot but it was a Sunday evening and we didn’t expect it to be busy.

ORDERING There’s only one window where you can order and it’s from the outside. To be honest, for it being a Sunday it took us about 5-7 minutes before the cashier even decided to take our order.

WAIT TIMES Once we ordered our food, I kid you not, we waited close to 20-30 minutes for it to be ready. I cannot imagine how much longer it would’ve been had we come on a busy night but this is a very long wait for food. Much longer than expected and I have been to far smaller places with far more traffic.

FOOD

Lengua tacos — $1.63 each — decent but left something to be desired. First of all, they do have a taco plate with beans and rice that comes with 3 tacos with the meat of your choice if you want it. Since my boyfriend and I were sharing, we opted for the tacos a la carte since it ended up being cheaper for us. The tacos come with onions and cilantro, with lemons that you need to ask for. There is NO SAUCE whatsoever on this. My boyfriend thought it was okay but I have had way better. First of all, the tongue was barely cooked. In the photos attached, you’ll see that it’s pretty light brown and typically it’s served a little darker. Not sure if it’s because they don’t marinate it or if they just refrigerate then cook but the overall appearance definitely matched with the flavor.

Carne asada fries — $7 — made without cilantro, hot sauce, or tomatoes, good but not as full as other places. Now for someone that has consistently gone to different restaurants in search of the best carne asada fries, this place wasn’t it. There aren’t as many fries as other places typically serve and the toppings on it were very odd. I had to opt out of three different toppings because they normally add it in. The taste wasn’t terrible but you’re definitely just getting about $7 worth of fries with this and personally, I prefer avocado sauce to guacamole on my fries.

Quesadilla — $6 — cheese only with sour cream, lettuce, guacamole, and salsa verde. Now this wasn’t bad, considering that it’s really hard to botch up a quesadilla. I did like that they cut it into 6 pieces but I thought it was weird to serve it with lettuce. They also gave such a small cup of salsa verde and I wish they added way more of it in as I was definitely craving for it.

SEATING Honestly, the seating here is pretty open air and is literally just lined on the side of the building. At least they have a wall that separates their “seating area” from the street. There are so many mosquitoes, BIG ONES, that it just felt uncomfortable. I can’t imagine how it’d be in the summer.

— Overall, not the best Mexican joint in SoCal but also not the worst I’ve been to. Probably won’t be returning but at least I got to...

Great food, but very dirty seating area and they got our order wrong, but did I mention the food was great?

We came at 9pm on a Saturday night, so about 30 min till close. It was semi crowded and the seating area was was pretty full and filthy! We would have just gotten the food to go but we decided to walk there and we didn't want the food to get cold on our 15 min walk home. So I cleaned off several chunks of meat and rice from the lone available table with a napkin.

Lets get to the good part, the food: We both ordered the California burrito with al pastor. She got a snapple to drink, I got horchata. The food was ready in about 15 minutes. They offer complimentary red and green sauce, not bad and nothing special. The burritos were decent size, definitely enough to fill you up on regular circumstances. The burritos were great and we both enjoyed them very much! The tortillas were authentic and seemed to be made recently. The fries in the burrito still had a little crisp and there was just the right amount of cheese and sour cream to go with the carne asada. That's right, we ordered the burritos with al pastor but they came with carne asada... so they got the order wrong but we didn't mind that much as the burritos we still delicious. I will have to go back another day and see if they will actually give me al pastor.

As for the drinks, the snapple was a snapple... but my horchata was delicious and had a very authentic flavor, I could tell it was made with real rice and not just a cool-aid knockoff!

Overall I would definitely recommend this place, but maybe try going a little earlier as it might be a bit cleaner, or if anything just get your food to go,...

Finally made it here after friends suggested I give them a try plus every time I drive by there’s a line formed and that’s always a plus…you know that means “Delicious Food” so today I called in my order super easy …estimated time pick up was given to me on point I asked for their spiciest salsa was told their red salsa is spicy… well our carne asada burrito was delicious it had the works carne asada, rice, bean spread plus sour cream and guacamole a bit of lettuce onions OMG simple but with just the right combination of flavors!!! I was helped during pick up by Joanna the cashier and she was super friendly I mentioned it being my first time there…she was right by saying watch you’ll return the food is great she’s been working there for a long time and that also is a plus…knowing great places to eat have employees that matter and are their for a longtime…so if you’re in this part of LBC and in mood for authentic Mexican food come try them out and if you like your food spicy definitely the Red sauce…I highly recommend it all staff wearing mask and social distancing followed outside they do have tables inside too!! Cash only… if you don’t have money there’s an ATM inside I noticed all of that plus my burrito was being kept warm for me inside a cooler which I loved..by the time we cut into the burrito it was still hot🙌💯I will return 🌻yes I cut the burrito in 3 pieces I shared it with two kiddos who devoured it..said it was so yummy they...