Driving down the street and decided to stop into this place. Usually, I wouldn't touch a place with the name like Nixtaco. Doesn't sound authentic. But wife and I were hungry and it was there. Walk in this strip mall type taco place and there is a hostess at the door. What???? That's a first for any taco place I have ever been in. I looked around and it looks like home-made booths with some stand alone tables in the center of the place. Back wall has a full bar. The smell of the place called to mind smoked foods, spices and mezcal tequila. I have never smelled this in your typical taco shop. Seated and served chips and array of four salsas. Notable was the peanut based salsa and the hot salsa which was not just very spicy, but flavorful as well. Chips were thin and crispy, no two were alike. I ordered the NixTacos (I always order the flagship dish when I go to a new restaurant; if they can't get that right, I wont be back), birria taco (I somehow found birria late in life and now make it myself at home), and a carnita taco. My wife had mushroom taco and something else I can't remember. Five minutes later the tacos are out and the presentation was amazing. My three were served together along with a small plastic cup of sauce for the birria. Birria was first and it was hot, like right off the grill. I moved over to the Carnitas taco and it was then that I knew this was going to be a good dinner. Finished that, then hit the birria and finished off with the Nixtaco which featured shrimp as the protein. OK this is getting to long so: this place is next level mexican tacos. it is not homestyle. It IS tacos raised to an art form. They may have been the best tacos I have ever had (sorry Rosarita Beach on a five day street-taco and dollar beer bender in the 1990s, you have been replaced). Spices are used to elevate, protein cooked perfectly, unique, flavorful. I was very full after the three tacos. 11 out of 10. Things I did not like: Being told 4-5 different times the kitchen closes at 9 made me feel a bit rushed (I think we sat at 8:15 which should be plenty of time to eat, but seriously if people are in and seated, why rush them, just come by at 8:50 and say last call if you want anything else? So while we were eating, I notice the bar is starting to get cleaned. OK I get the fact that folks want to get ahead on their end of shift tasks, but I do not like seeing the bar trays getting dumped out and cleaned in public view while I am eating. Gross! And then that sweet smell I talked about earlier started to be overtaken by the smell of cleaning chemicals (don't get me wrong, it wasn't that bad, but I could smell it). Anyway, I said to my wife, if I owned a restaurant that had food at such a high level, the last thing I want to do is have the last impression of a gross bar tray and cleaning supplies in my customer's mind as they were finishing the meal. She kinda told me it wasn't that bad and I had to agree it wasn't, but this type of food deserves that type of expectation. Like if I was at a fine dining establishment, I would not expect to see or smell these things when I was eating. But this is a taco place so should I give them some slack? Probably. But it is also someone's business and they are keeping a great staff employed. The restaurant is someone's baby and they are doing good work. So why not go the extra step avoid the final impression? In the end, I guess it doesn't matter much, but I root for people and businesses to succeed. One way to do that is to make constant changes in an attempt to do better. In this case, the food need not change, it was great! The service was great too. I will be back and maybe I will just make the change to an earlier eating hour to make myself happy! I've already told two of my friends they have to check out this taco place. Nixtacos is the best around for elevated mexican street tacos.