Taqueria El Chacho — Restaurant in San Mateo

Apparently Taqueria El Chacho hails form Arizona...

Matters not where you are from...as long as you can make some brilliant TACOS!!!

And yes! They do churn out some delish Tacos, albeit on the pricier side. Then again, it might just be the food inflation that nobody talks about. At $4 a Taco these scrumptious Tacos are packed with meat.

The "Taqueria" itself has a very odd set up. It's a make shift stand on the corner of Fashion Island Blvd and the 92 Exit just as it becomes Baker Way. Park in the Target parking lot and walk on over. The first thing that stands out is the Al Pastor on the spinning on the Trompos. From my experience that is generally a good sign. They also serve Carne Asada, Lengua and Chicken. There are a couple of bench tables behind the Taco stand to sit down, not a whole lot of room. I also don't advise sitting there during sever weather. There is NO menu anywhere...I looked! No prices listed either. As of Jan. 2025 They only accept CASH or Zelle, no Cards or Venmo.

#Tacos and More: ~ Tacos - 4/5 Had to try the Al pastor Tacos, especially since the first thing you notice is the spinning on the Trompos with it. Stuffed with meat and topped with a slice of Pineapple. Good stuff. You can add whatever you want to it later.

~ Al Pastor Burrito - 4/5 Just like the Tacos the Burritos are stuffed with meat. They ask you what else you want in it. I added everything. Just a very good Al Pastor burrito.

~ Carne Asada Burrito - 4/5 The same goes for the Caren Asada Burrito; packed with meat and with everything added. Very good.

I think the Burritos are $12? I'm not certain...had to do some detective work. Subtracting the price of Tacos and dividing the balance with the number of burritos. There is no receipt, I don't know if they charge tax...

While we were waiting we saw them make Quesadillas and Tortas, both looked amazing. I need to try them...

Beware, may receive raw pork. I did not order from here and backed out right before they were about to cut the El Pastor.

Like many people I have enjoyed the skewer style El Pastor around the Bay. The problem is that staff cutting it off are not trained well.

I wasn't sure at the moment until I got up to it but I watched them keep cutting meat off the skewer and you could see visibly raw pork being cut onto the plate.

I went to another El Pastor place that was less popular after this and to me it looked cooked but after taking it home we found raw sections in the el pastor. I think these trucks needs change how they serve this item or not serve it. I hope they fix this consistently because it is good.

BTW I did read up and from what I understand, El Pastor is marinated but there isn't additional cooking or prepping that would allow it be served still...

Food wasn’t all that good. I would personally rank their tacos a 2 out of 5, maybe 2.5. What really made me give them 1 star however was the absolutely horrid attitude of one of the workers there. Saw a gentleman, a customer, ask if he could exchange a drink for a different type ( rice water drink), the worker said “my boss keeps tabs on how much we sell I can’t exchange it for free. This customer said he buys from here every week and spends around $30 each time. The worker couldn’t make an exception and to me that was extremely disrespectful to the customer and also how she lied about her boss keeping tabs on what they sell. Very shady customer service IMO. I cannot in good conscience recommend this place let alone me visit there again. It was my first and last time. The ride worker needs to be humbled, her attitude was...