El Loco, Mexicana Cantina Y Barra

A few consecutive days of searing heat and it appears that summer has finally settled in. This is the kind of weather where I don’t feel like cooking.

At all.

Cue: lazy snoozing on a deck chair/in a hammock in the shade by a private pool/beach and polite staff bringing you refreshing fruit-based drinks carried out on fancy silver trays. Perhaps a butler called Alfred (because, you know, they always seem to be called Aflred) to “fetch” you when dinner is ready...mmmm.

Okay, cue: reality and maybe taco time instead? With fresh flavours and bursts of fragrant herbs enveloped by the soft surrounds of a flour tortilla, I do like gathering friends around a table when the weather is warm for a DIY taco dinner. What’s even better is when you don’t need to make them yourself, and better still when the place serving up the tacos is El Loco.

A margarita in a (plastic, environmentally-friendly) salt-rimmed cup is refreshing with its sweet, tangy and salty notes. (It also fits my description of a fruit-based drink!) It is the perfect complement to the fish tacos (daily special) with the fish encased in crunchy batter as well as the al pastor pork tacos with its little cubes of charred and smoky pork. The pollo chicken taco is a notch less smoky but has the added bonus of sweet corn salsa. At $5 each, just don’t order too many tacos at once – lest they go soggy whilst waiting to be eaten, leading to unfortunate exploding tacos and taco juices running down fingers.

The ‘Excelsior Hotdog’ is less perishable and a whole different kind of deliciousness with a non-red-skinned frankfurt cradled in a soft hotdog bun, loaded with condiments, mayonnaise and the all-important blanket of feathery queso fresco cheese. Share it around, if you can, but you will want to scoff the whole thing yourself.

Round up some friends and go crazy for tacos! Nibble on corn chips with salsa and possibly some of the smoothest guacamole (unpictured) you may have ever had. Make sure you don’t mind getting messy in your friends’ company, because I don’t think there was a single bit of food I didn’t manage to drop on myself or the serviette I’d laid on the table in preparation for it.

El Loco

64 Foveaux St, Surry Hills NSW

Tel: (02) 9211 4945

Opening Hours:  Mon & Tues  12pm til late

                        Wed  12pm-1am

                        Thurs-Sat  12pm-3am

                        Sun  12pm-10pm

happy eating!