Linkmeister

I come from Southern California too, but obviously I know the right people because my life has never been taco free.

Ok, this is very sad, but, not counting the regular tacos we had at home, Taco Bell.

If you want to know the first time I had a real taco, that was after I started hitch-hiking, at sixteen. I was probably seventeen before I actually had a real one.

Heh, that should have read, "regular taco nights."

And to venture a geuss, it was either Chicago or St. Louis, where said taco was acquired.

Probably in 1984, either just before or right after that year's worldcon.

I think the first taco I ever had was at a Jack in the Box in Florham Park, NJ, around 1970. It was also around then that they started advertising Old El Paso taco kits and suchlike in the New York metro area. The first time I saw and ate in a real Mexican restaurant was in 1973, at a place called Tico Taco in Green Brook, NJ.

Rhode Island is a tough locale for Mexican restaurants. Chains like El Torito, Chevy's, and Casa Lupita all failed. We didn't even get a Taco Bell until around 1980. I can think of exactly one independent Mexican restaurant. We've recently started getting a new wave of chain places, like On the Border (which I didn't like all that much), and places named "[insert Mexican flavoring here] Grill".

Hey Linky...we have to explain to these youngin's that Taco Bell, Jack In the Box and Taco Time/Tia are not REAL tacos. Let's organize a meetup at Olvera Street and introduce them to the real thing. They won't won't be disappointed!

You know, Karan, it's discouraging. Fast food chains have a lot to answer for, haven't they?

All the good or even semi-good Mexican places in Honolulu are 15 miles across town from me, which is a nuisance. I keep wondering what it is about Kaimuki that draws them. (Yes, I know; all you mainlanders will say "15 miles is nothin', man!" and all I can say is that distances are different in Hawai'i.) ;)

Hey now, I did qualify that I didn't have real tacos until later in life. . .Now I live amongst the highest Mexican population in the Portland area, with no less than seven real Mexican restaurants within a ten block radius, plus two semi-permanent trailer type taco stands. This after having lived in the Lansing MI area for nearly a decade, where there is a huge Mexican population and lots of good Mexican food.

That said, I do get the craving for Taco Bell once in a while, but not even they claim to sell real Mexican food. I had to explain to a friend once, that when one has a craving for Taco Bell, they are not having a craving for Mexican food, they are having a craving for Taco Bell.

I should also note that one of the Mexican restaurants in my neighborhood is called Tia's Taco, which indeed is a real Mexican restaurant. Their specialty is a particularly horrid sort of fish taco.