Tacos La Placita, Oxnard

Tacos La Placita

437 C Street

Oxnard, CA

I had heard of Carnegie Libraries and had even seen one someplace in Arkansas, but I didn't realize that there were some in California. I grew up in Bell and Downey, and though both are old enough to have applied for Carnegie Libraries, Andrew Carnegie funding libraries from 1883 to 1929, neither did, and it wasn't until I got to college that I had ever heard of one.

Oxnard though, has a very impressive Carnegie Library, though it isn't a Carnegie Library any more. It sits on top of a small hill, by a park and across from one of my favorite lunch spots. It's now the Carnegie Museum, and sometimes has interesting art shows.

Tacos La Placita sits across the street from the Carnegie Museum, and is important to my personal taco history for one reason. It's the place where I had my first truly enjoyable "street taco." 

17 years ago, when I first moved to Oxnard, I would run by this place. They had a sign out for tacos for 75 cents, I think, and it would smell so good that I finally tried one. Before that time, I always wanted the big, crunchy tacos that my mom would make. My mom would fry corn tortillas to make a shell, and then fill them with ground beef, tomatoes, lettuce and cheddar cheese. Street tacos, those smaller ones with just meat, onion and cilantro, seemed so tiny and poor in comparison. 

But the smell coming from this stand was amazing. I wasn't very brave, and just had asada, but it was good. Eventually, I would try several of their tacos, and find them all to be quite tasty.

The same old couple have run the place the whole time, though occasionally one of the children will be working the stand. The tacos have gone up in price, to all of a $1.50, but they're still good.

And by good, what do I mean? The meat is always moist and full of flavor. Usually, I'll have an asada, a lengua (tongue), a cabeza (head), and a carnitas, along with a Pepsi, which came out to about $8. The tortillas are soft and warm. Onions and cilantro, of course, but they also add a moderately spicy red salsa, along with some chilis that are always too hot for me to do anything more than nibble, and some grilled onion. It looks to me like they keep big pots of meat on their stove, and with the lid on, it keeps the meat moist.

Orders are done quickly, and though I've noticed that they have several other things on their menu, including hamburgers, all I've ever had are the tacos. 

Why eat something else when I know tacos make me happy? A great, inexpensive place when you happen to be in Downtown Oxnard.