Trinidad Ritual de Sabores- A taco pilgrimage in the middle of Mercado de Coyoacán

We almost left. Multiple times. We waited an hour in line, which is saying something because I never wait for food. I am far too impatient. There were the line cutters, the chaos- this was not a Swiss line. It was a line in a busy Mexico City marketplace on a Sunday that had 3 different tails. But I could hear my sister Sally's voice telling me again and again that these were the best tacos she had in Mexico. I had to try them.

So we stayed.

And Sally may have been right.

Trinidad Ritual de Sabores is tucked into the middle of the wonderfully chaotic Mercado de Coyoacán. There are just a couple of seats at the bar, with 11 cooks somehow squeezed into the tiny kitchen behind them. Watching them work in that impossibly small space is almost as entertaining as eating the food.

And then there are the tortillas.

They roll them out right in front of you, using beautiful blue and yellow corn, and cook them fresh as the tacos are being assembled. The restaurant makes its own nixtamal (explained below), turning traditionally treated corn into fresh masa for those tortillas. There is something very satisfying about watching the whole process happen right in front of you.

We ordered the Degustación de Tacos, an eight-taco tasting designed to show off the kitchen, and then added plenty of extra tacos and dishes because apparently eight tacos between us was not going to be enough. After all, we had waited a long time, and I wanted to get my time back in tacos.

The tasting moves across a wonderfully broad range of fillings and was composed of: Barbacoa de picaña, Diezmillo, Carnitas, Pork belly, Flor de calabaza (squash blossom), Camote (sweet potato), Pulpo (octopus), Gobernador (the "Governor" style taco)

And this is what really impressed me.

I have eaten a lot of great tacos in Mexico. A particular taquería might make a spectacular birria, or a certain stall might have a fantastic taco al pastor. But Trinidad does something harder. They make great tacos across the board.

The vegetarian tacos were excellent, including the squash blossom ones. I like that they kept the vegetarian tacos on a separate plate. The squash blossom was my favorite, I love how it had the flower and slices of zucchini in it.

Noah's favorite was the barbacoa de costilla, a rich, slow-cooked rib taco served with the bone still attached.

There was pork fat everywhere. It was practically a pork-fat festival. Which, in my opinion, is a very good thing. Chicharrones arrived as chips, chicharrón appeared as

taco and guac toppings; there were carnitas, pork belly, and all manner of rich, fatty goodness happening around us.

Just look at this picture of the guacamole. It has pieces of fried pork belly in it and chicharrón chips sticking out of it? I think they even drizzled pork fat into the guac. It was super yum!

Yet somehow, even a vegan could be very happy here. The vegetarian and vegan options aren't an afterthought. There is real creativity happening with the vegetables, mushrooms, squash blossoms, and huitlacoche.

The drinks are worth exploring too. Noah had the pineapple and ginger drink, which was wonderfully refreshing.

It costs a little more than your average taco stand in a market, but this isn't really your average taco stand. There is a lot of thought and technique behind the food, from the homemade masa to the range of fillings and the way everything comes together.

One piece of advice: don't do what we did.

Do not arrive at midday on a Sunday and expect a quick lunch. We were in the middle of a packed market on a Sunday at lunchtime, looked at the enormous line, and joined it anyway.

We are dummies.

Go early on a weekday.

And if there is still a line, well, Sally would tell you to stay.

I think I'd agree with her.

What is nixtamalization?

You’ll hear the word nixtamal quite a bit when talking about traditional Mexican tortillas. Nixtamalization is the ancient process of soaking or cooking dried corn in water with calcium hydroxide, or food-grade lime, before washing and grinding it into masa.

It does much more than simply soften the corn. The process changes the texture and flavor of the corn, makes it easier to grind into masa, and makes certain nutrients, particularly niacin, more available to the body.

That masa is then used to make the fresh tortillas.

At Trinidad Ritual de Sabores, you can actually watch the tortillas being rolled out in front of you, which makes those beautiful blue-and-yellow tortillas even more special. They aren't simply something to hold the filling. The tortilla is part of the cooking.

Trinidad Ritual de Sabores

The name Trinidad Ritual de Sabores is tied to the idea of the rituals of Mexican grandmothers and the family traditions that surround cooking and eating. The team describes its food as being rooted in recipes and techniques passed down from their grandmother, while also reinterpreting those traditions in a contemporary way.

Trinidad Ritual de Sabores is inside Mercado de Coyoacán, rather than being a street-front restaurant.

Address: Mercado de Coyoacán, Ignacio Allende s/n, Locales 123–125, Colonia Del Carmen, Coyoacán, 04100 Ciudad de México, CDMX, México.

Tuesday through Sunday, approximately 11:00 am–4:30 pm, closed Monday. (Double-check these hours as they seem to change)

There is now a sister restaurant, Maria Trinidad, in the Centro Histórico. It is at Bucareli 66, Colonia Centro, Cuauhtémoc, Mexico City. Unlike the tiny market counter, Maria Trinidad is a proper sit-down restaurant with a full kitchen, cocktails and a much more elaborate experience. Its focus on corn continues the philosophy of Trinidad Ritual de Sabores.