Taco

A taco is a corn or wheat-flour tortilla folded or rolled around a filling and eaten by hand, usually with salsa; Larousse's dictionary of Mexican gastronomy calls it the most widely eaten antojito in Mexico.

Definition

Larousse's Diccionario enciclopédico de la gastronomía mexicana defines the taco as a corn or wheat tortilla wrapped around a filling, folded or rolled, and eaten on its own or with salsa. It notes that the taco is the most widely consumed antojito, or snack, in Mexico, and that a taco usually takes its name from its filling, its texture or the way it is cooked or served: tacos de canasta are named for the basket they travel in, tacos dorados for being fried golden, and tacos al pastor for the spit on which the meat is roasted. The same dictionary records a second, unrelated meaning in Mexico City: a rolled sweet bread filled with jam.

Etymology

The origin of the word in its culinary sense is uncertain. Historian Jeffrey M. Pilcher, interviewed by Smithsonian magazine in 2012, proposed that it comes from eighteenth-century Mexican silver mines, where a taco was a small charge of gunpowder wrapped in paper and pushed into a hole in the rock to loosen ore. He noted that tacos de minero are among the first taco types described in written sources. Some linguists instead connect the word to the Nahuatl tlahco, meaning half or in the middle, a reference to the folded shape; Xataka México and the magazine Chilango both mention this idea, and Chilango also proposes the Nahuatl taqualli. None of these derivations is settled.

Origins

Corn tortillas long predate the Spanish conquest, and Indigenous peoples of central Mexico ate small fish, crustaceans and insects in them; México Desconocido groups tacos of charales, acociles, maguey worms, escamoles, chapulines and jumiles as Indigenous tacos. Whether such meals should be called tacos is debated. Pilcher argues that the taco as a named dish is not ancient: the earliest archival and dictionary references to the food date only to the end of the nineteenth century. Popular histories, repeated by Chilango and Food & Pleasure, describe a meal of pork on tortillas that Hernán Cortés is said to have offered his captains at Coyoacán, sometimes dated to 1526 and attributed to the chronicler Bernal Díaz del Castillo, but these accounts do not cite the original text.

The Spanish introduced pork, beef, mutton, goat and wheat. Wheat reached Sonora with northern expeditions in the sixteenth century, and México Desconocido credits settlers there with creating the flour tortilla, which now dominates taco making in northern Mexico.

Anatomy

A taco has three parts. The tortilla is usually corn, small and doubled at many street stands, or wheat flour in the north. The filling may be grilled, griddled, spit-roasted, simmered, fried in lard, stewed or pit-cooked. The garnish typically includes chopped onion and cilantro, lime and one or more salsas, set out for diners to add themselves. Mexico News Daily describes small corn tortillas, onion and cilantro as the standard finish for al pastor, while Los Angeles magazine notes that Tijuana-style tacos are crowned with guacamole and keep other toppings to a minimum.

Types

Tacos are often grouped by cooking method. Excélsior's 2024 survey of more than one hundred varieties sorts them by region: carne asada, cabrito, barbacoa de res, machaca and discada in the northeast; fish, lobster and Ensenada-style tacos in the northwest; pastor, carnitas, suadero, birria, barbacoa and insect tacos in the center; and cochinita pibil and poc chuc in the southeast. Other important families include tacos de guisado, filled with home-style stews; tacos de canasta, steamed in a cloth-lined basket; tacos dorados, rolled and fried; and the taco placero, assembled at the table from market ingredients such as chicharrón, cheese, nopales and pápalo.

In the United States, the pre-fried U-shaped hard shell became the basis of fast-food tacos. Pilcher found that the first patents for making shells were granted in the 1940s to Mexican restaurateurs, well before Glen Bell, founder of Taco Bell, claimed to have invented the shell in the 1950s.

Reviews

See also

• History of the taco
• Taquería
• Taquero
• Taco stand
• Tacos al pastor
• Tacos de carnitas
• Tacos de barbacoa
• Tacos de canasta
• Tacos de guisado
• Tacos in Mexico City

References

1. "Taco". Larousse Cocina (Diccionario enciclopédico de la Gastronomía Mexicana). Retrieved 2026-10-10.
2. "Where Did the Taco Come From?". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
3. "Cuando el taco no era un manjar con estrella Michelin, sino un cartucho de dinamita". Xataka México. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
4. "Este es el origen de los tacos de suadero, los tacos 100% chilangos". Chilango. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
5. "¡Para tacos, sólo México!". México Desconocido. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
6. "Se dice que este es el taco más antiguo de la historia, y te decimos dónde probarlo en la CDMX". Food & Pleasure. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
7. "Historia de las tortillas de harina, producto mexicano que va por 500 años de existencia". México Desconocido. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
8. "State by Plate: Mexico City & Tacos al Pastor". Mexico News Daily. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
9. "How L.A. Became Obsessed with the Tijuana Taco". Los Angeles Magazine. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
10. "Tipos de Tacos en México: más de 100 variedades que debes probar". Excélsior. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
11. "Taco placero: historia, cómo y cuándo surgió en México". UnoTV. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
12. "Mexico City's Beloved Tacos de Canasta: Inside the Steamy, Melt-in-Your-Mouth Street Food Tradition". MICHELIN Guide. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
13. "An Oral History of Hard-Shell Tacos". MEL Magazine. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
14. "Taco". Wikipedia. Retrieved 2026-10-10.