Kiko’s – The Contender and the Uncanny Valley
Chorizo & Egg – $1.59 • Carne Guisada – $1.99 • Bottomless but lifeless coffee – $1.15
If you live here you know: Corpus Christi is the center of the breakfast taco world. Period. So Imagine my chagrin when I read an article in the New York Times bestowing that crown on Austin’s pointed head. I grew up in Austin, and I can drive down any street in that city and tell you about some party I went to there, or what great music venue used to over here. There are things Austin has got that I wish Corpus had – Waterloo Records, KUT, the Alamo Drafthouse – but we have the best tacos hands down. I wrote John Edge, the author of the article in question, and explained this fact to him. He was kind enough to reply saying:
“United Tastes, the column I write, addresses the ongoing evolution of American culinary culture. In Austin, I found a city where breakfast tacos — served by Cambodian as well as Thai, Indian, and Vietnamese cooks — are becoming unhypenated American. I found a city where cooks were honing breakfast tacos that transcend traditional barriers of race and ethnicity. But I’ll stick by me declaration that, when it comes to making sense of how breakfast tacos are becoming an unhyphenated American food, Austin is the place to eat and think.”And while I respect any work that nurtures multiculturalism, this is so wrong. The column doesn’t claim Austin is ‘the best place for breakfast tacos that aren’t made by the people who invented them and know how to best make them,’ it says “when it comes to breakfast tacos, Austin trumps all other American cities.” Like a copy machine (or a clone, or a foreign film) the 2nd generation is never quite as good as the original. Look at the Storm Troopers – they’re taken right from Jango Fett’s DNA but he’s a bad-ass and every one of those storm troopers is a half-wit. I’m one of the only people on earth who liked Gus Van Saint’s remake of Psycho, but it’s not as good as the Hitchcock version. Can you think of any cigarrette lighter better than a Zippo? This unqualified affront to the great tradition of breakfast tacos must not stand, and like the Gracy family at the birth of the UFC I challenge any city to come here and put up or shut up. Just bring some kleenex and a some cardboard boxes, so you can pack up your broken dreams and wipe the tears from your eyes as you return home defeated to face the shame and humiliation of your ineptitude and the cold comfort of your inferior breakfast.
Imitation and re-imagination is fraught with pitfalls. Robot maker Masahiro Mori (I can’t pass up any opportunity to use the word robot) coined the phrase ‘Uncanny Valley’ to describe our reaction of revulsion to artificial humans that we find close enough to look more like a human than a robot, but at the same time seem inhuman and disturbing. There has been a lot of discussion of the Uncanny Valley regarding CGI as the technology sits at the edge of this valley peering in. What does this have to do with tacos, you ask? This morning we ate tacos at Kiko’s, a local taco purveyor and winner of the Caller Times‘ Best of the Best award for breakfast tacos. One need only to look at our national election system, or the academy awards to appreciate how easy it is for the unscrupulous to manipulate a poll. Kiko’s is an attractive and sprawling restaurant located a stone’s throw from Corpus’ main commercial thoroughfare S.P.I.D. (South Padre Island Drive). It’s central location is nearly perfect – close enough to the highway to pickup all the shopping traffic and far enough back that you can eat there and still feel like you’re in a neighborhood. It has a faux patina that is at once charming and artificial. I get the same two tacos every Friday, the carne guisada and the chorizo & egg. Their chorizo & egg taquito was pretty good, far short of such greats as Marroquin’s but still pretty tasty. The tortillas were just good enough to qualify as fresh, but not much better than off the shelf. The salsa, too, was fresh and hot but not great and somehow lacking anything to distinguish itself. Then there was the coffee: as the Hat said to me something was not quite right about it. Like a Stepford Wife it was satisfactory but a little creepy. All of these things fell into the Uncanny Valley, and tasted a few degrees off true. Let me throw another movie simile at this description, Dr. Seth Brundle in the Cronenberg remake of The Fly when he teleported the steak and then tasted it…
Something just wasn’t right. This was the case nowhere more true than in the carne guisada which could well have been the same steak. It looked great, the beef was tender, there was just the right amount of salt and viscosity in the gravy but it tasted synthetic, like I was eating it at the breakfast taco pavilion in Epcot.
While I can’t say the food here is bad, I also can’t recommend it in the shadow of so many terrific taco shops. This is a local taco touchstone and I don’t mean to alienate the faithful but they seem to do a brisk enough business that my detraction couldn’t adversely affect them.
Our free taco winner for this week is:
Kelly LeBrock
Kelly LeBrock played hands down the sexiest robot on planet earth as Lisa in Weird Science, and in the 80s could lead my unsuspected adolescent self into the uncanny valley and beyond, and to beat the metaphor to death, later fell into the valley of obscurity only to resurface in recent years to bath in the sullied waters of reality television. No one could approach her iconic visage during her brief stop at the summit of 80s teen desire. As time passed she aged, struggled with weight, and consorted with riff-raff (Steven Seagal). More recently she did come off as savvy, funny and frank in her interview for the John Hughes doc Don’t You Forget About Me. Honorable mention goes to Olivia Munn for reprising the role for the photo on the right.
Offer includes 2 tacos, an audience with the ‘tacoteurs,’ and a free tacotopia t-shirt. Please redeem this offer at Whetstone Graphics on a Friday morning of your choice. Offer subject to cancellation by order of the wives of the tacoteurs. Enter to win by emailing your name on the back of a Shermer Athletics gym tee to tacos@tacotopia.net.
I don’t understand how a place you don’t recommend gets a B- (82%). Can you detail how the number scores translate to recommendations?
Yeah, I hear you. There has been some discussion of adjusting our metrics. The problem is that Corpus Christi tacos are so damned good that it’s hard to recommend a B-. Maybe in Austin this would get a thumbs up.
“Just bring some kleenex and a some cardboard boxes, so you can pack up your broken dreams and wipe the tears from your eyes as you return home defeated to face the shame and humiliation of your ineptitude and the cold comfort of your inferior breakfast.”
Them there is fight n words! Bring it!
“But I’ll stick by me declaration…” ???? What the hell does a pirate know about tacos?
Loved the blog. It’s very surprising you got a response from the New York Times dude. Keep up the good work!
WOW! If you love Austin so much you should move back! Quit trying to bag on the ex-old lady and convince yourself she’s no good. You just spent more time trying to rag on Austin than you did reviewing a taco and restaurant that you apparently did not like much. Doesn’t sound good at all! If they can’t shine with a cornerstones like carne guisada or for christ’s sake, a signature like salsa, this is not the contender you want to throw in the ring. Bemoaning a decent(oh so basic item)cup of coffee is no way to flex either. You just told us about a crap dining experience no one wants a part of.
Yeah! take…that..Austin? If a food establishment can’t do basic things correctly, I really don’t want to know what the hell else is going on in the back room. The TAMALE HOUSE, or one of the many TAQUERIA ARANDAS in AUSTIN sound like much better places to dine.
For the record…. The Times piece written by some turd espousing the wonders of tacos -which apparently are mostly prepared with “jimmy dean” sausage- is pure shite and offensive. What a maroon!!!
Austin tacos suck. Bottom line. Anyone who says otherwise has no business even talking about breakfast tacos. How can you defend a city that is willing to put up with (and even praise) taquerias that use store bought tortillas. It’s appalling! I grew up in Corpus and was spoiled by the countless delicious breakfasts I ate while living there. I moved to Austin for 2 years and searched high and low for a decent breakfast taco. Sure, I found a few places that did the trick, but like Eddie Murphy said, you give a starving man a cracker and he’ll think it’s the best cracker he’s ever eaten in his life! I found one place in austin that served real home made tortillas. It’s called La Mexicana on South 1st St. I had to go out of my way to get there so it wasn’t very practical, but I gladly drove down there every weekend because to me it was the closest thing to Corpus tacos that I could find.
The thing about (todays) Austin is that nothing there is really authentic. Most of the people who live there come from somewhere else. It makes for an eclectic culture, but nothing is real. Over the years people have moved to Austin bringing with them the good parts from everywhere else. Most things are not authentically Austin, just good ideas they borrowed from other places. Since no one living there knows any better, they all praise what is new and different, but essentially mediocre.
I have never understood the hype that Kiko’s receives. It’s so “meh” — the food is pretty bland and always looks like it’s been sitting under the lamps for 20 minutes before they bothered to serve it. *Just don’t get it* However I do like Hunan what’s-it-called next door for decent Chinese fast food.
Ignore the haters! I totally agree with you! Corpus may suck in all the ways that really matter but we definitely have the best tacos! In fact, I have never eaten so many tacos for breakfast or a “taquito” until I moved here from the Dallas area, I also lived in Austin for awhile and while Austin does have a mass quantity of great things, tacos is not one of them! It is a way of life down here. On a good day at work a vendor brings us a bag full of delicious tacos (breakfast tacos = continued business, vendors that walk in the door with donuts might as well be empty handed and they get the boot!) On the subject of Kiko’s…that place is gross! My husband and I read great reviews about it on tripadvisor.com and were excited to try out a great Mexican food restaurant and were HIGHLY disappointed! Taco Bueno does back flips and front flips in comparison to that place! We have yet to find a local Mexican food restaurant that we felt was just awesome, maybe you could recommend? For now we just stick to “OTB” when we need our Mexican food kick!
Oh my. I have randomly stumbled across this blog, and I am very pleased. As a Corpus Christi native who goes to UT Austin, I applaud your open letter to the NYT. I, too, was spoiled by the general deliciousness of Corpus tacos and I have yet to find a decent place here in Austin..and this is my 2nd year here! Sure, Torchy’s Tacos is innovative and tasty, but sometimes I just want a traditional breakfast taco on a homemade tortilla. I’ve searched to no avail. What’s a girl to do!?