(Roving correspondent/ photographer Kristen Tobiason revisits and documents the scenes of our youth. Today, rolling with the tacos at La Posta, 2008!)
Ah! La Posta. Our signature Southern California cuisine. …. Craving carne asada at 3am? No problem. The mighty little taco shop, La Posta, on 3rd and Washington, is still going strong just as it was 25 years ago. (Twenty-five years?! Jeebus!)
Back in the day it was all the nutrition we needed. Next to McDonald’s five-hamburgers-for-$1 deal, (the Morlocks were huge fans of Mickey D’s), it was a cheap feast. Who would have thunk that today we would be eating sushi?
It’s comforting to know that some things remain consistent in this world. When the show is over at the Casbah, the kids still got La Posta to go to. I know I sleep better at night knowing that — and at 3 in the morning that’s what I’m doing: sleeping, not eating rolled tacos.
— Kristen Tobiason
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
I still love SD Mexican holes in the wall.
I can get and do get robertos when in Vegas.
My mom brings me burritos on the plane when she comes to visit.
October I will be in SD and will chow down like never before. Only thing is I do it at 6 pm and not 3 am like the old days.
it’s kind of funny that all the recent posts have been food related. back then i dont recall either myself or anyone i knew really ever eating apart from after a 3 day speed binge. does all this food mania imply that everyone is now unrecognizable?
BOogie: Regrettably, I am currently more Jabba the Hutt than Han Solo. I’m using the tentative prospect of a reunion concert as an incentive to eschew the baked goods for the treadmill. (Kind of high-school-reunion stuff, only I’m more emotionally invested in this crowd.)
Neuropsych experiments do bear out the perception that taste is hard-wired into all those memory centers, which is probably why it’s so evocative here. (We could try a “Smells of the SD underground” post — scent supposedly being the most evocative sense — but it might devolve quickly!) 🙂
HA! BOogie is so right. I was in skinny Princess Leia shape -- like in Jedi -- A wannabe Edie Sedgewick, I micromanaged my food intake. One thing I’ve learned getting older is how to enjoy eating.
The Morlocks were huge Mickey D’s fans? I wouldn’t have guessed that. I’m imagining the world’s greatest ad campaign right now….
“I could’ve been your dad, but the Hamburglar beat me over the fence!”
I arrived at La Posta early one morning just minutes after a large SUV (did we call them that in the ’80s?) had lost control on Washington and flipped, landing roof-down on one of the concrete tables. (I think it had clipped the awning, but I might be embellishing.)
The driver was fine, standing outside and chatting with the cops, and everybody else was just going about their business of cooking and ordering and eating as if there weren’t a big ol’ truck upside-down on the patio.
matthew i like the “more emotionally invested” comment, i too have been looking for an excuse as of late, i shall take inspiration from your words…cheers!
>>My mom brings me burritos on the plane when she comes to visit.
Mark: My grandfather moved from NY to a small town in Puerto Rico in his late 50s. He would come to the city every few months to visit his aged mother and load a cooler with dry ice, lox, pastrami and other delicacies he couldn’t get in Aricebo.
I recently talked with a guy who was a little kid when my grandfather came to town to join his second wife and family … He still vividly remembers my grandfather and his stash of cured meats.
>>“I could’ve been your dad, but the Hamburglar beat me over the fence!”
Paul: How do you say that in American Sign Language?
>>(We could try a “Smells of the SD underground” post — scent supposedly being the most evocative sense — but it might devolve quickly!)
Ah, the scents of 2-stroke exhaust, amyl poppers, and Aqua Net hairspray!
Is anything good at La Posta these days? I usually go to Los Panchos down the street when in the neighborhood. Of course, when you’re drunk at 3AM anything tastes good.
>>Paul: How do you say that in American Sign Language?
Don’t know, but I’ve got the perfect name for the ad campaign for the milkshakes: All Thick and Creamy!
Dean, I like the carne asada tostadas at La Posta. Los Panchos is good too, but La Posta is a couple of blocks closer to my house, which is an important factor when making 4 am food runs 🙂 On a side note, a disguised La Posta shows up in Ed Brubaker’ “LowLife” comic book from the nineties. He now pens Captain America for Marvel, but back in the day was quite the scenester. Has anyone mentioned Lalo’s in Hillcrest ? Great potato rolled tacos and I even ran into David Klowden there one night:-)
I’ll be in the U.S. in December, and I’ll head straight to amigoland and order three rolled tacos with guacamole and a carne asada burrito!
I liked the Alberto’s drive-through across the street. That’s gone though… What do they have there now…drive-through sushi?
does any one remember the old anvertisment for the vox wah wah peddle wth the electric prunes ? thats the voice i hear introducing the morlocks for mcy dees and the new poop snack !
oh yeah get it now at the poop snack shack
i can hear leighton whining in my mind to go get the tasty burgers…..tasty yum yum I want them give them to me
he like food food taist good he like food food taist good greasy burgers greasy fries
Mmmmm! La Posta. My eyes would roll to the back of my head after my first bite of their carne asada burrito.I have never savored a burrito the same way again. After moving up to S.F. I never found anything remotely close to the taste of those burritos.The S.F. burritos were much bigger and I believe they probably kept me from starving to death but they just didn’t deliver like La Posta’s did. Even in L.A. nothing comes close.
The Alberto´s was a block up the street, not across the street. It´s now Panchos.
Matt, I think you are referring to the time a truck (we didn´t call them SUVs back then) plowed into the side of the Mexican eatery on the west side of the parking lot, which is now Bronx pizza. I can´t quite remember the name of it (El Charro rings a bell) but it was painted with fake bricks. No one I know ever ate there, I think because it only kept respectable hours.
Having been a vegetarian for around 15 years now, I don’t do La Posta or Roberto’s anymore--too generous with the manteca.
But I love Bahia on El Cajon Blvd. @ Florida St. for burritos. It is my favorite taco shop in SD, with El Zerape on Park Blvd. 2nd & Lalo’s on University in Hillcrest in third. My favorite sit-down Mexican place is Rancho Cocina in Ocean Beach. They also have one in North Park, but the OB one is 3 blocks from my house.
Bronx Pizza, next to La Posta, very good slice, for those craving NY style in SD.
Tom: Wednesday night Nancy and I took her brother to the East Village (as opposed to Greenwich Village West!) for dinner at La Palapa, which is one of our favorite Mexican places this side of the country. (The site also says it was the home of W.H. Auden, though they probably didn’t serve blood-orange margaritas then.) We should go there sometime.
Paul Kaufman can maybe help me remember the name of the East Indian/Mexican hybrid we used to go to in Greenwich Village back in the ’80s, when decent guacamole was rarer in these parts than Beluga caviar. They served good versions of both cuisines, with spiciness as the common argot.
Casa Machado, hell yes, such a nice spot for a drink and a meal overlooking the little airport. let’s not forget the spot directly across, 94th aero squadron, slow jams, fine sisters, free food all done up like a french farmhouse from ww1, good times
Etna Restaurant is still across the street from Hoover high. It is owned by a small corporation that owns several italian eateries in the mid cities . Etna is not what it used to be. You get one server, who has to take care of all the tables for the whole night. The sweet dough is good.
They were trying a buffet style dinner in the early nineties, killing the sit-down, “eat in a dark, cool place” ethic that we grew to love after band practice. I don’t think it’s open all that late, as the area isn’t quite gentrified as the rest of the mid city.
In related sadness,Julio’s mexican eatery off of University and 44th has been closed for a year now. Wickershams band practice ended there a few times, did it not?
“Chuck Berry Guy”? I don’t remember the reference. I do remember that the owner/head cook knew Ron Silva and always came by to say hi to him. He brought enough biz to the place with all the Crawdaddys and bands after that. I never saw the cook much after that.
I found Etna’s sweet pizza strange, so I preferred Vesuvio in North Park (I think they are now owned by the same company that owns Etna’s), or Fillippi’s on India St., or Sanfillippo’s in La Mesa. And for value the place in O.B. with huge slices. But we ate at Etna’s once in a while for the atmosphere.
Wish I lived in New York for the pizza. Nothing compares here in California. “Gourmet” pizza is all the rage in San Francisco. Sometimes I like a little bit of it, but not when I get a pizza craving. Then I want the old-fashioned kind of pizza with plenty of homemade sauce and mozzarella.
Just took the wife and kid to La Posta, fugg’n great!
La Posta has been in business over 25 years, my mom used to take me there back in 1980.
We are in San Diego for the weekend, staying at a friends in South East San Diego(Oak Park). I went to a place off Euclid called Rojiburto’s across from Foodland. I must say this place has the Carne Asada I have ever had.
Dylan’s post took me back here and I see the responses to what I wrote awhile back. Dean, you mention Filippi’s on India, and I just remembered being there with elements of Manual Scan one night (probably in 1986). Some kind of band was playing (?), possibly some kind of “ethnic” Top-40-of-the-past outfit resembling a house band. Does this register as truth for anyone? And then if I am not insane the memory says I sat in (playing bass) on a frenzied version of Hava Nagileh (???). It’s a cinematic memory resembling a hallucination at this point. Calling Bart Mendoza! Do you remember this? Yet another night I’d enjoy to relive. And I should have gotten down to see that band again.
Which brings up the point--have the parties at Bart Mendoza’s family compound been remembered here on the blog yet?
The address of Bart’s family’s place is engraved on my memory kind-of like the address of Chess Records--y’know, 2120 South Michigan Ave., unless I’m off by a digit or two.
Tony, “Chuck Berry Guy” was apparently just another regular, like Ron Silva was. He’d just been a frequent sighting for Ron, and of course Ron was into the Chuck. But this guy really did look a lot like Chuck Berry. I forget but I think maybe after I’d heard the reference, I actually spotted him myself rather than having him pointed out. I was like, “Oh, that must be Chuck Berry Guy.” Now what would have been really funny is if he’d looked like a cross between Chuck Berry and Buddy Guy. Then we’d have to hyphenate his name! Or make it “Chuddy Berry-Guy,” which would make him sound a little like he’d come from the Subcontinent.
Speaking of which, I had a rehearsal with Dean Parrish the other day, had to take a train out to New Brunswick, New Jersey with the drummer. We missed our stop, had to hire a car to drive us miles back from Princeton Junction. We were silly with grief at the unnecessary $50 we were spending, but, well: we passed some funny (to us) businesses on the highway. The one that sticks in the memory now, if I even have it right, is “Chutney Manor.” It’s probably not funny at all--and the thought of it is making me hungry for some 6th St. (or 23rd and 2nd Ave) cuisine--but the sight of “Chutney Manor” on a suburban semi-rural expressway just struck us as highly improbable. In fact it wasn’t clear if it was a restaurant, or some kind of chutney wholesaler. It was verging on big-box architecture….
Of course, I look it up via search engine and there are thousands of pages that mention it. Turns out it’s a large banquet hall! Maybe we can hire it out for a show! I see it now…reunion of Mod Fun, the Funseekers and Manual Scan, live at Chutney Manor! Maybe we can get the famous Bollywood soundtrack band exploited in “Ghost World” to round out the bill. Jaan Pechechaan (Tally) Ho! I wasn’t sure where I was going with this just now until I realized it was the perfect excuse to revisit this! I present to you: Ted Lyons & His Cubs! This is what Living looks like when you spell it with a capital L! Capital.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyEnG_DEB1I
Dylan, you have made me very hungry. How many La Postage stamps would it take for you to send me some of the stuff via airmail? Just freeze ’em, and ship it in an authentic ’80s “Playmate” cooler with one of those survivalist / emergency, tinfoil / reynolds aluminum “space blankets,” if you will--for a little insulation.
Three in the morning, why’d I move to Brooklyn? Nothing in the refrigerator, not even a frozen burrito due to my close-tolerance bachelor meal-planning. Back at home in my old apartment on Sullivan Street in Manhattan, this would be less of a problem. For one thing, down the block--okay, maybe it’s not open this late, or on monday--but for kicks check out:
http://www.florencia13nyc.com/
http://www.florencia13nyc.com/history.html
“In related sadness,Julio’s mexican eatery off of University and 44th has been closed for a year now. Wickershams band practice ended there a few times, did it not?”
Tony , fyi the former head waiter from Julio’s has relocated and brought the Julio’s recipes , combos and amazing hot carrots to a new location across from the Avalon II on Adams . The new location is called ” Casa Adams ” if anyone wants to meet up for some authentic down south goodness .
I remember eating there ( Julio’s ) when I was a kid and my dad somehow knew about it all the way up here . It seemed like it took an hour to make it up from Bonita in our 1974 doge colt station wagon rolling along at 50 mph . . . we would always get our ” biorhythm ” done on that silly machine by the door on the way out .
I used to love the big “cheese crisps” at La Pinata in Bonita when I was a kid. I don’t know if that location is still around, but last time I was at the Old Town one, they still had ’em. Yum!
Matt I used to eat there all the time . . . I’m suprized we weren’t buddies from that far back in our childhood . I must be like 3 or 4 years older than you at this point I guess .
Missed you by a few summers apparently .
Those cheese crisps were amazing . . . I think you can still get them at the La Piñata location in Old Town .
Matt Johnson? Mike, who is this guy? Matt, who are you? Are you from Bonita? How old? Where did you live? I too loved the greasy fried cheese things from La Pinata. You can get the same basic thing at El Patio on Broadway/G (or so) in Chula Vista.
“Rolled Tacos: random musings about La Posta De Acapulco’s Taco Shop #8 at 3AM”
Really good. Thanks, Matt.