Sargent Taco earns its stripes

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This article was published 03/05/2018 (2892 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

This small, friendly West End taqueria has tons to recommend it. Sargent Taco Shop serves up a range of Mexican street food that’s tasty and crazy-cheap, including a value meal that lives up to its name (rice and fried beans, three tacos and a drink for $10).

Tacos are mostly three for $7, and stand-out choices include the chicken with pipian, a rich, gorgeously pale green sauce made with ground pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds and spices, and the chicken mole. The complexity of the mole sauce comes from a mix of spices and seeds and just a touch of unsweetened chocolate for lots of dark, deep flavour.

(Unfortunately, the strips of white-meat chicken used for the tacos have that suspiciously juicy injected feel. A better bet might be pork mole, which was offered when the chicken mole was sold out and made with slow-braised bits.)

The classic al pastor tacos have lots of vibrant taste; the strips of grilled pork are combined with ribbons of pineapple and finished with finely diced white onion and cilantro.

The slightly pricier taco options (three for $8) include beef and huitlacoche, a fungus that sometimes grows on corn. One of its nicknames, “Mexican truffle,” conveys a sense of its earthy, smoky, umami vibe. The inky-black huitlacoche paste pairs beautifully with crema and strips of roasted poblano peppers.

Tacos are really the main thing here, but there are also flautas — rolled, nicely crisped corn tortillas filled with ham and chicken and covered in shredded romaine.

And there are good quesadillas, big flour tortillas packed with chicken, ham, soft panela cheese and topped with pico de gallo.

There is also a daily soup, including a really terrific pozole (only on Saturday, I’m afraid). The pozole manages to cram all sorts of flavours and textures into one bowl, with chili-spiced broth, lots of shredded chicken, the comfort of hominy and tortilla chips, the crisp of sliced radish, the smoothness of avocado and the tang of fresh lime.

Drinks include Mexican soft drinks, in a rainbow array of colours and with unusual flavours such as guava, tamarind, pineapple and (alcohol-free) sangria, as well as pumpkin or cinnamon tea. There is no liquor served.

The one dessert option is churros (six for $6), Basically ribbons of fried dough rolled in sugar and cinnamon, churros really need to be fresh and warm, and these were.

Now for the drawbacks: the Taco Shop has no atmosphere, being a hole-in-the-wall with lots of weird industrial ducts looming over the kitchen area. In the waiting area, there are just two tables, some fold-out chairs and a few counter stools, with nothing to personalize the bare-bones premises except a bright “Welcome” sign.

Service is warm and helpful at this family-run joint – that welcome sign is sincere. But it can be slow, especially during the lunch and dinner rushes.

On one visit, part of our order was forgotten – though the mistake was hastily fixed when its was pointed out. On another visit, a Mexican-style poutine came to the table without the promised chorizo, crema and pico de gallo. Popular dishes can run out near the end of the day.

One evening, our churro cravings were thwarted by lack of supply. Never mind — that just gave us one more reason to come back.

alison.gillmor@freepress.mb.ca