At Taco María, we’re excited to bring new traditions together with the old, starting from the ground up with the most basic Mexican food ingredients. We’ve received our first shipment of heirloom dried beans from Rancho Gordo, Steve Sando’s “New World Specialty Food” company in Napa, California.

Rancho Gordo aims to revive indigenous ingredients and support California agriculture as well as farmers and forgotten varieties from across the border.

The Rio Zape bean is a very special legume, dark and mysterious with subtle flavors of coffee and cocoa. We cook it very simply with brûlée onions, garlic, and bay leaf and mash it coarsely for our rich refried beans.

North America’s own Tepary bean was developed by indigenous people to be drought tolerant. These little white beans have a unique texture and a mild maple-syrup aroma and are best presented whole. We cook them lovingly with a beso of ancho chile and a touch of piloncillo (Mexican raw sugar.)

Welcome to TacoMaría.com. It’s our pleasure to introduce you to Frida, our kitchen on wheels. She was born in East LA at West Coast Catering Trucks and dressed in vinyl by the talented team at Wrap One in Anaheim.

So named because of her mustache and her fierce individualism, Frida will be taking us all over Orange County to serve our sustainable Mexican cuisine in your neighborhood and at your local farmer’s markets.

We’ll be rolling out soon to locations in Orange, Costa Mesa, Anaheim, Fullerton, Irvine and more in the next few weeks.