“You can tell how long a couple has been married by whether they are on their first, second or third bottle of Tabasco.”
— Bruce Bye
Carniceria y Taqueria Soto
Located across from Raley’s in the Western Plaza shopping center, Carniceria y Taqueria Soto is another of the least known, and probably the smallest, restaurants in El Dorado County.
“We originally had the store and meat market (carniceria) and just started making snacks in the kitchen for our customers and then expanded into food to go,” said Vicky Soto, who owns the business with her husband Beto. “Our burritos and tacos became very popular, so about a year ago we decided to expand. We now have quite a menu and following.”
When I dropped in last week just to get information on the restaurant, I spent most of the time wandering the aisles looking at many unique foods and items available. Boy, if you were going to put together a Mexican style dinner, you need to shop here. On top of all the spices, dry and canned goods, drinks, produce (ripe avocados), baked goods and even piñatas they stock, their meat counter has a large variety of freshly sliced meat not found many other places, meats ready for your Mexican dish.
Back to the restaurant, it is a real taqueria in the true sense, and seats less than 10 people. It is really set up for orders to go. They serve a large variety of tacos, sea food regular and super burritos, combination plates and tortas. And, they have Mexican drinks like (h)orchata, jamaica (hibiscus) and pina (pineapple), along with imported and domestic bottled soft drinks.
The meat selection for the tacos includes asada, adobada, carnitas, pollo asado, lengua, buche, chorizo, tripa de res and pescado (fish). The combination plates include: enchiladas, tamales, chile relleno, quesadillas and more. On Saturday and Sunday you can get menudo and birra (beef).
Each day there is a lunch special for only $5.99. Monday it is a chile verde burrito lunch, Tuesday a chile relleno lunch, Wednesday (all day) one of my favorite Mexican dishes, pozole. Thursday’s special is a tamale lunch and Fridays is a two fish taco lunch. Saturday and Sunday is menudo.
Stop by and check out the store and the taqueria. The taqueria is open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. until 7 p.m., from 9 a.m. until 6 p.m. on Saturday and 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. on Sunday. For more information call 530-295-8121.
Oh, one of my first comments to Vicky was how clean the place was. She looked at me and said, “I haven’t even swept today.” And, if you think you recognize Vicky, she worked at Durango’s, just up the street, for eight years.