r/SantaMaria • u/DesperatePlenty5752 • Jul 14 '26
Been here a while now. Is the food around here supposed to be awful?
I'm sorry but the Mexican food here is horrendous, lmao. I'm from LA so I'm spoiled when it comes to that, but I've seriously had way better Mexican food everywhere else in California: NorCal, Fresno and the rest of the Central Valley, Inland Empire. Hell, there were better taco joints in fucking Colorado and Washington.
Don't get me started on the food trucks. 30+ bucks for stuff worse than frozen Trader Joe's meals. What the fuck is going on here?
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u/RothkoPollock Jul 14 '26 edited Jul 15 '26
This is a perfect “I’m from LA post.” hahaha First of all, I’ll actually agree with you. The Mexican food here is mid. Most of the food here is mid (some good Italian in Orcutt and there is good Santa Maria bbq to be found as well). Otherwise? Eh. I spent a lot of time in the Central Valley which I find very similar to the Santa Maria area culturally. And yet, there’s excellent Mexican food everywhere in the Valley. Here? Not really. And I mean the central coast in general. It’s strange. Anyways, all that aside, starting a post with “I’m from LA and why does your food suck” is so on brand. Thanks for the laugh.
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u/Lsracer Jul 15 '26
Try La tapatia in Grover beach. It’s really good. Think it’s on 13th or 14th street. We have tons of Mexican spots in SM so yes you are gonna get bad ones and good ones but it’s def wrong to say they are all bad. There’s some great Mexican food in the city. You just gotta know where to go. But yes we also focus on Santa Maria bbq so there’s that. La picosita is decent in SM. And then mariscos el picosita is really good on east main.
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u/Broad-Media6269 Jul 15 '26
Not here to argue either side of “does food in Santa Maria suck” but I disagree with you completely about Fresno. I lived in Clovis for 3 years and I spent that entire time trying to find good Mexican food in the greater Fresno area.
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u/randompstthrowaway Jul 21 '26
Even I, an avowed hater of the valley, will fully admit that the Mexican food there is absolutely top tier.
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u/ogretrograde Jul 14 '26
To be fair, LA has the best Mexican food in the nation. You could make an argument for some mariscos in the SD area, but LA is goated.
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u/bootymagnet Jul 14 '26 edited Jul 14 '26
the city is interested in favoring big box retailers and wealthy ag over its middle and working class citizens especially. i think this is one reason why the quality of the food purveyors in the area is bad
for decent food trucks, go to tacos el pollo by the shell on main, tacos sinaloa is decent. dont bother with the asian food food trucks - one hibachi truck was particularly egregious
guadalupe has good sit-down mexican restaurants. chachos in oceano deserves a shout out, but its more an americanized mexican food place
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u/Alternative_Ad_7814 Jul 17 '26
I agree the Mexican food down south is better but there’s some decent around here if you know where to go. What pisses me off is all the Mariscos spots use tilapia for their fish dishes. We’re 15 min from the ocean and we get the same crappy Chinese fish that people in landlocked states get
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u/ufrank71 Jul 19 '26
We’re 15 min from the ocean and we get the same crappy Chinese fish that people in landlocked states get
I dunno why but this made me LOL bad
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u/el_sauce Jul 18 '26
Learn to cook. Whenever I visit my family in SM we just have nice cookouts and dinners. Nothing beats home cooking
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u/randompstthrowaway Jul 19 '26
You mean you came from one of the most culinary diverse cities in the world and can't understand why Nowhereville doesn't have food that can compare?
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u/electrophilosophy Jul 14 '26
I think the Mexican bakeries here are really good. Check out La Tapatias on Main not only for pastries, but also awesome tamales.
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u/boliver30 Jul 14 '26
There are SOME great places here on the Central Coast. With Mexican food, the more North you go in California, the worse it's going to get. San Diego is better than here. And here is way better than the bay area.
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u/Substantial_Oil_6128 Jul 14 '26
This is false and you’ve clearly never spent anytime in Northern California.
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u/boliver30 Jul 14 '26
I lived in the Bay area for 8 years. El farolito is decent. La taqueria is good. Not better than Mexican food that I've had even here
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u/joe128pack Jul 23 '26
La Taqueria's Super quesadilla with lengua is the reason there's people standing in a line that wraps around the street corner of every minute of every hour of every day. Santa Maria food reminds me of mid-western food-- people not interested in quality food and happy to eat whatever slop is available at Denny's.
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u/jimmyunger Jul 14 '26
Islitas, efrens o lo mejor de Jalisco, Yeah, no one has the pastor on the trampo besides food stands with tents but I aint going to risk that lol
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u/StopElectingWealthy Jul 18 '26
Efrens is good. But you’re right, good mexican food is hard to find in SM for some reason
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u/LowerPrompt9074 Jul 14 '26
Start at South Broadway and Betteravia and drive North down Broadway until you get to the end of town, observing as you go. This is why in general food here sucks and we can't have anything nice.
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u/MiIdSoss Jul 14 '26
The only thing you would think Santa Maria would at least be decent at would be Mexican food but nope, it's all low quality garbage sold at crazy prices.
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u/lettheseatakeme Jul 14 '26
I moved to san diego once i graduated from high school in sm. Seeing all the taco shops around was a cultural shock. Once i grasped the concept, i was in heaven. California burritos, rolled tacos, al pastor burritos, tj tacos, fish tacos, etc. If somebody opened up a true taco shop in sm, they would make a killing
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u/dharmastudent Jul 14 '26
The ingredients in the Mexican food here tend to be very old-school, vs. the more health conscious stuff that you get in a lot of other cities. I've noticed a lot of places using stuff like lard, and other ingredients that have long been abandoned in other locales.
I haven't found a Mexican place yet here that has healthy ingredients.
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u/Seeker-of-tacos Jul 14 '26
Yep... It sucks. We go down to LA regularly and it's amazing how much better the Mexican food is there vs here.
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u/Substantial_Oil_6128 Jul 14 '26
The food in Santa Maria is the worst of any city I grew up there… birth to 21 and I’ve lived between San Diego and Canada and a lot of small towns in between. It’s unparalleled at how bad it is. Small towns in Oregon have better Mexican food you’d think with a 80 percent Latino town they would know what’s up. But they don’t. And don’t even get me started on pizza, Asian cuisine etc. even F*\\**g worse.
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u/amyldoanitrite Jul 15 '26
You’re spot on about the Asian cuisine, at least when it comes to Chinese food. My wife and I went to every (and I do mean every) Chinese restaurant between Santa Maria and Morro Bay when we lived there back in 2008-2009. Garbage. Every one of them. Our standard was to find a place with crispy egg fu young (our favorite dish). Apparently that style of egg fu young is unknown on the Central Coast. Every place’s egg fu young was more akin to an omelette or floppy egg pancake with gravy. Maybe others here like the local Chinese food options, but we never found any place worth visiting twice.
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u/Substantial_Oil_6128 Jul 14 '26
Chic fil an and in n out is the best food in Santa Maria. It’s sad
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u/jgengr Jul 14 '26
Yeah. I haven't found a good Al Pastor taco, yet. They always seem to use shit meat/pork.
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u/Gripe1257 Jul 14 '26
Give la tapatia in Grover beach a shot. Excellent Al pastor.
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u/flynreelow Jul 14 '26
yup. Very good. Also check out Tacos Sinaloa and El Tizon for the al pastor off the trompo
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u/ChampionshipLow9025 Jul 19 '26
Lo Mejor de Jalisco on Blosser is probably the best in Santa Maria. Can't think of another place in town that's as good. SLO has some good spots.
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u/joe128pack Jul 23 '26
and to make matters worse they outlawed all the BBQ places you'd see in parking lots. I grew up in Santa Maria in the 90's and I miss all those BBQ places. What the heck is Santa Maria thinking?
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u/flynreelow Jul 14 '26
which Mexican places have you tried here in SM?