Taste
Taco Revolution It all starts with the tortilla. BY MARYBETH BIZJAK
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spooked by the color of the tortillas or demandatricio Wise remembers the day last ed to know why they couldn’t order a chalupa, or August when his phone started blowing a taco salad. But local chefs like Brad Cecchi and up with congratulations. At first, he Patrick Mulvaney and foodies such as former figured the texts referred to a recent restaurateur Peg Tomlinson-Poswall got it, and rave review in the San Francisco Chronicle for they embraced the innovative new restaurant. his Roseville restaurant, Nixtaco. He soon Enthusiastic media coverage appeared in outlets learned it was something even more momentous: like Eater SF and Food & Wine magazine. The Michelin Guide, bestower of stars on the Alerted by the F&W piece, San Francisco world’s best restaurants, had just given Nixtaco Chronicle reporter Dianne de Guzman drove to its Bib Gourmand award, granted to restaurants Roseville, then wrote a review proclaiming Nixfor serving affordable great food. taco the maker of the best tacos in Northern It was sweet vindication for Wise and his wife California. That started a stampede, with Bay and business partner, Cinthia Martinez, who Area food obsessives coming in droves to try opened Nixtaco six years ago in a Roseville strip Nixtaco for themselves. The Michelin announcemall with an exceedingly ambitious goal: nothment a week later merely amped up the craziing less than to change the paradigm of the ness. People waited hours for a table. Regulars Mexican taqueria. were steamed when they couldn’t get in. Wise The tortilla was key to their concept. The and Martinez worked nonstop for a week. Their couple had grown up in Monterrey, Mexico, three young kids hung out at the restaurant day where Wise recalls his mother making fresh after day, waiting for mom and dad tortillas every day. She would cook AT FIRST, SOME to finish up. “It was a blessing but dried corn kernels, then steep them CUSTOMERS SIMPLY also one of our hardest weeks ever,” in an alkaline solution to soften DIDN’T GET WHAT says Martinez. them, a process called nixtamalizaNIXTACO’S OWNERS WERE Since then, the Bay Area crowds tion. She would take the softened TRYING TO DO. THEY WERE have dispersed and business has corn—the nixtamal—to a local mill SPOOKED BY THE BLUE settled down to a brisk but manageto be turned into masa, which she COLOR OF THE TORTILLAS able level. Wise recently started a used to make tender, flavorful corn OR DEMANDED TO KNOW distillery next door to the restautortillas. WHY THEY COULDN’T rant, making vodka and gin, with As newlyweds, Wise and Martinez ORDER A CHALUPA, plans to eventually make whiskey moved to Roseville in 2010 for Wise’s OR A TACO SALAD. and rum as well. The products are finance job, figuring they’d stay only named after Mexican revolutionaries: Emilia two or three years before returning to Mexico. vodka (for Emiliano Zapata) and Dorotea gin Dining out around the Sacramento region, they (after Doroteo Arango, aka Pancho Villa). “Nixwere unimpressed with the Mexican food availtaco came to revolutionize the taco scene in Sacable. At one place, the tortillas would be good ramento,” says Martinez, explaining the thinking but the meat inferior; at another, the tacos would behind the names. be loaded with lettuce and tomato to hide the Nixtamal tortillas are now showing up in finefact that the shrimp were tiny and tasteless. dining restaurants like the two-Michelin-starred The couple had run a supper club and restauCalifornios in San Francisco, part of what Wise rant back in Mexico, and they saw an opportucalls the “real tortilla movement.” Getting a Bib nity to create a new type of taqueria, with a Gourmand from Michelin was confirmation that focus on fresh, high-quality ingredients. They Wise and Martinez were on to something with invested in commercial milling equipment to their blue tortillas and creative taco fillings such make their own nixtamal tortillas fresh every as shrimp with beer-and-cheese sauce, peanutday from heirloom blue corn grown in Mexico. chipotle aioli and chicharron powder. The paraWhen they opened Nixtaco in 2016, their sigdigm, it seems, has shifted. nature product, based on Wise’s favorite Monterrey taco, was the Chicharron: soft chunks of braised pork belly topped with pickled red onion NIXTACO and served on two blue-corn tortillas. 1805 Cirby Way, Roseville At first, some customers simply didn’t get what (916) 771-4165; nixta.co Wise and Martinez were trying to do. They were
Assorted tacos: pollo en mole, rajas con queso and pork al pastor
Guacamole, chips and salsa board
f r a n c i s c o c h av i r a
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SACRAMENTO MAGAZINE August 2022
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