One of Fort Worth’s favorite taco stands finds a new home on the west side
Mariachi’s Dine-In was already drawing crowds, and then owner Ashley Miller had an idea.
“I said, ‘Let’s try to do a vegan taco,’ ” she remembered.
Two years later, Mariachi’s is about to move up from its cluttered convenience-store location east of downtown to a glossy new restaurant off Camp Bowie Boulevard.
Soon, chef Angel Fuentes’ tacos, burgers and vegan or non-dairy items will be coming to a strip shopping center at 5724 Locke Ave., the former home of much-missed Mariposa’s Latin Kitchen.
“I’d been looking at that spot all along,” Miller said last week in the spartan dining room at the current location, a well-worn gas station grill at 301 S. Sylvania Ave. “I can’t tell you what a blessing this is for us.”
Mariachi’s is known for Fuentes’ exceptional Monterrey-style street tacos, burritos, tortas and salsas. The namesake “Mariachi” is a loaded flour taco with fried poblano and guajillo sauce, or try the birria tacos.
Vegan patrons order from the same full menu, not some limited selection. The tacos or tortas are made with vegan cheese or queso, soy-based pastor or chorizo and the same outstanding grilled veggies and peppers.
It’s become one of the most popular restaurants in town for vegans, along with Spiral Diner and salad-friendly Local Foods Kitchen.
The new west side Mariachi will add dinner platters and mixed drinks.
And for the first time, it’ll be attractive to “Dine-In.”
“Some families are always having to decide — ‘Your restaurant or my restaurant?’ Now they’ll be able to get it all,” Miller said. “It’s a place where dads can get steak quesadillas, and a daughter can get her bean quesadilla, if that’s what she wants.”
The birria is made with either beef or jackfruit. The elote is topped with Valentina, crema and cotija cheese, or vegan crema and cheese.
Even the burger comes as the superstar “La Charra” with beef, pastor, cheese, avocado, cilantro, tomato and onion, or in a soy-based version.
Mariachi’s simple menu and niche appeal kept it busy in a pandemic year, along with the booming popularity of birria tacos.
On the west side, Mariachi’s moves into a familiar location where Mariposa’s ruled before taking a much-publicized developer’s offer for a Willow Park location that has never materialized. (It was briefly Fivi’s Kitchen.)
The current Mariachi’s Dine-In opens for lunch and dinner Tuesdays through Saturdays; 682-760-9606, mariachisdinein.com.
This story was originally published March 23, 2021 at 5:45 AM.
