These Gas Station Tacos Are a Cheap, Plentiful Marvel

Getting tacos from an unnamed place in a Chevron and finding some incredible barbacoa is like discovering you're able to sense something in the future. Stumbling on something so unexpectedly great is like you’ve discovered you have a superpower.

We’re not claiming anyone at the Observer has superpowers, but we can at least do the service of letting you know about the taco window at Chevron Fuel Town No. 2.

On the exterior of the building are bold letters reading “TACOS.” An orange awning beneath reads “TAQUERIA//ABIERTO 24 HRS.”

We expected something like some picadillo with standard toppings and instead found a taco menu with fajita beef or chicken, pastor, carnitas, lengua and barbacoa. Each for just $1.69.

Ordering at the exterior window, we list off what we want while an employee scribbles a Sharpie on a sticky note. She asks if we’re paying by card or cash. We say card, she tells us to go inside, pay and bring back a receipt.

Doing so, the gas station cashier takes us at our word when simply saying “nine tacos.” We walk out with a receipt for about $17 (we got a lot of tacos), hand it over to the employee and wait. But not long.

Soon, we get to-go containers filled with tacos. While the menu says you can buy salsa for 25 cents, you don’t need to. They provide plenty in both red or green — we’re pretty sure that green is a habanero that is determined to test how much heat we can handle. But it’s delicious. Even if it makes you sweat. And cry.

The tacos themselves already look better than we expect. Full of meat, these tacos don’t look like we got them at the same place you can buy windshield wiper fluid and Red Bull. We are in District 6 in Dallas, where the best tacos seem to be anyway, so maybe that has something to do with it.

The meat is all fresh and tender, especially the lengua. The barbacoa is on par with some of the best we’ve tried elsewhere: full of flavor, sticky and juicy.

We see the usual fresh, white onion mixed with cilantro, but also long strips of sauteed onion, giving us another level of flavor we weren’t expecting.

There are breakfast tacos, too (for nearly a dollar more at $2.49), and we’re curious to try their chorizo. Burritos, a quesadilla, tortas and burgers (?) also fit onto this menu, a large sticker on one of the sliding order windows.

Getting tacos at this Fuel Town gas station is fast, inexpensive and shocking with such a good barbacoa.

Chevron Fuel Town No. 2, 1525 Inwood Road (Northwest Dallas)