Revisiting La Herradura in New Rochelle

A year or two ago, I finally made it to La Herradura and had one of the better tacos I’ve ever had in the Tristate area. Hand made tortilla, flavorful grilled skirt steak (really), guacamole, etc. It was awesome. I’ve recommended the place pretty highly based on that one taco and the fact that the interior isn’t dingy – which is generally the case with the places I like.

But Laylag’s post here had me concerned: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/48539…
So, I decided to go back there yesterday and check it out. Boy was I disappointed. It didn’t even seem like the same food.

Like laylag experienced, the only salsa was the table salsa, which is a tomato sauce concoction. Bad and boring.

I ordered two tacos – grilled steak (same one that enthralled me last time) and a shrimp taco. My wife order flautas, and the kids had a variety of dishes.

First, no more hand made tortillas. Same tortillas that you get anywhere.

Second, they put lettuce on their taco. What??? Granted, these were their “Herradura” style tacos, which I’ve now realized must mean “Gringo” taco to them. You get guac, lettuce and pay $2 more per taco.. But last time I went and ordered it, it certainly didn’t have lettuce. That’s an unforgiveable abomination in my book.

The steak was still pretty good, but not great. The guacamole was OK. But overall, extremely average.
My shrimp taco was actually pretty good, but for $4 bucks, it better be.

Wife’s flautas were quite poor and everything else we ordered was your standard typical east coast bad mexican. Really disappointing.

What’s happened? Was my first visit a crazy anomaly? But if they were hand making their tortillas when I went the first time, that’s not something they do just on some odd night… that’s very a deliberate attempt to go above and beyond. It takes skill and dedication to hand make tortillas for a restaurant operation.

So I’m guessing they’ve changed their cooking staff or something? The menus look exactly the same though.

Anyhow, sadly, I can’t recommend it any longer. But, at least there are still 4 other above average Mexican places within walking distance.

[originally posted on chowhound]