King Taco

I really enjoy the food here. What I can’t understand is why I call in my order ahead, do I have to wait like a regular walk in customer. I thought the whole point of taking phone orders was for those like myself who don’t have a lot of time to be waiting. If you could tighten up this process, I’d have zero complaints.

This is by far is the best king taco you can go to. The people that work here are always on point. I’ve been here many times. I even drive pass the peck Rd location to come here because sauce isn’t ever a big deal here. =)

What is up with the flat-​tasting pepsi and dude being super stingy on the salsa verde on the side? So for 5 carne asada tacos, 1 small container of salsa verde is enough? I don’t think so homes. I swear there are only 2 employees here that are worth the dime, the security officer who smiles a lot and of course the other employee i forgot her name. She’s got a light complexion, about 5’5 and freckles. No matter who she serves, she’s always super eager to help and super friendly. She should be running the place.

I don’t think I can go anywhere else for my sopes de lengua. They make them so good here and I am happy to see that they’ve grown and flourished from the small taco shop they used to be.

Second Time Trying King Taco This location looks dirty smells dirty and has alot of rude people.
Sope de Asda Was Good The Pork Tamale Wasnt So Great Burritos Are Tiny

Service could be better, but the burritos, tacos, quesadilla and green chili sauce are super good! However they are really stingy with the sauces which sucks for the people that love to drench their food in it.

Oscar Lopez is probably the best employee they have at that location! As a frequent King taco consumer, I have never had as great of an experience than I had today with Oscar! THANK YOU DUDE YOU ROCK! This man deserves a raise!

Wow this wait is extremely long! And I’m normally not one to complain about wait times because I understand it takes time to cook food! But if ur on ur lunch break you won’t have time to eat here. The cost is high as well, but this is all King tacos. The menu isn’t that broad and I always have an upset tummy after eating here I literally have to ask myself if I’m in the mood to eat here. Normally I will come here with my husband but truthfully I guess I don’t really care for the southern Cali favorite

I said 3 times to cashier no beans. Receipt clearly says no beans. And yet the gal that puts together my order not only put beans, but ratio of beans is more than the Carne Asada. This is like the 5^th time in 6 months. Just destroys the whole experience. God damn.

NOTE: Before you read on, please note that I am writing this review on the basis of my first visit, so take this with a grain of salt. Everyone will have different things to say about this particular location and King Taco as a whole, so my review may not truly represent how many people truly feel about King Taco.
Today I had the opportunity to try King Taco on Garvey Ave. A friend of mine really hyped me up about this «King Taco» place that I had never heard of and had never been to. I say this as a San Gabriel Valley denizen for over 14 years, so you could say it’s ironic that I had never been to such an iconic place. I was very excited and was very curious about King Taco so I told myself, «Why not? It’d be great to try King Taco for the first time!» I ordered 2 carne asada sopes, a carne asada quesadilla (for take-​out), and a hibiscus tea. The moment I walked through the door, I could smell the meat on the grill. I was fortunate enough to come at around 4:15pm, as there was no real line. It did take a while for me to get to the front but at that point, it didn’t bother me. Once I got to the front, I made my order. Interestingly enough, I can’t remember if the lady at the register greeted me. I gave her the benefit of the doubt and assumed that she did. My order came up to $ 13.51, which was very alarming to me because I could have sworn it should only have costed $ 12, give or take 50 cents. I looked at the receipt and noticed that the lady at the register charged me for a large drink. She never asked me if I wanted a regular or a large, so she charged me for a large hibiscus tea. The order took a long time to get to me, and the lady never prompted me to get my hibiscus tea; she did call put to a female customer that her horchata was ready. I don’t even want to delve into the topics of gender or race-​based discrimination here, but if that’s what it comes down to, so be it. One member of the kitchen staff, a moustached man, was very friendly and gave me my food and only 1 pack of salsa verde. King Taco’s policy states that every burrito and/​or 2 tacos or so gets you 1 pack of salsa verde or salsa roja. Additional packs of salsa are 69 cents each. There are way too many kids here and customers here are pretty rude.
As far as the food goes, it wasn’t half bad, bit it wasn’t that good. I never had sopes before, and the hibiscus tea tasted like grape juice. The sopes were good; the corn meal base had refried beans, carne asada, as well as shredded cabbage and crumbled cotija cheese on top. I smothered some salsa verde on top and I would say that it was a good first experience. My only complaints about the food was that I didn’t get very much in terms of quantity and the flavor of the carne asada was, at best, just below average. It had more of a lime-​flavor to it, which isn’t bad; but it only tasted like lime juice and the carne asada was very dry. The cabbage and cotija cheese were probably what made the sopes stand out in regards to flavor. I waited in line to get a refill on my drink, and they told me to waot in line; then they told me only seconds later that I didn’t have to wait in line and told me to go to the front of the line. They tried to charge me 86 cents for a refill on my large hibiscus tea, which I vehemently refused.
The fact that I had to settle for a mediocre meal and a beverage that tastes like grape juice is absolutely pathetic. People on this Unilocal page claim that King Taco is a quintessential gem of SoCal cuisine; I would definitely say otherwise. In-​N-​Out is, by a margin, far better than King Taco. Old-​fashioned burger parlors, fusion food and trendy, unique food concepts are what truly make up SoCal cuisine. King Taco has no place in this category. It doesn’t even come close. Hell, I could settle for Chipotle, although food posoning is still a large issue with them; in fact, I would go so far as to say that Chipotle tastes more authentic than this garbage. Would I ever come back to King Taco? Not to this location, at least. I’ve been told that the store on Peck Road is better. Congratulations, King Taco! You have just lost a potential frequenting customer. With food and service as poor as yours, you won’t get very far. I might only be one person, but believe me: you’ll be in for a surprise.
Service: ²⁄₅
Food: ³⁄₅
Price: ¹⁄₅
Atmosphere: ²⁄₅
Overall: ²⁄₅

The quality of meat is great here and the salsa roja is spicy (as it should be). I would highly recommend the Carne Asada Burrito with jack cheese. It’s pretty much a rolled up quesadilla with asada and all the fixings. Note that this place gets busy in the evenings and late nights on the weekends — you know, for the drunchies.

Love this place! Use to think this place was all hype but I can understand why. The tacos are super tasty and flavorful. I usually go with the basic carne asada tacos with green sauce. Their sauce is also very good. It’s spicy and thick and goes really well with the tacos. Their tacos are packed with meat, actually overpacked! I’ve also gotten the al pastor tacos before and it was good too. Parking isn’t bad too because there’s a lot in the back, and customers come and go so that’s not to worry. Workers are really friendly as well.

Im a big King Taco fan, I had them for the first time at the ford and 3^rd street location in ELOS in the early 80’s
I stopped at the El Monte location, and It was so bad! their service is the worst I have ever seen! I order me 4 Asada tacos, and it took 1 hour waiting to get it, the worst thing was that all of the customers before me were waiting on their tables without food. The ladies here got so behind that the people wanted their money back. I complained and they gave me a BS story on how their number system works, and when I asked for the manager, no one ever came out of the little back room. All of these ladies all they do was talking and making fun on how they felt behind. I love the food, but this is one location that I will never stop again!

This isn’t my first time coming to King Taco but it’s my first time in YEARS. And sadly I was a bit disappointed in their tacos.
I live in the San Gabriel valley and its really hard to find good, even decent taco places around the area. I found a really good taco place in north Pasadena, but it’s just too far to go just for tacos. Because a lot of people say King Taco is good and since it’s a lot closer to me I’ve been wanting to give it a try and I was able to today. I don’t think I’ll be coming back.
The service is good, so nothing wrong with that. It was just that the tacos weren’t hot at all and the taste wasn’t all that great as people would say.
Needless to say, I would still drive further out to north Pasadena to get tacos at La Estrella than King Taco.

RIDICULOUS! $ 4.50 for their regular nachos! Whish was 711 cheese I was so offended when I received my order I demanded a refund.
NEVER EAT HERE!

King Taco has crack in their green sauce and red sauce! I’m not a fan of cilantro at all especially in asian food but it’s delicious in Mexican food especially their green sauce. It’s an addiction literally on anything you order.
I been going to King Taco for years even their other locations on Peck Rd and Pasadena. I started out with their carne asada combination, then I went to all meat carne asada to carne asada tacos, to tamales, to el pastor combination, to el pastor all meat, to beef tongue tacos, and ordering horchata. Yeah, I’m in love with King Taco.
Parking is easy. Security guard on duty. Waiting in line looks long but they are efficient as it gets like Chipotle with workers working on your order and then calling your number in Spanish. If your number doesn’t get noticed, then they will say it in English. Their staff is always friendly and easy to communicate with. By the way, you can only have two sauce for one order depending on the size of the order.
I also like to order a side of their pickled Jalepenos and carrots, that’s when horchata helps you out. It’s spicy. Their red sauce is really spicy as well.
Overall, I’ll have my cravings every so often and come by and pick up an order.

First time here and it is absolutely delicious!
The Al pastor & Carne tacos are good, but I prefer the Al Pastor one, more flavor. The rice was a bit old though, didn’t taste as good with my meat. sigh, I really like Mexican rice too & yes, I like to eat my tacos with rice (I’m too Asian, I grew up eating meat with rice alright).
BTW they use a lot of oil, especially for the Al Pastor, maybe that’s why it taste so good. Their green salsa is not like the green salsa I’m use too. It’s a bit on the spicy side, but I can still handle it.
The only downside to King Taco is …
–they don’t give lemons with the tacos (so sad T_​T)
–place is hella sketchy at night, especially at 2:30AM
–limited English
–water isn’t really clean for their water cups (I suggest getting a soda or something)

The price is on the steeper side for tacos, but was quite delicious. I had tongue tacos, and a tamale. I’d have to say that their tamales was better than their tacos though. Everything gets a bump on flavor with their chipotle red sauce, and it is HOT (for me anyways).
I’d say their red sauce is one of the main stars if their dishes.

King Taco is truly the King of Tacos!
Over 20 of them in the LA area, You have to have been living under a rock if you have never tried King Taco! They are a chain of Mexican fast food restaurants that serve tacos, burritos, nachos, sope, tamales, etc! Visually it looks like any Mexican restaurant, but let me tell you what has got me super hooked on this place. What makes this place soooo addicting is their super yummy «rojo’ sauce which means «red» in spanish! Be careful though, IT’s really really spicy! I usually order their sope, which is a thick corn based tortilla topped with bean spread, your meat of choice (beef, pork, chicken, etc), cheese, cabbage and sauce! Just thinking about it makes my mouth watery! I think I will come here tomorrow! :)
Recommendations:
Tacos, burritos, or Sope with carne asada (beef) and everything on it and RED sauce!

For the longest time, I’ve always wonder why King Taco was so popular.
Among all the Mexican taco spots in El Monte, you would think that this place wouldn’t be so busy. Wrong. This place is always packed at lunch. It is because they are cheap? No. Is it because they have large portions, Nope. If anything, I think they probably have one of the smallest burritos around. Ha!
Then why does everyone keep coming here? Here’s what I’ve noticed. Their locations are usually quite clean looking. Even though they don’t give you free chips or pickled carrots, nor jalapenos, their food is quite consistent. You can nearly expect the same food every time. Here is the main reason why I think people keep coming back. Their salsa. The red sauce is especially spicy, but it’s deceptively addicting. And the workers are super stingy about giving you extra salsa.
What to order? Get the carne asada burrito (to go) or tacos (dine in). Everything else is just sub-​par. Something about their carne asada that sounds out from the rest. I usually Never get carne asada at taco places. But for some reason, I always get the carne asada burrito here.
All in all, King Taco is iconically SoCal. Just like IN N OUT burgers, these things only exist here. You’ve gotta give credit, where credit is due… and I’m not mad at that. Maybe that’s why I keep coming back.