Sahuayo Meat Market & Taqueria

In an area where good Mexican food is dense, this gem shines like the glistening of chiccharons freshly pulled from the vat. Like my boys Incubus said like a thousand diamonds strewn across a blue blanket.
Sometimes hole the wall places are hard to find, but not here. Look for all the pork names across the red building off Pomona West of Main. You must first differentiate between the carniceria or the restaurant. Both are mislabeled here on Unilocal.The restaurant @ 165 has the correct name just placed over the old one, so you’ll see taco, carnitas sahuayo and chicharrones in a jumbled mess and next door the carniceria @ 155 is Sahuayo meat market.
I know most people think they love carnitas because they think it’s that stuff you get at Chipotle or it’s that fried pork you get at other places, but my food game is on point and I’ve spent time around enough Mexican grandmothers who know that true Carnitas is slow cooked and in copper kettles made famous from Chihuahua. I’ts not pork butt like American BBQ’rs use, but pork shoulder, lard and spices. I’ve seen people use orange juice and coca cola for the marinade to try and get some flavors prior to cooking, both are good, but part of the process is the temperature, it’s quite low and it’s slow, but still fried, just not flash fried.
I love saying the name Sahuayo, but I love eating here more. They cook the whole pig, the bits and pieces of the face, ears, check, tail, feet if you ask nicely. They have a huge put they fry in, a BTU burner that’s worthy and a flat top grill for plating and prepping their already cooked pig parts.
The menu is certainly pork centric so looking for barbacoa and other beef cuts besides asada is difficult. They do good taco’s. Not the freshest tortilla’s as they aren’t hand made, the condiments aren’t the star here, but they do an ok job of cilantro, rabanos (radishes), spicey carrots and with salsa’s. Honestly their pork is so well cooked and with the right amount of fat and salty flavor you don’t need salsa, which tends to be too acidic or vinegary. Taco’s are easy to plate and ready, but their burrito’s are lacking in construction and ratio. Nothing wrong with massive amounts of meat, but some offsetting color or texture would be nice, otherwise it’s a dumpling, an enormous dumpling which needs sauce.
Service is ok, it might help if you can speak a little Spanish, plus you don’t want to get caught as they are cash only, the market across the street has an ATM. I don’t speak or didn’t lead on that I do a little, but I order my food just fine. It’s a little more café than restaurant and the prices are good considering you don’t get pork cut or cooked like this anywhere else, not even around here.
Décor is basic and almost unfinished looking, maybe seems a little less than clean, but it’s hole in the wall so it gets some slack cut. It’s very traditional. If you like taco’s and you like pork, all kinds of pork, come here. If my heart and my doctor would let me I’d come here just to eat chicharones, but there’s not enough Lipitor to counter the divine swine they serve here.

The food is DEEELISCIOUS! I KEEP GOING BACK DESPITE THE AWKWARD SERVICE! This place has its old town charm. The service is somewhat friendly & They tend to want to charge after you eat. but honestly Try to pay up front so u can leave quickly when you are done. Otherwise you are waiting forever and the girls «accidentally» overcharge for things you didn’t order. keep a good inventory and pay up front…