Austinist's Top Five Veggie Breakfast Tacos

Narrowing down the vast selection of tacos found in Austin is a near-impossible feat … and claiming to be experts on the Tex-Mex folds is an assertion worthy of an internet ass-kicking. But we have eaten our fair share of breakfast tacos, sport tongues trained for tortilla-tasting, and feel pretty much obligated to share our worthy opinions with alla y’all. (And we’re ready for whatever verbal lashings come our way.) With that, we give you:

Austinist’s Top Five Veggie Breakfast Tacos!!

#1 Torchy’s Dirty Sanchez Taco ($3.50)

With three-item breakfast tacos offered all day for only $2.00, why would anyone opt for the pricier Sanchez? Because it’s heavenly, that’s why! Torchy’s isn’t shy on eggs—a soft, steaming pile of ‘em sets the foundation atop a flour tortilla. Next comes tempura-coated poblano peppers, fried to golden perfection, and tangy sticks of escabeche (pickled) carrots. A decent amount of fresh guacamole (never a brown spot) fits in there somehow, and the whole thing is topped with finely shredded cheese and comes with just the right amount creamy poblano ranch. You really couldn’t find a more perfect combination of colors, flavors, and textures, and the finished it pretty giant to boot. Eat it for breakfast, lunch, dinner … or all three, really.

Torchy’s Tacos
1207 S. 1st Street
Monday-Wednesday, 7am-10pm
Thursday-Sunday, 8am-11pm

#2 Quack’s Maplewood Icehouse’s Luna Taco ($2.99)

Ever show up to Quack’s on 43rd Street, only to find a cat’s cradle of laptop cords and scattered seats filled by all the devoted regulars who’ve been there all morning? Fear not: Quack’s Maplewood cousin is just across I-35 and offers an entire menu of snacks, salads, sandwiches, burgers, and tacos, as well as homemade baked goods from the O.G. Bakery. Save the Luna for those mornings when you wake up ravenous because the thing is as big as your head. Eggs, cheese, vegetarian black beans, homemade soyrizo, and green onions fill a big, soft flour tortilla. But the best part has to be the crunchy, golden “needle and thread potatoes” on top, a textural phenomenon made even better awith an avocado added to the mix. Feeling creative? Opt for the Artist Taco ($2.25 for any three items) and choose from any of the Luna ingredients, as well as cilantro lime rice, fried tofu, vegetarian refried beans, and regular sausage and chorizo. Salsa options include pico de gallo, fresh roasted red salsa, or their special guajillo blend.

Quack’s Maplewood Icehouse
1400 E. 38th Street
Monday-Friday, 7am-2pm
Saturday-Sunday, 8am-2pm

#3 El Chilito’s Migas Taco ($1.95)

Many a silent, hung-over brunch has been suffered at El Chilito, and we mean that in the best way possible. After a successful night of heavy drinking, there’s nothing we want more than a hot taco served up by the same tattooed hipster girls we partied with the night before (how do they get up so early?) Their migas taco doesn’t look particularly appetizing but never fails to satisfy—soft egg, melted cheese, and crunchy tortilla strips come together with finely chopped tomato, onion, and Serrano peppers. Order it on corn tortillas, if you know what’s good for you, and don’t forget to ask for their smooth, smoky salsa too (some people swear by it, others it grows on, but either way you’ll end up liking it). Order a frozen sangria to go with it and start to nurse the pain away. You’ll thank us later.

El Chilito
2225 Manor Road
Monday-Friday, 7am-10pm
Saturday, 8am-10pm
Sunday, 8am-9pm

#4 Mr. Natural’s Veggie Chorizo ($1.85) & Wheatsville’s Vegan Sausage ($1.40)

There’s nothing like waking up, gorging yourself with a lardy breakfast taco, then returning to bed for a nap … right? Well … sometimes. But if you’re feeling “healthy” or whatever, you might want to crunch on something with a little more sustenance, like these tacos (they tied!) from two of Austin’s hippie-food Meccas. Mr. Natural’s flavorful veggie chorizo goes nicely with potato, egg, rice and cheese, wrapped in wheat or corn tortillas so fresh you know someone’s Abuelita just pressed ‘em. They also throw in a little cup of hot sauce that has just the right kick to get you going, but make sure you ask for napkins—beware the chorizo juice! Wheatsville’s similar version is a bit bigger and a less oily with brown rice instead of the sticky short grain used at Mr. Natural and vegan sausage that is milder )but just as delicious and less messy.) Of course, wheat tortillas are the norm (it isn’t called Cornsville, after all!) and for salsa choose from casera (mild red), verde (mild green), hot chipolte, or the monthly special (this month: roasted pineapple…mmm!) Both versions are topped with a generous serving of veggies: lettuce, tomato, onion, sprouts, and jalapeños. Forget the nap! At this rate, you may even be inspired to do some post-breakfast yoga.

Wheatsville Food Co-Op
3101 Guadalupe
Daily, 9am-11pm

Mr. Natural
1901 E. Cesar Chavez
Monday-Saturday, 8am-8pm
2414 S. Lamar
Monday-Saturday, 9am-9pm

#5 Tamale House’s Egg, Rice & Guacamole Taco ($.85)

To enjoy Tamale House, one has to enter the premises knowing several things. Don’t ask too many questions. (Why are the eggs so fluffy? You probably don’t want to know. Where are the tamales? Clearly you’re a first-timer.) Don’t judge the guacamole but do fear the beans. Bring cash, order fast, and don’t bother taking a seat because your food will be done and bagged up before you can utter an ignored, “Thank you.” The place is essentially kind of trife (hence, ridiculously cheap) but there’s a reason they’ve been around for so long. Try their egg and rice taco and add guacamole to it for a couple cents more—suspiciously light and airy eggs, flavorful rice morsels, and guac that’s been shamelessly cut with lettuce and God knows what else. Get it on a wheat tortilla and don’t be shy about helping yourself to one of the consistently good and spicy salsas kept in topless Tupperware bottles.

Tamale House #3
5003 Airport Boulevard
Monday-Saturday, 6:30am-3pm

*Note: All these places serve breakfast tacos for the entire time they’re open … as it should be! Tacodeli’s El Popeye taco (eggs, spinach, queso fresco) was a close contender but you can only get it up until 11am … for shame!

Photo by GypsyRock on Flickr

Contact the author of this article or email tips@austinist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By v_meewes in Food on September 4, 2007 5:08 PM 0 Comments

Comments [rss]

guest

If Im pro-choice, then eggs aren't meat. right?

oh,

check out taco town dot org for da real austin taco skinny. including a nice review of the Sanchez. gracias.

guest

bouldin has great veggie and vegan tacos (awesome tofu scramble). how could you forget about them? long live the neil.

Benj

You could say it's a chicken-and-egg argument.

guest

Not that those hens don't get to mingle with the roosters, but that they're constantly caged. Also, I know roosters are tenacious creatures and if they have any means of breaking into a hen house and have chicken sex, they will. That's why your factory eggs might sometimes get fertilized.

guest

Sometimes eggs get fertilized if they're farm fresh or free range. The hen that live in tiny cages and don't get to roam and have no access to roosters usually do not get their eggs fertilized. If I were a vegetarian and concerned about animal welfare, I wouldn't be eating eggs for that reason alone.

guest

okay, whatev. but the stem cell analogy works regardless.

Scooby

#17, the average egg breakfast taco with no cheese and no meat has 1 or 2 animal cells in it. Grade A Milk is allowed to have about 3/4 million animal cells per milliliter (mostly white blood cells), or a couple of hundred million animal cells per serving.

Enjoy your dairy products.

guest

ugh quack's maplewood. i wont eat there again for the last 2 times there were over a dozen flies cruising in the pastry counter and enjoying their breakfast, while the staff behind said counter didn't give a shit...

Sam Armstrong

Fallopian tubes aren't the new earbuds? What?

guest

I don't eat eggs because they taste like shit and smell like day old shit.

guest

Ummmm, #17, I'm sorry to say this, but that is the DUMBEST thing I have ever heard.

Animal by-products are animal by-products.

But hey, that's your deal. Eat, not eat, whatever. Be merry.

guest

Most vegetarians eat eggs because, as previous posters have pointed out, they are not fertilized. My reasoning for not eating eggs is that they're still animal *cells*, while milk is not. Just my personal view.

guest

strange that someone who isn't a vegetarian holds a higher standard about what is and isn't meat than any actual vegetarians i know.

Sam Armstrong

#14, I think you can also purchase at Hoffbrau.

guest

mmmmm.... can't wait to get down the B'n'R after work for a bloody fetus shake. y'all are making me hungry.

Sam Armstrong

OK I gots to say, this is one of my favorite things ever:

ya'll left out wheatsville breakfast tacos cause I guess ya'll are dumb.

guest

Please remember these eggs we refer to are not fetuses!! They are unfertilized much like the egg a women discards during menstruation.

Equating human embryos to eggs in a taco is like saying we're in Iraq because of 9/11 and Al Quaida.

The two are completely separate.

OK what prize do I win for taking a discussion about breakfast tacos and relating it to the war in Iraq?

guest

ya'll left out wheatsville breakfast tacos cause I guess ya'll are dumb.

guest

Edie:

The eggs are not fertilized! If you left one under a heat lamp, a chicken would not develop inside.

Remember how sexual reproduction works? That applies to chickens too.

Edie

Okay. Maybe egg *whites* are vegetarian, but *yolks* are not. ...Because yolks are future chicken people, and white is merely their sustenance...?

Scooby, why does somebody hafta to get all angry every time someone else makes a joke?

Fuckin relax.

All I'm saying is, it's ironic (regular ironic, not 'beard ironic') how some people say stem cells are 'life', but a cheese omelet is 'dairy'. If you take a bunch of third trimester abortions, and blend them all up, and put whipped cream on top, it's not something you can really expect to find at Baskin Robbins.

Sure, the meat material has yet to be reorganized by the influx of the expected other half of DNA, but still: every once in a while, you crack open an egg and you get a little vein, or maybe an eyeball. Yum.

guest

Sorry sweetish chef, but I think the comments section might have beat out your article as far as entertainment value goes...still informative though.

Question: Are eggs vegetarian like placentas are vegetarian?

guest

mmmmm.... can't wait to dig in to my morning menstrual flow...

Jros

Gypsy Grove taco at Foodheads (34th at Guadalupe)

Scooby

To continue the nasty ass analogies, eggs aren't meat for the same reason menstrual flow isn't a baby.

Does every mention of vegetarian restaurants have to trigger some anonymous guest sniping about how "that isn't really vegetarian"?

Bre

"aborted fetuses aren't breast milk"

That. Is. Awesome. And bizarre.

Some vegetarians eat eggs. Then again, some vegetarians aren't really vegetarians. Flexitarians, more like.

I hope modam doesn't see this post.

Sam Armstrong

Wait .. semen isn't yogurt?

guest

Great write-up. Polvo's Exotic with Caliente is a personal favorite. But still, my favorite Austin-oriented debate, by far. And props to Quack's for the unconventional tofu taco. Vegetarians need hangover fare too.

Speaking of, not to be all nit-picky, but vegetarians can't eat egg. Egg is meat. Egg is pre-animal, not animal lactate. Egg is meat for the same reason aborted fetuses aren't breast milk and semen isn't yogurt. Sorry to be all gross, but eggs are gross.

Sadly, a search for a true vegetarian or vegan taco in any city is bound to be more brief and less interesting than the effort above. Sigh.

Not that I'm a veggie anyway.

Do fish tacos next!