Food may be alright, but travelers be warned!
Protip#1: If you're on a time crunch and don't have a fancy hour to snooze until you hit the roads again, just go the local Subway/fast-food joints.
It took 20 minutes for the food to be prepared and served.
Protip#2: Food mishaps may happen.
There was a confusion and they got the order wrong - no meat please, but we got it. +10 more minutes to bring back the corrected dish.
Protip#3: If you have a special diet, they won't accommodate.
Although there are dishes vegetarians can enjoy, it was quite the surprise when I couldn't order a veggie burrito because all of the options had meat in them and the only accommodation they would make was a "rice and bean" burrito. No thanks, not for $6.
Vegan? Forget about it.
+Pro (compliment): Pupusas were fairly large, about 6 inches in diameter!
+Pro (compliment): Food tasted alright, although it could have more flavor to it.
All in all, it may be a nice place... if you simply have the time and will.
Tita's has gone down hill a bit. I'm not sure if they switched owners or something, but for the last 3 or 4 years the al pastor, which used to be some of the best I have ever tasted, now tastes kind of bland. Everything is still decent, and it certainly is better than anything within around 100 miles but it used to be like "how may more miles til Tita's ... I can't wait ... must have tacos/papusas now!" Now its just a good place to stop while driving along the 5.
Review Source:I'll keep this short, as not much needs to be said about this place. Â It's good food on an otherwise barren stretch of road that stretches from the greater LA area North, until you reach civilization in either Sacramento or the Bay Area. Â
Pupusas: respectable, better than most in LA. Â
Burritos: specify spicy and it shall be so. Â Otherwise, they tend to cater towards clientele lacking flavor tolerance. Â Jalapenos (added at no additional cost) were much appreciated. Â As was the enormous portion size. Â
Other stuff: tacos were fine. Â
Generally: good. Â Which seems impossible, given the location. Â Driving N or S? Â Stop here. Â 'Nuff said.
We've been to Tita's a few times now in the past 2 years, on each of our 3 road trips to SoCal. Â I'm not sure we'll be stopping again.
Yes, I like their pupusas, with sofrito and the hot sauce, washed down with a bottle of cold Negro Modelo. Â It's far better than the typical chain restaurant option off the 5 freeway. Â Yet here's why I hesitate to go back:
1. Â Too damn slow. Â Is there someone growing the corn out back to make the masa before making the pupusas? Â I wish getting pupusas to eat did not entail an hour or more long pit stop. Â When you're tired and itching to get back on the freeway, an hour is just too long.
2. Other items are ho-hum. Â My girls get tacos or quesadillas while my husband has tried burritos, tacos, etc. Â He likes their lengua, but I haven't been impressed by the other food. Â The guacamole was particularly disappointing--it tasted like bland mushy avocado. Â Where's the kick? Â In fact, in addition to missing spices, where's the salt?
3. There's always some loud futbol game or telenovela blaring on the TV. Â After being cooped up in a car for 3 hours, the last thing I want is more noise. Â Normally, I don't care about that sort of thing (heck, my favorite Korean hole-in-the-wall restaurant always has Korean soap operas on at such a high volume that the cook in the back can hear it!). Â But I'm looking for a restful break when I'm on the road.
Notice I didn't comment on cleanliness or decor. I don't expect much from my hole-in-the-wall restaurants and Tita's is actually a little nicer than some of my favorite ones. Â They have clear vinyl covering the tables, so yes, elbows will stick to it. Â They have lots of fake plants and random beer posters. Â Whatever. Â It's not a place you'd choose to celebrate a special occasion and it's far cleaner than most places (especially if you've traveled outside the US and Europe).
Suffice to say, on our way home from our last trip, we decided to just stop at In-N-Out. Â Not as unique, no beer options, and not as fast as other chains, but still better than the ordeal of waiting at Tita's when you're tired and cranky!
I have eaten here twice over the past 5 years--the quality of their pupusa has not declined. Â They are fantastic!!. Ordered 3 different ones: Â cheese&bean, cheese and lorca and cheese&pork. Â Now these pupusas take time to make, so do not order unless you are willing to wait. Â Take the hispanic kim chee, cover your pupusa, then drench in the red sauce from the squirt bottle. Â AAHHhhh...heaven. No match in LA that I have found.
Review Source:2 words....worth it! I drove through with my  husband and we waited about 10-15 minutes. I figured it was because they made it to order. It was true cause our pupusas were piping hot and delicious. The cortido was quite good too. The service was great and now when we travel through, we make a mandatory pit stop. It's worth the extra stop, I recommend it. Next to try is the truck!
Review Source:Very briefly- I'll write an extended review later- the food is better than average (better than expected for Buttonwillow), and nicely priced, but the customer service sensibilities really need a LOT of help.
The various other reviewers complaints about slow service or imperfect hygiene are on the mark.
On the plus side, if you have the TIME, the food is good and served in generous portions. Considering the location (Buttonwillow), you can do a LOT worse.
If you need it fast, then go get fast food.
Roadtrip + hungry kids in the middle of nowhere + not many choices. So, if you have an hour to spare, it was a-ok. Â Took forever and honestly, it looked dirty--tables, bathrooms. Â I am not surprised about folks complaining about roaches and flies. Â Ugh. That is what sucks about roadtrips, all junkie dives or fastfood. I was scared of the beans so had corn tamales which were not bad. Quesadillas for kids and shrimp tacos for hubby. Â A-ok.
Review Source:I was very pleasantly surprised by this restaurant. I live in Southern California where good, authentic Mexican food is everywhere!
My mom ordered the enchiladas with rice and beans platter and the cheese enchiladas were delicious! We're particular about the red sauce that comes on the enchiladas and their sauce was very good.
I had a hard beef taco and the meat was absolutely fabulous. I feel like I could have eaten four of those tacos. I also ordered a bean and cheese burrito made enchilada style and the server was really helpful and the cook made a special order for me because they didn't have the sauce ready-made so they accommodated my request very nicely.
We also tried the bean and cheese pupusa and I thought it was delicious. I added some of their fabulous salsa and sour cream and it was outstanding.
The food here was great and the service was even better!
What's a Pupusa you ask? Â Well, I didn't know either so don't feel bad. Â The definition is: a traditional Salvadoran dish made of a thick, handmade corn tortilla (made using masa de maÃz, a maize flour dough used in Latin American cuisine) that is usually filled with a blend of the following:
cheese (queso) (usually a soft cheese called Quesillo found in all Central America)
cooked pork meat ground to a paste consistency (called chicharrón, not to be confused with fried pork rind, which is also known as chicharrón in some other countries)
refried beans (frijoles refritos), or queso con loroco (loroco is a vine flower bud from Central America).
Well now that that is out of the way, They are delicious! Â We stopped here on way from LA to San Fran, while it not quite have the way, it is pretty close. Â We tried a bunch of "Mexican" dishes, but the Salvadorian Pupusa was best. Â The 4 stars is for that and the great service. Â
It is definitely worth a try.
#Yelp100
Best carnitas taco I have ever had!
My friend just came back from Costa Rica recently and she and I made a trip down to San Diego together. Â I am a foodie at heart, and love trying new restaurants and hole in the walls.
I saw this food truck on my left as I stopped to pour gas and I gave it a try.
The Pupusas are better than the ones in Costa Rica she told me. Â They were pretty good with its cheesy goodness. Â And I will definitely get another order when I am in the area, but I have to tell you to try the Carnita Tacos! Â These tacos were the best and most flavorful carnita tacos, I have had.
I have been doing Taco Tuesdays for the last month and a half trying new taco places, and these tacos are divine. Â At $1.75 each, add one of these bad boys to your pupusa order and go to food heaven.
Delicious food but a horrible waitresses. Been here 3 times now for the food but putting up with the service is such a pain. The location is really convenient being right off the freeway and it is definitely at least the second best place to eat in all of button willow. If you do not mind a long wait and poor customer service in order to get very good quality Mexican food, then this place will more than fit your needs. I LOVE the food, I mean, I really love it. I am just not sure I can put up with the workers there any more.. I guess all good things come with a price, and since I keep going back.. it must be worth. I do leave with a smile on my face and a satisfied tummy every time. :)
Review Source:There is a lighted sign at the curb advertising a drive through window, but it has pictures of ice cream, not Mexican or El Salvadorean food on it, hmmm. Â When you arrive at the menu board, there is a hand lettered sign stating that they will take your order at the window - not promising, but I've already driven out this far to try it so I'm not backing down yet. Â The homemade sign on the window says "Honk for Assistance. Thank You!!" Â Yes, there were two (!!) exclamation points on the sign, and the handwriting was nicer than mine, so I haven't been scared off yet. Â They charged $9.92 for the two pupusa plate with rice & beans. Â (I ordered the revueltas which I believe are stuffed with pork & cheese). I ordered at the drive through hoping for quick snack. As she gave me the change, she said the order would be ready in 10 minutes. Frankly, if she'd told me that up front I wouldn't have bothered, but at this point I'm kind of committed.
This place is a little hole in the wall, but they do take Discover, MasterCard, Visa, American Express, even Diners Club International, or, at least, yet another sign posted in their window asserted that they do. Â And, remember, I had a full 10 minutes to read the signs :) Â In exactly 10 minutes, give or take 30 seconds, my food arrived. Â
Any pupusa enthusiast will tell you that they're not an "eat in the car as you are driving" type of food, a lesson I was only just figuring out. Â I pulled over to the side of the road and cut them up into fork appropriate pieces, doused everything in hot sauce, and then headed back to Bakersfield.
I really enjoyed their pupusas, which for the uninitiated are thick doughy creations made from masa and stuffed with meat and cheese, warm melty oh-so-gooey yummy cheese. Â I liked both the flavor and the texture, but the hot sauce was not my fave.
This place has pretty solid food, but I don't know that I'd drive all the way out  from Bakersfield again just to try it.  I'd definitely stop here again on my way home from a road trip, though.
Great food! In fact I don't think I have ever had better Carne Asada. Prices were expected. $15 for my dinner. We're I was extremely disappointed was the level of service. The two waitresses seemed rude and gave the impression that they did not want to be there. Overall, this is a 5 star quality of food with 2 star service. A must stop if you are traveling Highway 5
Review Source:What. A. Gem.
Heading back to LA after a trip up North, the man and I were looking for something to fill our tummies outside the fast food/convenience store options.
Trusty Yelp did us well again, and I was blown away at how fresh and tasty the Pupusas were! Granted it was my first experience enjoying this cuisine, but I could tell by the crowd lined up to order that they were doing something right. I ordered the pupusa with squash and cheese (since I don't eat meat, I didn't have a ton of options, but luckily the ones I did have were good).
Plus, the portions are absolutely massive...so I took it home and had Pupusas again for lunch the next day.
Absolutely delish.
Great Breakfast! Totally surprised me! I am marking this on my list every time we come into town. Â The place is clean and the service was good. Love that it is El Salvadorian which is rare to see it adds to the appeal. Â The wait was a little long but worth it. Â What I ordered:
Hashbrowns with Chorizo & Eggs, salsa
$7.50
Reasonably prices, much needed in the area, and not your typical Hispanic breakfast, Mark it on your list too to eat here ;)
I usually don't write too many reviews. But this place pissed me off. I went there twice while staying in a crap motel because this place is located in a dump town. I will admit I'm a little spoiled on my business travels due to my high standings with airlines and nice hotel chains. But this place blows. When I went there the first time, the waitress acted like I was a bother to her. Ordered the carne asada steak. $15. Not worth it.
Thought I got a bad deal the first time, went back again (because there is really nothing else besides chains) and I was disappointed again. I ordered the carne asada burrito supreme. It was HUGE!!! Â But there was about 00000.001 ounces of meat in it. It was 99.99999 % rice and BS. Nasty. Never going back. And with that 7lb burrito, I got 1 glass of water. And the place was not even busy this time. Maybe 4 other people total. This place sux!
Oh my goodness. This place is so good. I'm headed to LA again this week -- maybe I should cancel my flight and drive again.
Tita's has so many delicious and uncommon menu items (to start with, pupusas), that I always want to take a cooler of food to go.
On my last trip, I enjoyed (and was stuffed after) two pupusas (one cheese, one chili, I think), side of (very good) guacamole, and agua fresca (maybe jamaica?). I was a little jealous of my friend, who enjoyed this massive combo plate in the appetizer section that included an egg, a line of plantains, beans, tortillas, and like seventeen other things (ok, I may be exaggerating, but it looked super good to me). Â We each spent about $12 total, I think.
This is not fast food. This is a delicious quality meal. If you're lucky, like we were, you can watch Jurassic Park on TV. Ha!
I was very please to find a place that serves real food in the dearth of I-5 between LA and SF (well, other than Harris' Ranch). And I am all for supporting local small business. The quality of the food is "decent for the area", and the portion there is HUGE - I ordered a Menudo and a pupusa, and could only finish half of the soup. The pupusa went straight into the to-go box.
A BIG con is the extremely slow service. It looked like they only had 1 (or maximally 2) person(s) working behind the house in a small kitchen, and another 2 bussing tables. Â The restaurant was full when we were there, with continuous incoming take out customers. It took at least 45 mins for our order to arrive, and we had to inhale our food so that we could hit the road again. In retrospect, my 2 hours could have been spent more wisely, like getting to my final destination with more restaurant choices. Right?
Also, they only have 1 restroom for women. So, ladies, expect to wait in line. And you'll have plenty of time to do so!
Wow, who would've thought such a place would exist in the middle of trip from LA to SJ off the 5? Was feeling a bit hungry on the way home, and we decided to make a pit stop in Buttonwillow again. Saw a Taco Bell sign, but then saw a sign for Pupusas! We saw a little truck, and opted not to eat there, thinking it was the Pupusa place (which I believe it is, but there's also a restaurant). With TB not being in sight, we decided to have a longer sit down meal at Tita's Pupuseria. We walked to the front, thinking we'd order, but she gave us menus and had us sit down at a table of our choice. At 3:30 PM on a Sunday, the restaurant had a good amount of tables taken. I decided to get two of the pork and cheese pupusas ($2.85 each). Little brother decided on the special, which comes with 2 pupusas of your choice and a side of rice and beans ($9.50 or so - which I don't think it's worth the extra $4!). During our wait, we heard the soccer game on the TV behind us and munched on the tortilla chips and salsa. Salsa was decent, but wish it had more flavor and spice.
Eons later, I see the table behind us get their pupusas. I gasped. They were the largest pupusas I have ever seen! Size of pancakes you'd get at IHOP! I was imagining smaller than half the size they were, as that is what I am used to. Ours came out shortly after, and we had a jar of cabbage slaw and hot sauce to go with it. If I knew they were going to be this big, I definitley would've only ordered 1. They were pretty tasty, but I wish it had more substance inside. Since they were pretty thin, I could barely taste the pork, but definitley tasted the cheese, although it was burnt as some had oozed out while cooking it. Went well with the slaw they provided, and added some tapatio for that extra flavor.
We both took one each to go, as there was no way we could finish all of that. They also provided us baggies of the slaw to go as well. I reheated it the next day, and it was still good, but not as good as being fresh off the pan.
This place did put us out for awhile out of our trip since it takes awhile to receive the pupusas. Also, the service was not great, we had to keep going to our waitress since she never came by, and she gave us our food without any utensils. She then started chatting for awhile with our utensils in her hands.
Came in an hour before they closed, and all the chairs were already stacked. The girl at the counter asked if we'd like it for here or to go and I said "For here.....buuut it kinda looks like you want us to go." She nodded. We placed our order, then sat awkwardly outside since the inside seating was already roped off.
When it was done, we received our pupusas in takeout containers, with the curtido and salsa awkwardly packaged in tied-off plastic bags. You'll have to pierce the bag with a fork and squirt it on your food for the most efficient application.
We hauled our grub over the Carl's Jr., bought a Coke, and felt like the biggest white trash ever bringing our own takeout into a burger joint. But at least we had somewhere to sit.
Pupusas were alright, I'd eat them again. Considering the effort involved, however, next time I'll just get the Famous Star and call it a night. :P
*This is for the restaurant, not the Taco truck*
The fiance and I decided to make a quick lunch run while at work in Wasco. We had been hearing about Tita's for quite some time, and were ready for a great lunch experience courtesy of our fellow Yelpers.
The location is nothing exciting. It's an old Burger King building in a travel center. We walked in and found ourselves a little confused where to go. Front counter or tables? We walked up to the front, and waited a few minutes before we were told to sit if we wanted to eat in or order at the front to go.
We sat ourselves in a corner table that could desperately use a clean rag. The plastic table covers were a little sticky, and the seat cushion was ripped down the center and full of crumbs. Those kinds of things don't bother, but for some they may.
The real issue for me, was the food. The chips and salsa were not good, and I'm definitely not a C&S elitist. The chips were over fried and had a bitter and old taste. The salsa was very plain, no flavor and no heat. More like a pico de gallo. The pupusa's were pretty good, but not what I was expecting. If you like a plain white cheese quesadilla, then you'll find this to your liking. And for 2.95, it's a great price.
We also got two burritos, one chile verde and another al pastor. They were very large and definitely could fill a big guy up. The al pastor was sweet, but there was very little meat and little too much sauce, which cause the entire burrito to be one soggy mess.
Overall, it's a decent place to stop for some inexpensive eats. I guess I was expecting something more because of all the fantastic Yelp reviews. I love hole in the wall places, and the aesthetics didn't bother me a bit. But the food left me wondering what I had missed. I'll probably give Tita's another try later on and re-review my experience.
BEST place to stop between S.F. and L.A. Â That's not saying much, I know, I know, but seriously, Tita's is almost reason enough to make that drive! Â The pupusas are almost too good to be true, and the squash is exceptional. Â It's right off the freeway, so just go. Â You will smile about it the rest of the trip.
The only thing not awesome is the bathroom.
Between the lady answering the phone with "buenos dias" and what looked like a Latin Big Brother on TV - this place is definitely more authentic than most..
Raves about the cheese & pork pupusa made us order it - but I thought it was a bit lackluster.. Not a fan of the tortilla and couldn't really find any pork.. Am I missing something here?
The quesadilla and al pastor burrito were excellent though! Packed, delicious flavors popped out, and tasted fresh! Not at all like your usual fake/Americanized Mexican food..
To top it all off: hands down the best jamaica I've ever had!
Admittedly, the "culture" can be overbearing.. But if you could get over being a bit uncomfortable, then the food will surely justify all feelings of alienation!
There was really bad traffic on the 5 due to construction and it was 105 degrees and I really had to pee, so I stopped here instead of at Lost Hills. After checking yelp and seeing the reviews for this place, I went in for some food. I walked in, was told to take a seat by a waitress at the counter and walked by the waitress on the floor - who saw me. And yet, despite that there weren`t many customers around, it took her 10-15 minutes just to come by with the menu. Then, she comes back after like 2 minutes and when I ask for another minute, she takes another 10-15 minutes to come back. I ordered chile verde, fish and shrimp tacos, as well as a cheese & pork pupusa.
I literally waited about 1 hour and 15 minutes. I wish I were exaggerating. It was so ridiculous! The food was great but who has the time to wait that long when I`m in the middle of a 7 hour drive?! Yeah, they give you chips and salsa but my chips were definitely burned. You could already tell by looking at them, but they also left a very bitter aftertaste. The salsa was probably from the bottom of the jar because it was all water and no salsa.
Not to mention, my waitress was so rude! Aside from avoiding eye contact every time we spoke, she kept doing random little tasks instead of coming back to my table - which would be fine if I had my food and water. Which, by the way, I asked for water several times and after like 30 minutes, she comes back and goes: "What drink did you want again?" ... Lord. So you would think she would go get me water after that. But no, she goes behind the counter and starts talking to another waitress for the next 30 minutes. With a drink in her hand. As if to taunt me.
Anyway, I`m rambling. The point is, while the food is good, it`s not worth it. In all that time, I could have delivered a baby.
In terms of good places to eat on the long drive from NorCal down to SoCal, it's a barren wasteland. Imagine the joy I felt when I discovered that there was potentially a delightful restaurant conveniently located off the I-5S, where I could get mouth-wateringly delicious pupusas.
...And the pupusas were pretty good. We ordered some al pastor tacos, rice and beans to go with the pupusas, and those offerings were just okay. Not sure if it was what we ordered or if the rest of the menu was equally mediocre, but I was not as wow-ed as I was praying I would be.
I'll be back if I'm ever craving pupusas on the drive up and down California, but I think In'N'Out could just as easily hit the spot.
A five star truck! You heard it right, A Five Star truck! I love this place and they make top of the line pupusas! Listen TOP OF THE LINE! it takes a few minutes and is totally worth it. A dirt lot, Â with a tin shed covers your dining table, the hot plate of beans (all the beans you want) Â and the salsa bar in the side of the truck (don't miss ti - I almost did) The al pastor taco was nice, but the melting cheese flowing out of the fat pupusa is to be remembered and will bring you back as you ROAR down 5 at 85!
stop in buttonwillow and enjoy this one!
I don't hand out 5 Star ratings on a whim. A business has to earn it; and Tita's did! We were at Buttonwillo for a track weekend and ate here for dinner both nights. It was that good and the menu had lots of things I NEEDED to try!
Food: The Pork&Cheese Papusa w/hot sauce and cole slaw were killer. I have to say that the highlight of my meals was the Chile Verde Tacos though; really really good! I also had the Menudo; which was awesome.
Service: Great group of folks running the place; always smiling and spending time chatting with you to make sure you have everything you need. They honestly moved the rating up a star; we had a great time just laughing with the staff.
Decor: Clean and nice. Excellent for Buttonwillow.
$$$: Food and beer was a lot cheaper than I expected.
I know where I'll be eating in Buttonwillow for now on!
Cheers!
Dear Future Hazel,
This review is only intended as a reminder not to stop here next time you're driving to the bay area. You forget every single time. All you have on your mind is pupusas, yet you forget that it takes approximately 7 1/2 years for your order to get to your table. And you forget that the waitress will never come and tell you what's going on. And you forget that it's pretty damn expensive for a little pupuseria/diner like this. And you forget that you'll leave grouchy because none of it was worth the time or money in the first place and you weren't even that hungry and you could have just gone to stupid McDonald's across the street and been in San Jose by now.
Consider this your reminder. And if you simply MUST have some pupusas, stop off at the food truck to shave a bit of time off your order and skip the restaurant.
Sincerely,
Past Hazel
Tita's is one of the few landmarks that makes the long, tedious, arduous drive from the Bay Area to Los Angeles on I-5 tolerable for your intrepid yet exhausted reviewer. There are only so many trips up and down that long, straight, flat stretch of highway that a person can take before losing it completely. Luckily, this place is there for reassurance (yay I'm almost there!/well, I'm on my way home now!)...and PUPUSAS!!!
If you know me at all (which, to be fair, very few of you do), you know that I'm a sucker for masa and cheese. Stuff masa with cheese, fry it on a griddle, and voilà : happiness! Add a little curtido (or Salvi Slaw, if you prefer) and salsa roja and I'm in gooey, greasy heaven. I don't know if I can tell the difference between a "good" pupusa and a "bad" one--and I don't know if I really care to be able to. I'm not a foodie and am pretty proud of that fact. What I do know, though, is that when I'm driving up or down the 5 and famished (or just really bored), Tita's showing up on the side of the road puts a smile on my little face.
I haven't eaten anything here besides the pupusas, and I've only had cheese pupusas, but I don't really feel the need to try anything else. I get some cheesy goodness and a beverage, sit for a while watching soccer or a novela on the TV, do a little people watching, and then hop back in my car for a few more hours of tedium.
I won't lie and say that I stop at Tita's every time I drive to/from Los Angeles, but I'm certainly glad that it exists, because I might very well go completely insane without it. Just knowing it exists is a comfort.
And now, so that people with FUC me, I know all about AUTHENTIC Salvadorian food (I don't) because of my numerous trips to El Salvador (I've never been), and I have to say that Tita's Pupuseria provides THEE MOST AUTHENTIC AND DELICIOUS PUPUSAS ON ALL OF THE 5 (this is probably true; haven't seen any other pupuserias on the way from the Bay to Los Angeles). But if you're like me and aren't concerned with authenticity or proving how multicultural you are when eating "ethnic" cuisine (refraining from my diatribe about how the adjective "ethnic" is inherently racist and stupid) and only care about something tasty, stop here when you're about to poke your eyeballs out from boredom on the 5. It's cheesy, it's yummy, it's inexpensive. You'll like it.
Well, you should, anyway.
Where else can you find a delicious beef tongue burrito for around $5? Of course at Tita's Pupuseria! (not to be confused with Tito's!).
This was probably one of the best beef tongue burritos I've ever had. I can only imagine what it would be like to get a beef tongue taco without all the other ingredients getting in the way. The beef tongue was tender, soft, flavorful and went with the burrito so well. The chicken burrito was pretty good as well and their pupusa was alright ... I didn't think it was all that but their pork taco = deliciouso!!!!
We had a whole feast, and I do mean feast for two for two days for around $15 (wow??) and it was right next to Motel 6. There's no better way to be lazy than to grab a feast for two after a long day of sitting around doing nothing at the track and coming back to the motel room to feast and sleep. great restaurant.
SO I stopped at one of the trucks here with my youth delegation here about a week ago, and let me start off by saying this place has some amazingly good and authentic mexican food. Â The quesadillas are so good alone that I would drive 200 miles just to get them and come back, let's not even get started with their mega burrito. Let me just say if you ever stop by buttonwillow, CA. You would be crazy to go to the McDonalds or Carl's Jr. next door. Just saying...basically if you eat here you'll be in a food coma the rest of the day. They include everything you need for the best mexican feast fo your life right in the bag and they have that authentic coke straight out of Mexico and AHH it's just too good!
It only goes to show that you should Yelp everything because serious Yelpers take serious advice. This place is Pupuseria heaven!
Me amo Tita's! I think other folks do too, but since this location (the one closer to I-5) wasn't on Yelp yet, people mistakenly put their reviews in for the other one.
After a disappointing dinner the night before at the Willow Ranch, our dining options for this town dwindled. Should we bite the bullet and go to Denny's, or hit the restaurant back at the TA Travel Center, which was pretty much the same as Denny's, sans families and more truckers?
My hesitance to eat at Mexican eateries has good reason. I'm allergic to garlic and onions, and I can't stand cilantro, even in the remotest parts-per-billion quantity so this leaves a lot of their flavors to the satisfaction of other people more fortunate. There are exceptions like Juan's Place in Berkeley where I can get my food on without drowning in pico de gallo but the places are few and far between, not to mention I have a hard time paying $4 for little tacos that have little more than seasoned beef and a squeeze of lime. but I digress- we were hungry and I we refused to suffer another meal at a crappy dining establishment being treated worse than sewer rats.
After countless jokes about Tita's pupusas and a twiste pupusa (the signage had a missing r and s for their twisters, I guess a type of shake they make) - heheheheh- we decided to give this place a go. Even though I work close to the Mission district in San Francisco, I've never had a pupusa and my over curious palate said the time was right. My reasoning to JR was this- we drove into the town of Buttonwillow proper to see if it had any better dining options (it didn't)- they had another Tita's there as well, and they also had a roach coach too. I figured if they were successful to have three things going on at the same time, they must be pretty good.
We walk into Tita's and the young lady tells us to have a seat if we were dining in, which we were. it was pretty quiet around 7:30PM with only two tables of about 4-6 folks. My eyes keep bouncing all over the menu because I'm hell bent on eating a pupusa if not two, and something else authentic like lengua (tongue), cabeza (head) or sesos (brain). they didn't have sesos so I settled for lengua as it's usually tender, flavorful and not greasy as with other cuts of meat. JR ordered the three enchiladas roja, which he got one of each (beef, chicken and cheese). Our server was very helpful in asnwering a few questions I had about the food.
We also ordered a pork and cheese and also a cheese and vegetable (which tasted a lot like nopalitos-cactus) pupusa to try. JR said he tried pupusas a little while back, in Richmond on San Pablo somewhere and he said it wasn't anything to write home about.
It was too quiet and I like music with my food so I decided to throw some money into their jukebox and arbitrarily pick songs. Roger's method was to pick songs based off of sombrero size- mine was the size and number of chins (double, triple) and we seemed to fare well. The restaurant was filled with jovial music as we nibbled on our chips and beer.
Our food arrived and I nearly had a heart attack- the lengua burrito, which I had them NOT put their spicy salsa OR pico de gallo, but added lettuce and tomatoes and it came with beans and rice, was the size of a football. I shit you not. As I sat contemplating how I was going to eat this all, the pupusas showed up and I cried mercy.
The lengua was tender, not greasy at all, and not overly seasoned- just how I like it. I'm used to eating it braised and sliced, and this was chopped which I think I prefer. I also think it would serve other people well to have it with the salsa as it was a little on the bland side, but I can't take the heat!
The pupusas were great- slightly crisped where the grill had touched their sides leaving little grill marks, and tender and not too fluffy or bready. The cheese and pork oozed delicious meaty flavor and the cheese and El Salvadorean vegetable one was also very tasty and savory. It was served with this shredded pickled cabbagy carroty slaw which you put on top and a little squeeze bottle of mild tomato sauce- deeeelicious! Â JR said these pupusas were much better than the ones he had previously.
There was no way in hell I had room for dessert but their display case by the cash register with all different sorts of sweets was twisting my arm in a bad way. I didn't give in but next time I may not be so successful.
Browsing their menu I also noticed they served breakfast. What a shame we didn't overcome our hesitance and eat here the day before since the money we spent at Willow Ranch was a waste, but then again I'm glad we ended our stay at Buttonwillow with a delightful meal.
Thanks Tita, we'll be back for your delicious pupusas and other foods next year when AFM racing hits Buttonwillow again!
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