Taqueria Pico de Gallo has graced South Tucson for 3 decades: What makes their corn tortillas so special?

If you ask a Tucsonan “What’s the best thing to order at Taqueria Pico de Gallo?” you’re going to get as many different responses as the taqueria has menu items. Many will swear by their horchata, made fresh daily and ladled out of beehive-shaped 10-gallon coolers. The eponymous snack, Pico de Gallo — spiced fruit salad that originated the taqueria, back when it was a pushcart in front of Pueblo High School — is considered a hardly-optional dessert.

“I always want the pico, the fruit cup,” said a 20-year Pico de Gallo devotee, Jennie Sherwood. “But I usually take it to-go because I’m too full.” If, upon encountering Pico de Gallo’s menu, your eyes are too big for your stomach, rest assured you’re not alone.

The real matter of contention is what you get in your taco. My favorite meat is their fried shrimp, or camaron, prepared in the style Antonia, the matriarch of the restaurant, learned growing up in Baja California. But, like many of the taqueria’s fans, my favorite filling happens to be the first one I tried. I like it so much, I can’t bear deviating to try something else. A similar phenomenon happens if you try their cabeza, or their fish. “I always think I’m going to try something new, but I have to have [the fish],” said Jennie.

Beyond dispute, though, is Pico de Gallo's corn tortilla. Despite Tucson’s loyalty to the traditionally Sonoran tortillas de harina (flour tortillas), we have a few beloved corn varieties. La Noria’s white corn tortillas are rich and full of fresh-corn sweetness, with a tender consistency that pulls apart in flakes like soft leaves.

Taqueria Pico de Gallo’s tortillas are something else altogether: made out of yellow corn Maseca, they are sturdier and thicker, more substantial and a little cakey. You don’t need to layer two tortillas atop one another for when the contents of the first spill out. “You go home after eating there, smelling like the tortillas: your hands smell like corn,” said Jennie, with reverence.

“The process of making them is actually quite simple. We slowly add cold water to the Maseca, stirring until we get the exact right consistency. Then we press it with a hand-press machine. From there, all you need is a really hot pan,” said manager Diana Bojorquez (daughter of the founders, Ignacio ‘Nacho’ and Antonia Delgado), adding that you can even get the maseca from grocery stories not too far from the taqueria, like they do during an unexpected rush.

Their secret, beyond the ingredients, is Pico de Gallo’s freshness. “Every day we make everything fresh, our masas, our meats, our salsas,” Diana said. They soak the rice for the horchata every morning.

“The only thing we use vinegar for is our pickled carrots” — another menu item devotees swear by — “Everything that isn’t sold that day goes into the trash at night. But we don’t waste much, because we know exactly how much we need,” she said.

Diana has been running Pico de Gallo alongside her parents for its entire, nearly 32-year-long tenure. Her dad, Nacho, was a Honda mechanic when he first moved to Tucson. Her mother, Antonia, was a housekeeper. When they opened the week of the rodeo in 1990, Diana was late because street closures affected her job — the morning shift driving school buses in South Tucson. “My children grew up under the counter,” Diana said. She hopes to pass the legacy of her parents’ restaurant on to them one day, and then her grandchildren. Diana currently manages the restaurant, most days, from 3-10 p.m.

But for now, 78-year-old Nacho still shows up every day, for at least a few hours. He says it keeps him alive, and Diana agrees. For a long time, he was behind the counter all day, every day, supervising the preparation of his wife’s recipes. “He didn’t want people to change the recipes on him… He said no, even if you change it just by the amount of salt or water, it’s going to make a difference and we could lose our customers. I’m really proud of what they accomplished. I’m proud of their legacy, and I want to pass it on,” Diana said.

Antonia passed away 15 years ago. Antonia had decorated the inside of the restaurant with family photos, which Diana recently took down to clean the walls. “They were just the family portraits you could get at Sears,” she said. Since Diana removed the photos, regular customers have been asking about them, where they went.

“That’s what makes [Pico de Gallo] feel unique, homey. We like it like that,” Diana said. “So I’m in the process of cleaning and framing them and getting them back up. Because people asked for them. My mom put them up there. I want everyone to remember her, for as long as we can.”

Find Taqueria Pico de Gallo at 2618 S. Sixth Ave. For more information, call 520-623-8775.