Just before last year's inaugural "Tucson 23 Mexican Food Festival," the Tucson City Council put in writing its commitment to the notion that Tucson is home to the best Mexican food north of the border.
The council approved an ordinance designating a 23-square-mile area neighboring South Tucson and including swaths of the south and west sides, downtown and central Tucson, attaching a list of more than 50 generational restaurants that proved the lawmakers' point.
But Ray Flores, whose family owns El Charro Cafe and the related Sir Veza's Taco Garage and Charro Steak, said that wasn't the first time we heard the label "Best Mexican Food" attached to Tucson. In fact, he says his father Ray Sr. was one of the first to publicly use that reference.
Ray Jr. recalled that his dad reportedly told the noted Los Angeles Times writer and columnist Charles Hillinger that his hometown had the best Mexican food in the entire world.
"Sometime back in the '80s my father, being the kind of crazy dude he is, made a claim that Tucson was the Mexican food capital of the world," Flores said.
Hillenger came to Tucson to investigate the claim and wrote a story that ran in the LA Times and was syndicated to hundreds of newspapers around the globe including in Hong Kong, Flores said.
"That launched this thing that we were the Mexican food capital of the world," Flores said.
Tucson's Mexican food roots stretch back to Sonora, Mexico, brought here by immigrants and kept alive by the generations that followed. They infused their bold and colorful cuisine and their rich culture to help create a diverse culinary experience that continues to grow and prosper well beyond our borders.
Best Mexican food in the world? The Floreses, who lay claim to having the oldest continually operated Mexican restaurant in America at their flagship El Charro Cafe, are unwavering.
"I kinda feel like my father's claim ... put Tucson on the map when there was nothing to put Tucson on the map before," Flores Jr. said.
Part of the goal of Saturday's "Tucson 23" festival is to showcase Tucson's cultural and culinary blend and celebrate the contribution of Mexico that goes beyond the food to the quintessential mariachi music and vibrant visual arts. But mostly, the festival's goal is to introduce Tucson to itself through its taste buds.
