As a border community, San Diego is filled with excellent Mexican eateries. From the neighborhood taco shop to the high end offerings downtown, we have lots to choose from. As you can imagine this makes it hard to stick out. Mario’s in La Mesa is unique enough to stick out. Let’s look at three things that make Mario’s an East County favorite.

Location: This spot takes “neighborhood restaurant” seriously. It looks like a house from the outside. Feels like a house on the inside. In fact, I’m pretty sure that this building started out life as a house. It also serves as a gateway to a neighborhood. There’s both a good and a bad side to a neighborhood location. With a tiny parking lot, you will likely have to find street parking. Also, the dining areas are pretty small. So expect a wait at high traffic times and if you have a group of more than eight… well, I’d like to see how they handled that. Maybe the patio?

Home-style: Before we went to Mario’s we had heard two must have items on the menu. First, the carne asada platter. Second, tamales. The former lived up to its billing while the latter was good but not superb. (Not sure why tamales were covered in sauce, we didn’t like it.) Besides the menu items there are a couple of things that make Mario’s amazing. The chips and salsa are fantastic. While it’s just an expected condiment at a Mexican restaurant these stood out as especially good. Also, diners were given a taster of fruit salad. The fruit salad was fantastic and added to the family-factor of our time there.

Also atypical on the menu is home-style Mexican breakfast. If you’ve never tried that it is worth the trip to La Mesa alone.

Service: The waitstaff was great! While busy during our visit I was surprised at the attention we were given. Courtesy, prompt, friendly, and knowledgeable. These are all words we thought of to describe the service we received.

Bringing the fun of Mexico to San Diego Lucha Libre is a great little taco shop located just north of downtown San Diego in the Mission Hills neighborhood. The first thing that will smack you in the head about this place is the wrestling theme. Lucha libre, Spanish for free fighting, is a form of professional wrestling practiced in Mexico and Latin America. If you liked Jack Black’s Nacho Libre than you’ll love the decor of this place.

The Good: As far as the food goes I was completely satisfied. Gourmet tacos, great salsas, Jarritos, and the infamous TJ hotog. What is a TJ hotdog? This is an all-beef dog, wrapped in bacon and swamped in grilled onions, ketchup, mustard, and mayo. This is one of those things you just have to try when you visit. At just $1.50 it’s worth it even if you just take one bite. The thing that makes Lucha Libre truly unique is the wrestling decor. Hot pink seats, wrestling posters and movies, masks, belts, and of course an area reserved for the champion. You’ll want to bring a camera and snap some photos of your group eating the TJ hotdog here. Price wise this may be the best deal in San Diego. Specialty tacos are less than $4 each. Even the hungriest of families is going to come up at less than $10 per person.

The Bad: If success in the restaurant business is based on location, location, location, than these guys are in trouble. The shop is small, seating about 30, and parking can be an issue.  The flip side of their location is that it’s really close to the airport. When we pick up friends from out-of-town we make Lucha Libre our first stop and indoctrination into San Diego.

Lucha Libre Taco Shop