2020 James Beard America's Classics Winner: El Taco de Mexico

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Each year since 1998 the James Beard Foundation Awards Committee has recognized our nation’s beloved regional restaurants. Distinguished by their timeless appeal, they serve quality food that reflects the character of their communities. We anoint these locally owned restaurants with a James Beard Foundation Award and designate them as America’s Classics.


El Taco de Mexico
714 Santa Fe Drive, Denver, CO
Owner: Sasha Zanabria

Among Denver’s thriving Mexican food culture, El Taco de Mexico is a lodestar whose appeal cuts across lines of race, class, and age. Maria Luisa Zanabria, a native of Mexico City, arrived in the city in 1985, first opening a trailer on Santa Fe Drive in Denver’s Art District. Her business grew into a small taqueria with a bright, bumblebee-yellow exterior. The serious, focused cooks (all women) keep pace with the all-day crowds, turning out tacos (carne asada, al pastor, and lengua are among the options), enchiladas, gorditas, and weekend menudo. The restaurant’s crowning glory is the pork burrito, smothered in green chile humming with earthy spice. Made extra-heaping as a breakfast burrito stuffed with egg and chorizo, it brings bleary-eyed devotees back to life.


Watch the full 2020 James Beard Awards broadcast:    • The 2020 James Beard Awards Broadcast  



Community-focused and independent restaurants are at the heart of every city, town, and village across America and the world. The James Beard Foundation celebrates restaurants that showcase culinary leadership and provides training and resources for chefs and restaurateurs to use their voices for positive food system change.

Open for Good is the James Beard Foundation’s campaign to help independent restaurants survive this crisis, rebuild better, and thrive for the long term. Open for Good programs provide critical resources to help independent restaurants build the capacity to come back stronger, more equitable, more sustainable, and more resilient. Learn more at jamesbeard.org.