I Tried The Best Street Food In America

America has always gotten credit for two things, fast food and fine dining. But in between those two worlds, there's something that doesn't seem to get any credit. Street food. Everywhere else in the world, street food is a way of life. But here in America, I think it's often underappreciated and overlooked. Oftentimes, the best food in the world isn't served on white tablecloths. It's served from carts, trucks, and tiny family-run stalls. And today, I'm going to uncover what America truly has to offer. So we asked you, the audience, which cities have the best street food in America. After thousands of responses, we have our top four. New York, Los Angeles, Portland, and Austin, Texas. I'm going to the streets of every single one of these cities, but I'm not going in blind. In each city, I've got a local street food expert to guide me through their top five must-try spots. And by the end, we'll have our answer. The city with the highest rated street food average wins the title of best street food city in America, starting with New York City. Everyone knows the New York food scene is insane. I eat the food from 20-plus countries in a single day here. And that's why I enlisted the help of Julian Mu, aka MubarEats, one of New York City's most respected street food connoisseurs. And he's going to show us his top five New York City spots, starting with, uh, grills on the sidewalk. Where I rejerk. I will say, this is one of those things where if you were walking on the side of the street and you smelled what we're smelling, you got to at least ask yourself, should I? And the short answer is, f*** yeah. Cheers. F***. Aww. Succulent, fall-off-the-bone. The spice levels are wonderful. It's a little sweet. It's seasoned perfectly. Salt levels? Perfect. Texture? Super moist. Zero dryness present. I've had jerk chickens a little too over-spiced. And I don't mean spicy. I mean, like, they mask the flavor of the chicken. This, you're getting that, like, nice chicken fat flavor, and it's perfectly balanced with the smokiness. There's the sweetness of the sauce on there. And there is that jerk chicken spice that you wanted there, but it's not too overwhelming. I've had smoked chicken at barbecue restaurants in Texas that had less flavor and less smoke than this chicken right here. And it's cooked in a f***ing barrel on the side of the street. This is extraordinarily good. I would travel out to eat this. I would come travel all the way out to come sit on the side of the road and f***ing eat this. Texture? If it's all leg, it's a 9.5. Flavor? I'm gonna give it a 9 too, out of 10. I mean, this is, like, crazy. Oh, thank you. Oh my god. Unbelievable. You gotta come to Texas. Yo, you have to invite me. I've never been. Yeah, we'll take you. The barbecue guys, you need to show them a couple lessons. I'm ready. I'm gonna be back. I'm bringing my wife. Moving on. An incredibly strong start for New York City, proof that NYC street food is not only served from a food truck or a cart. Like our next spot, Bolivian Llama Party, there's no dining in, it's just a window on the street. P.S. I've never had Bolivian food, and I'm pumped to see how it stacks up. So we're at probably, it's fine, just a gun. Two shots fired. It's all good. Three shots fired. Oh, it's fireworks. It's fireworks. Please help! We are at probably my favorite place in all of New York City. It's Bolivian Llama Party. They specialize in Bolivian food. What we have right in front of us is the beef saltenia. It's a mix of a soup dumpling and an empanada. Wow. It is beautiful dough, toasted on the bottom. It's braided by hand. I mean, I love it. The ideal way to eat it, take a small bite out of here, let some of that air out. You take a little sip of the inside, and then you pour a little bit of that hot yacua inside. Wow. This is really something. This is kind of perfect for this weather too. By the way, it's freezing out here. We have this like hot, juicy, sort of like beef stew in the center. It's spiced nicely. The sweetness of the crust, it's got some crunch, there's some softness, there's some chew from the beef, little pops from the peas. It's like a god tier, like Michelin level hot pocket. I've never heard that before, and I like that. Absolutely delicious. Texture of the pastry. I've had a lot of different types of pastries that are similar to that. Texture on the inside. I would bring that score down just slightly because I wish the beef were a little more tender. It's pretty chewy, but you know, maybe that's the vibe. It just kind of is a weird contrast. So I would give it a flat eight for texture. Flavor, the spices, the garlic, the onion, all the things that were in there were just exactly where I wanted to be. It just felt like I was eating, it's like grandma food in the best way possible. That's a 7.5 out of 10 for flavor. Didn't blow my mind, but it's still a strong score. Moving on. We're in Midtown right now. We got Halal Guys, but why are we at Halal Guys? This is one of, if not the OG street foods of New York City. It's crazy because they franchised. They like started in the street and they got out of the streets and went big time. Most of these places now have run because Halal Guys has walked. So it better be good. One thing, I know a lot of people are going to say this, Halal is not a type of food. It's a way of slaughtering animals and that is true. But in New York City, it is a thing that people say, I'm going to the Halal cart on the corner. Is this one of the best still? It's a New York street food icon. That's why it's in here. But there's a surprise, which we'll get to after we try this. This is the OG. The Halal mixed platter, chicken and beef over rice, white sauce, hot sauce. One of the things I love about Halal Guys, I'm shocked at how much they've expanded and how well they've maintained just the quality of everything. The texture, the rice isn't overcooked. It's chewy. The salt levels are good and it's fatty. It's just like rich and juicy and the meat is seasoned perfectly with salt. It's a little spicy from the hot sauce. I mean, this is great. This is a nine. And I'm not going to down them for this, but their pita has always not been that good. No. Just going to be straight up honest. I will give you that. You can just let that part go. Everything else is lovely. Flavor an 8.8. I don't like giving franchises love, but Halal Guys always delivers somehow, some way. We do have something to say. We can't finalize this because we have another one. There's a competitor on the block now. We're at the surprise location of Adele's. Some people are saying that like Halal Guys has fallen off and this is the new one. Is that right? This is the Halal darling right now. It is 25 degrees Fahrenheit and people are waiting in a line for Halal cart food. So this is lamb and chicken. I'm going to try and get a little bit of everything. Spicy rice too. That's a big difference. I've got to be real with you guys. It's slightly less good in my opinion because it's not seasoned as well. It's not spicy at all. There's no spice at all in there. This one's missing a little flavor to me. The other one was more flavorful. It was more fatty. So you're saying that this line we should see in front of Halal Guys instead or split 50-50? I think it should be split 50-50. This seems like a personal preference thing. Personally, it's not seasoned as well with salt. I don't taste any lamb. The lamb is not that flavorful. I thought the beef was more flavorful than both of these combined. The chicken is under seasoned. Try both. Pick your favorite. I don't give a f**k. They're both delicious, but I'm going to give this one to Halal Guys. That's the one who entered in the competition. Wow. Shout out to them. On to the next. Thanks to the video where we ate around the world in 24 hours, I've had some of Queens most famous street food. So I guess Julian had a little curveball for me. We're in a parking lot. Where are we? We're here at Rockstar Chicken for Halal Korean Fried Chicken. It is hot Korean sweet chili, sauced wing, spice level two. Out of what? I think out of two. Oh, so max. This is the spiciest sauce that you have. Okay. They bread it to order. Wow. Everything is made fresh. Everything is handmade, homemade. That's hard work. These are sauced beautifully. This is exactly how I would sauce mine. F**king coated. It's got breading on every square inch as it should be. Oh yeah. Super, super, super tender. Almost falls off the bone. And the sauce is not too sweet, which I really appreciate. Yeah. It has a little bit of that kick that you really want. I would take it spicier, honestly. The spice level is good for the average Joe. If you were to come here and get a two out of two, I think most people can handle this spice, but it's just enough heat to keep it exciting. First thing I got to say is the chicken, not even considering the breading, was unbelievably succulent, perfectly cooked. The crispiness, I like fine wings crunchier usually. I don't think I've had wings with that thin of a crust from a Korean wing. Texture, I'll go with a seven. Chicken flavor was super apparent. It was very chicken-forward. I like that the sauce didn't overpower the chicken flavor. Flavor, a seven as well. New York City going strong, but with three huge cities to come, can it get a boost from the final spot? Steinway Halal, where we not only got this charcoal grilled chicken, but two kinds of rice, two soups, and a salad. So all of this is like, what, like 30, 40 bucks? $15. Wow. Look, I tried everything. With how cold it was outside, it did kind of hit emotionally, but the main event, chicken, I got to be honest, a bit dry, heavily under-seasoned in my opinion. The meal itself, from a value perspective, is incredible, but texture and flavor really just kind of fell flat for me. Just slightly above mid, with a 5.5 on flavor, and texture sitting at around 5.5. Is that a terrible score? I would count that as mid. We still have some insanely high scores, making Julian's top spots hard to beat, but we're moving on to the place that I reside, Austin, Texas. We now move on to a new co-host to represent Austin, the David Douglas, a prolific Austin food reviewer, and a buddy of mine who also appeared on our Which Country Has the Best Breakfast video. Listen, Austin is a special place to me, and I know it's in good hands with his help. We are starting with high expectations here. The Potato Barbecue Breakfast Taco at Michelin Bib Gourmand, La Santa Barbacha, looking good. They didn't skimp on beauty, and it's loaded the f*** up. And this is always how it comes, by the way. Mmm, that's busted. I don't know how long you've lived in Austin, but I've been in Austin for the better part of six to seven years, roughly. The barbacoa is succulent, it's fatty, the creaminess from the avocado plays well, the tortillas are so fragrant, like when you lift this up to your mouth, the first thing you get before you even bite it is the smell. It's almost floral. So nice. Chew on the tortillas great. I have always felt the breakfast taco was a bit overrated, and I think that if you really want a good experience, you gotta do it at a place like this. I love it. I mean, f***. Texture-wise, it's such a simple thing. Tortilla, egg, cheese, meat, avocado. And it's getting an 8.7. That's a crazy high number. Flavor. The barbacoa by itself, that's like a f***ing 9.5. I do wish there was a little salt on the avo to help bring it together. Flavor, I'm going with a 7. This is easily the highest, best breakfast taco I've ever had in Austin. That's what I like to hear. I'm very competitive, and I'm giving Austin the best chance, so I want to see these types of scores every place on. That's my hope. That's my dream. Let's make that dream a reality. Moving on. Welcome to K.E.G. Barbecue. Holy f***, dude. They loaded us up. I have always wanted to go here. I just want to be really clear. The line is always so long, and for obvious reasons, I'm glad that they're hooking us up today, though. Holy f***. They don't mess around here. I'm half Middle Eastern, and the flavors here are what I grew up with, but with Texas barbecue cooking style. So, the ribs are made the same way you'd make Texas-style ribs. They have a pomegranate glaze, pomegranates on top, za'atar-dusted mac and cheese. Look at this. Look, look, look, look. Look at this. The chef grew up in Egypt. When he visited here, he fell in love with Texas barbecue. Years later, he's here, the James Beard nominated barbecue spot, crushing it. Those are the most balanced ribs ever. They're not too sweet. They're not too salty. They're like a little spicy. The za'atar comes in for some fragrance. Mac and cheese, fire. Cooked nicely. Shells are nice. The sumac pickled onions, crazy. And the rice is fragrant. It's cooked nicely. Welcome to the culture, brother. Lamb bacon ribs right here. Oh my god, they're so juicy, Lucy. Take a little of this chimichurri, put that right there. That is phenomenal. That is one of the best bites of lamb, I think, in the city. Anything you badly associated with lamb is replaced with fat and flavor. It's not gamey. It's just smoky, salty, delicious, melts in your mouth. Super succulent. Look at this juicy lamb chop. Wherever they're sourcing this lamb from is a godsend. This is so perfectly seasoned with salt and just flavor and smoke, and it's juicy. This feels like the marriage of Texas and Egyptian together. Putting it on a sauce would be wonderful, but it's so good on its own, it doesn't need it. You never get barbecue that's balanced like this where you have a little bit of everything. Overall experience for texture was incredible, but it did fall just a bit because the sliced brisket was not great. I'm not going to lie. David said it was an off day, but I'm still going with a strong nine. There's so many options here. I think it still deserves that. I mean, it's an onslaught of flavor, spices, sweet, sour, tart, salty, fatty, acidic. I mean, what the f**k else is there you could possibly want in one meal? What would have already been a nine? I'm going to give a 9.3 out of 10 on flavor. We might have a winner on our hands, but there's only one way to find out, moving on. We are at Discata, what I think is the most addicting taco in Austin. We've done a breakfast taco, but the taco scene in Austin is so developed, you really need to experience both, and Discata does things differently. They actually cook their tacos in one giant stew that are made out of discs, and they render out five different types of meat. This is beautiful. Cheers. Whoa! Dude, what the f**k? Why haven't I been here? I didn't know that Austin did tacos like this. Yes. I've been sh**ing on Austin's taco scene for way too long. I'm from Los Angeles. I think the best tacos in America do not come from Texas, I think they come from Los Angeles. That said, this is blurring that line pretty aggressively for me. The meat is phenomenal. It's perfectly fatty, perfectly seasoned with salt. The flavor is wonderful. It's just what I want. It's a little bit of sweet, salty, spicy. This pickled habanero, when I put all that on there, I got a little scared, and it's all nice and balanced out with that really finely chopped pineapple, I almost said pina colada. I can't pick apart what is or isn't wrong with it, because it's kind of all there. Honestly, texture, 9.3. There was zero dryness. It wasn't too fatty. I've had tacos that weren't dry, but were almost too fatty. These were very balanced. I would give flavor a 9.2. Very good. Delicioso, I might say. I cringed myself out on that one, all right. We were driving here, I looked at the map and it said, you are headed to Cocti Juicy. We're being told that it might be cocti. I think it's cocti. I could be wrong. I've never seen fried chicken like this, a corn masa flour dredge in a Oaxacan chili sauce. This is either going to be way too much, or a game changer. We take a drumstick, we take our lime, we give it a wee squeeze. Take a bite. Whoa. That really is cocti juicy. And then this is where I go right into the house-made queso. The queso I like. It's a very naughty bite. This is naughty. But the queso kind of mellows out some of the spices because of the dairy. This is like drunk food, but it's so good. It's rich, it's fatty, perfectly crispy, it's spicy, it's sweet, it's salted nicely. Ooh, it is spicy, wow. So I prepared a little surprise for us. What goes well with fried chicken? Oh, wow. Sparkling wine. Dude, you're a naughty boy. He's been toting this around all day for this. Fried chicken and champagne or sparkling wine is one of the greatest combinations in human existence. It's, dare I say, finger-lickin' good. Let's talk about the texture. The cook on the chicken, perfect. It was very juicy, no dryness present. The crunch was perfect. I didn't want any more, I didn't want any less. I like that it was a firm, stiff, crackly crunch. That's how I make mine personally. Love the addition of that sort of like flavor paste on the outside, if you will. Seems like they're dunking it in a Nashville hot oil. I'll give it a nine too, because I have had better textured fried chicken, but not by much. Flavor, unexpected. It's sweet, it's spicy, it's salty, it's garlicky, it's fragrant. Might be one of the best fried chickens I've had. I mean, it's also a nine-one, I would say, on flavor. Austin rolling after four spots, but the final spot needs a 12 or higher to take the lead against New York City. And our guide's choice could be a little risky, street food with sushi hand rolls. Cheers. After trying all three rolls, my top choice was the hamatoro. I love hamachi. It was wonderfully seasoned, the crispy shallots, the whiskey ponzu, you know, the flavor was really an 8.5. Now, let's talk about texture. As I was chewing, I started to realize something. I think this was just a simple mistake, and it happens from time to time. I honestly don't even blame them. Maybe they had a rough day, but the rice was undercooked and crunchy, and sometimes that happens. I wouldn't hold it against them, and I absolutely will be going back, but I've got to say that really hurts my score here. So I'm giving the texture a flat five, which is still pretty high considering the rice is the most important part when it comes to eating sushi. That's going to happen sometimes. I won the perfect day in Austin, Texas for Joshua Weissman, and I couldn't get perfection, but I got as close as I could, and I hope we put up a good fight against those bigger, badder cities. Oh, man. Austin's total average takes a big hit with that last score, unfortunately. But it's still in the lead as we head to Portland, Oregon. It's a city I've never been to, but supposedly the food is great. We'll see about that. Our Portland guide is Mike Thielen, a longtime food writer, former James Beard judge, food festival founder, and let's be honest, general Portland food expert. He's starting us off with Korean food at one of Portland's most iconic and longest running carts, Kim Jong Grillin. Now originally we were going to try the Galbi Bibimbap that you see here, but midway through the owner, Han, surprised me with a Korean inspired hot dog that he thinks will steal the show. Oh, dude. It's bread. Holy ----, dude. And the sauce in here? Wow. If somebody was like, what is Korean American? That would be it. I'm sorry, Vikram, but this like totally demolishes any Chicago dog that's ever ******* existed. I never ever want to see a white hot dog bun ever again after trying this because the baguette is like somehow like crispy, but the crispness is so thin and the inside is so soft and fluffy, it just, it doesn't fall apart. It's just nice. But then also that banchan daikon and then this creamy sort of like acidic, a little bit sweet with a little bit of spicy umami sauce in there brings it all together. It's like glazed spam. You take spam and you put a little goddamn sweet soy glaze on that. This is giving that vibe, but in a totally new way. I'd give the texture a solid like nine, which is so weird giving that to a hot dog, but it's like the sourcing of the bread, so much better than any hot dog bun you'll ever have because it's not even a hot dog bun. He's using a banh mi bun. I mean, it's genius. The crunch from the banchan at the bottom and then that soft, like almost juicy pickled mango on top. I don't know that a hot dog could be better than that. Score for flavor, I think a solid nine as well. Two nines. Anything above a seven, I'm usually bewildered, but right now I'm fucked up. I don't know how we're going to find a number one here. Moving on. We are at the Midtown Beer Garden. Specifically what we're trying here is bing me, which is the only place in Portland that really specializes in Northern Chinese style jianbing. These in particular, it's like a super crispy, thin crepe filled with egg, kind of a nice spicy sauce, a crunchy wonton cracker that you can literally hear people bite into from across the room. I heard him cutting into it. Yeah, literally. It's freezing out here. I was warming my hands up probably, I don't know, 10 to 15 feet away from the cart and I heard a crunch and I turned and it was that man. We have two types. You have the sort of classic one that everyone kind of raves about the most. That's the roasted duck. And then this one here is the Chinese sausage. Two of my favorite things. Oh yeah. I want to rewind to when we went to New York. We got jianbing in New York. This is way better than that one. There's a perfect amount of duck in here. It's super fatty and rich within that. You've got this nice, refreshing, crunchy cucumber and it's seasoned beautifully. You've got the Chinese sausage. Cheers. Which one's your favorite? I kind of like the sausage. Because it has the same kind of sweetness as the duck, but it's a little more salty. I think it just sort of works your palate a little more. It gets you the extra saltiness to get the rest of the way there. And the fattiness from the Chinese sausage. And look how thinly cut it is. It's so thin it almost like melts on your tongue. You got a little bit of spiciness from it too. It's sweet. It's like almost caramelized in a way. I've had both. Easily the Chinese sausage one is the hallmark one to me. I'm going to give the rating to this. Texture, solid 9.3. Flavor 9.1. Jiangbing. Wow. One of the top scores of the entire journey. I should probably go before I eat this whole thing. Moving on. We're in the Nob Hill food cart pod in Northwest Portland. We're here for Bajala, which is one of the newer food carts that we're trying today. They're known for seafood-centric Baja-style Mexican food, and we tried three total tacos here. First, sturgeon, which was a bit odd. I gotta be honest. Not expecting that. Then, the fried shrimp. But our final taco was by far my favorite. We're also doing the gubernador, which is flour tortilla with really, really nice cheese, fresh vegetables, and cooked in a lot of butter. Oh my God. Dude, this is way better than I thought it was going to be. We had a taco very similar to this. I don't know if you remember. This was when I almost shat myself in Mexico City, and we had a taco that was very similar to this. With cheese, quesadilla, a little bit of butter. I think maybe that was their inspiration of it being a Baja-inspired one. I don't know. This is 10 times better than that. It's salty. You get a little bit of a crispy skirt of cheese around the taco. The texture is wonderful because you've got all this vegetable, and you've got some fresh tomato with perfectly cooked shrimp, and then little pieces of poblano that are charred and nicely softened, but still, they're not so soft that they're gooey. This takes the cake. This is something special. This is what I'm going to rate. Texture. The butter adds this unbelievable crispiness to the outside of the tortilla while remaining that elastic chew. Then there's all those different textures. The fresh tomato. It's juicy. It's cheesy. It's got a little bit of toothsomeness from the shrimp. So texture, I'm going to give a solid 8.9 out of 10. Flavor. Oftentimes when you see tomato in a taco like this, the first thing that happens is you lose salt because the tomato then dissolves the salt and dilutes the intensity of flavor. That's not happening here. The seasoning is throughout. Flavor of the shrimp is fresh. It's not fishy. It's oceanic. It's got brightness. I think this is also a 9. Baja. What the f*** is going on? Bring the Baja. You make me go, bye bye. Moving on. We are here at the Little America food cart pod and we are at a Korean fried chicken place specifically called Fry Baby, owned by Sonny Hatch. This is like his rookie endeavor was Fry Baby. That's the first thing he ever did and immediately is the most talked about food cart in the city of Portland, Oregon. We tried two items. The classic gochujang wings and the snow cheese wings. A little unusual, but supposedly they say mac and cheese meets chicken wing and it's one of the most talked about street food dishes in all of Portland. Yeah, I mean it looks almost like an unfinished gem. It feels like if you ran this through a polisher, what would spit out is possibly a chicken wing shaped diamond. They also gave us a dime bag of what they call Korean sparkle. It's like ramen powder. Love that. So they were nice enough, smart enough, and kind enough to give us what I like to call condoms for eating. They're gloves. Here we go. The snow cheese. This giant monstrosity. Where do I even begin? Wow. Whoa. It's good, right? Dude, what the f**k? Got a little sparkle in there. With wings, one of the hard things about it is you kind of get like a wet crunch. Yeah, yeah. This is a really nice, dry, crisp crunch that immediately hits you and I don't know what the f**k they did. Like, you can see the separation of the seasoning and the chicken. So the seasoning formed like a crispy barrier that is substantial. I'm not picking up tons of cheese notes. I'm picking up a subtle toasted Parmesan flavor and I really like it. And then if you use a little bit of the Korean sparkle, you add a little bit of umami, a little bit of salt, a little MSG in there that's really hitting. I will say, like, if I were to have one critique, I wish there was like a touch more salt. Before I go any further, let's try the gochujang. Oh, dude, come on. This is another Portland versus New York situation. Korean fried chicken in New York, in the freezing cold. We're in the freezing cold again, but this time in Portland. We have two great Goliaths in the fried chicken world. And the question is, who had the better Korean fried chicken? To me, by far, the one in the lead is Portland. It's got more depth of flavor. It's got that rich pepper gochujang flavor. This is like how I would make mine. I hate that I'm comparing it to the way that I make mine. If I were to rate one of these, I'm honestly going to go with the original one. I hate to be a bit of an outlier. I know everybody's saying that the cheese one is their favorite. The cheese one is delicious and I will come back for that. I think it's a unique offering. But if we go to the classic, this is a banger. Texture, nine. Easy. This has been sitting here with the sauce in the cold. If it were my wings, they would have been soggy by now. The fact that they're still crunchy, I think, speaks volumes to them. Flavor, it's got all the flavors that I want. I almost wish there was just a hint more saltiness, like maybe a little bit of soy sauce. Flavor, flat eight, which is strong. Portland, our Korean wing champion, and through four spots, Portland is killing it. But our next spot, Matt's Barbecue Tacos. Listen, taking a Texan for barbecue and tacos, that's risky behavior. But here's the real question. This spot could backfire and completely ruin Portland's average and thus kick them out from even winning. Matt's needs to score 13.5 or higher to hold Portland's current lead. And two tacos will decide that. The brisket breakfast taco and the barbecued pork belly taco. What makes this really special is they make their own flour tortillas. I will say a lot of places, even in Austin, don't make their own tortillas. So they've got a leg up. Immediately, first bite, the promise is there. And they delivered. First of all, this brisket is cooked really nicely. It is chopped brisket, which I should say kind of gives them a little bit of a leg up. Chopped brisket is the easiest to make good, because you're tossing with barbecue sauce and you're chopping the lean with the fatty. So you can hide all the imperfections with all the fatty cuts. That said, I got a big chunk of lean in that, and it was moist. It was tender. It did not have a steaky chew. But the first thing I noticed was that nice smoky flavor. The eggs are cooked nicely. They're not like super rubbery. They're nice and tender. It's like flaky almost. You can see there's a little air pockets going on in there. And I like that. That's adding the density of this taco, and it creates a formidable base to hold all this meat. And also, by the way, potatoes are really good. Yeah. Wow, I'm like nervous almost. Unbelievable. The importance of this is picking the right cut of belly. It's not too fatty. It's got the perfect ratio of meat and fat. It's really hard to find pork belly like that. It's almost got a bacon-y cure to it. I don't know if you feel that way. Yeah, totally. I'm going to vote for the breakfast taco as my favorite of the two. This is a top 10 breakfast taco. Firstly, it's the homie tortilla. But more importantly, the eggs were actually properly seasoned with salt. This stands at a solid eight for texture and eight for flavor. But Austin chefs, more specifically the ones serving breakfast tacos, please hear me out. It's time to step it up, guys. If you make breakfast tacos in Austin, step it up. You're going to show these guys up. I got to say, I had much better of an impression than I expected from Portland. Not that I thought it would be bad, but it exceeded my expectations. Which means it's now in the lead after conquering two of America's top street food cities. Except there's one more missing that we have to see. And that is where I was born, Los Angeles. It's a city celebrated for its street food. But it's faced troubling times, devastating wildfires in early 2025 that left unimaginable destruction behind. And as an LA native, witnessing this was heartbreaking, to say the least. It's one thing to see it on the news. It's another thing to see it in person. But even in tragedy, food is at the heart of this city. Chefs, line cooks, street food vendors, restaurants, despite being part of such a vulnerable industry, are among the first to step up, feeding those in need without hesitation. Today we're joined by Memo Torres of LA Taco, a James Beard award-winning publication that not only shares the best taco spots, but also covers the true community behind the beauty of food. During the fires, they were on the front lines, amplifying the stories of the tragedy, the recovery, and the taco vendors who turned their food stands into relief stations. One of those taco vendors on the front lines is our first stop today, Marisco's Jalisco, arguably LA's most famous taco truck, thanks to, honestly, a very simple creation, just a shrimp taco. How good is it going to be, really? This is one of the most addictive tacos you can get in LA. And it always hits. It's always the same and never disappoints. I always say, oh, seafood tacos are underrated, right? Because a lot of people don't order them. And I always try to push people to order a little bit more seafood tacos. Just try them. If anyone were to start here, you would never want to order a meat taco again. This is f***ing bonkers, like phenomenal. I've had over a thousand tacos in LA. There's very few I crave and I run back to. This is one of them. There's so many things going on. The first thing I notice is, like, the temperature. You've got this, like, really beautifully, like, hot on the inside, a little bit warm on the outside, and then that cold, refreshing salsa on top. The cold, refreshing avocado. It plays really well together. Temperature, I don't even think it's been a topic of conversation until now. This is the first time that we're talking about it in the whole video. Texture is unbelievable. By applying this sort of, like, a little bit more moist, a little bit more wet salsa, it calms down the crunch without losing the crunch. You now have a little bit of chew. And then, of course, the inside is just like this luscious, moist, ooey-gooey. I don't even know what the f*** is in there, to be honest with you, but it tastes great. Nobody knows what's in there. It's a secret. People have tried to pry it out of him. We don't know. Hey, Raul, what's in this? Memo also recommended the Poseidon Tostada, which looks f***ing insane. It's very tasty, but truthfully, I really was more focused on the shrimp taco. Texture, I think it's a 9.4, honestly. It's, like, the best textured shrimp taco in human history. Flavor, dude, it's a f***ing 9.4. That might be the highest rating I've ever given. Crazy work. Moving on. We're at Tacos y Birria La Unica, which is one of the OG birria trucks. I know birria's exploded everywhere, but these guys have been doing it for a long time. One of the special things about these guys that other birria trucks don't do is that they do goat and they do beef. And on top of that, they make their own handmade tortillas. I like that they do both beef and goat, because I feel like oftentimes, anytime I've gone anywhere, it's either one or the other. And most of the time nowadays, it's beef. You don't really see goat anymore. That's obviously the more traditional route. I like that they're kind of trying to cater to both parties. Nothing much. You got your consomme there, too. Let's see you do it. Oh, f*** yeah. This has flavor. I want to, like, try and persuade you here. For anybody who has had birria before, you really should be looking for the goat variety. I think that you're going to get a more authentic flavor, but it's really not like, I think what everyone's afraid of is, oh, it's going to be gamey. I'm not going to like it, blah, blah, blah. First of all, you got to try it before you start talking s***. Second of all, beef to me is so mellow that it gets lost in all the power of this flavor. You've got chili. You've got the onion, the fresh cilantro. And of course, that nice consomme that's just, like, enrobing this rich bite. But the beauty of having goat in there is you can actually taste the meat. So now it's a whole experience. I think this is great. This would definitely go in one of my top contending birria. It was far better than the one that we had in Mexico City, in my opinion. The whole history of birria, it was created to tame the gaminess of goat. If you ever get a goat taco and you still taste the goat, they didn't do it right. All right, I'm going to break this down. Texture, super crisp on the outside. And a lot of tortillas, this is why you can tell that they're making them here. When they try to get that crispy exterior in their older tortillas, they do get a little crispy, but they're kind of, like, leathery. This is like a nice snap. It's still a little bit elastic from the tortilla. You've got the cheese in there that's kind of promoting that chew even more. And the meat is so soft, it melts in your mouth. Not too spicy at all. I almost wish it was a little spicier for me personally, but that's what the sauce is for, so there you go. Honestly, I'm going to give the texture a 9.1 out of 10. Flavor, I almost wish there was just a tiny, tiny bit more salt. I wouldn't say this is under-salted. Even without that, though, the flavor is so intense. I think I'm going to give the flavor an 8.8 out of 10. Very, very, very, very strong start. We have much more to go. Moving on. So I'm super excited to bring you to this spot. It's one of my newest favorite spots. We're in Cypress Park, down the hill from Dodger Stadium. And this is one of the first tacos I bit into, immediately was like, this is a winner. This is their Al Pastor taco. And one of the unique things that they do here is they're the offspring of a good franchise in Tijuana called Tijuanazo, which used to be called Taconazo. So like the tortillas, they're all from Tijuana. He's got his great marinade on it. And one of the most unique things that he does that you won't see anywhere else is that cilantro cream on top. Yeah, I love that. There's two sauces, basically. Go ahead and take a bite. Better than any Al Pastor that we had in Mexico City by far. This is exactly what people imagine when they see that juicy trompo, hot and sweaty, seasoned to the maximum with salt. There's zero dryness. It's nice and fatty. It's luscious, it's unctuous. And then all that richness gets cut by the acidity in the pineapple, the sweetness of the pineapple. It's nice and acidic in the crema too. The crema is not overwhelmingly creamy. Exactly. Because I think if it was, it might almost be too much. It's also very fresh. I'm like drooling over here. Yeah, one of the most unique things about this taqueria though is that he takes after his father who taught him this trick. He has a specific salsa and a specific tortilla for every meat that you want. This is why I always say, the best tacos in America do not come from New York. They do not come from Texas. They come from California and Los Angeles. And this is the exact epiphany moment you'll have. You come eat here, you'll know what the I'm talking about. I'm not joking. And I know a lot of people are going to think, oh, you're so biased. I really don't give a. That is what I believe. Because when I put it in my mouth, I want to take my pants off. Do you understand? Flavor, the meat, I taste the unctuousness of the pork and the spices and it's garlicky and rich. And you can get that a little bit of that achiote. It's got that cream, herbaceousness from the cilantro cream flavor, nine, six. And I think I'm going to give the texture a nine, five. This is the highest score of the video so far. And that means that we've only got a few more places left to see if that can be beat. Moving on. Okay, so we went a little bit off the path here. We went to Kogi. I picked this out. It's been around for a long time. Actually, it's been around so long that I would argue it might as well have been one of the first, most important food trucks of the United States of America. They kind of kicked off basically the food truck scene. I grew up eating off of these growing up with my dad and working around LA. After Kogi took over the truck style and did his thing, Roach Coach is no more. It was like the fusion trucks, the food trucks, and the whole scene exploded all over. Not just LA, but the US. It made the public comfortable with eating street food in a big way across the US. In other countries, it's very common. No one thinks twice about it. But in America, we're all about sanitation. And oh my God, I don't know if I can eat that off the street. So we got the sliders. We got the Korean Kogi dog. What we're going to do is we're going to try these. Whichever one is better is the one that we are going to rate. Okay, it's good. Yeah, the Korean barbecue sauce on that. When I saw the bag shredded cheese. Scared you a little bit, didn't it? I got scared. Yeah. But that fear turned to joy. The meat is super tender. It's not chewy. Nice little sear. The Korean, I guess, barbecue sauce, whatever is on there, is sweet. It's salty. It's perfectly balanced. It's a little bit acidic too. I like the acidity in there. That's really important. You got the crunch from the fresh cabbage. It's got a little bit of like a kimchi flavor to it. But this bun is like remarkable. I don't know where the they're sourcing these buns. This might be one of the best slider buns I've ever had in my life. It's not like a King's Hawaiian roll, but it's very similar. Yeah, it's not as sweet, but it's soft like it. And it's buttery. Honestly, forget the Kogi dog because that thing looked whack as f***. I'm just going to vote for this. You sure? I mean, you don't want the glizzy? The way that that is slung over, let's just let them have this win and call it a day. I'm curious, man. I'm going to give it a try. This dude really wants this f***ing duog in his mouth. We got it. I got it. Is that right? Yeah. That bun was not it, man. Okay, okay. Texture. Can I get a drum roll, please? We're going with an unbelievable 9.2 and flavor 9.3. Maybe one of the most surprisingly tasty sliders I have had in a very long time. Kogi still got it, man. Kogi still f***ing got it. Good for you. Just maybe not the dog. Now, LA's score might look big, but remember, this is just the current average. This number could go down depending on how the final spot goes. And yes, it could still lose the lead. It all comes down to me and Miyashwarma. If they score a higher than a 13, LA will officially be the best street food city in America. The energy emanating off of these guys is crazy. They've been around for under two years. They're still very new. They've got that excited energy that kind of goes away after you run an establishment for like four or five years and you've been killing it for so long. You know, it kind of goes away, the magic. And they still got the magic. So there's a strong chance we could have a winner. So this is a Jordanian style chicken shawarma that got its start at Schmorgishburg, LA. This is my most favorite street food festival ever. It happens every week. It's massive. There's s***loads of people everywhere and s***loads of very unique food by some of the most passionate people I can think of in restaurants. But for Chef Yaz, the magic really started back home in Jordan. He brings this bread, which is like this beautifully thin, translucent bread that's handmade from Jordan and the spices. Here we go, cheers. This is not any shawarma I've ever tasted in my life. At first I was like, why is there a line of people on the side of the road in front of this s*** car wash parking lot? And then I see these hot, long, crunchy boys going in people's mouths. I think I'm getting it. Oh my God. There's a garlic aioli he puts on there too. Some pickles. It's like a perfect bite. That is exactly what I was gonna say. This is a perfect bite. God, that bread is so thin. It's so delicate. And because it's so thin, it's really just doing the bare necessities of its job. It's holding everything and all the goodness together. Texture, really crispy here. Super soft and chewy. Almost like a super thin tortilla mixed with the naan. The inside, the protein is salted f***ing perfectly. You're getting crunch from the pickle. The meat is moist. It's got a nice toothsomeness to it. It's fatty. It's not dry at all. I don't even know what kind of meat it is. Come on, look at this. Look at this. Dude, it's so thin. Wow. I can't believe we've arrived at the final moment. After four cities, endless flavors, it all comes down to our final score. Which city is our champion of American street food? It's so difficult. Think about New York. Arguably, many people would look at that place as the greatest place for a dining experience in the United States of America. Globally, people would say that. But then again, Portland has won over the hearts of culinarians around the U.S. And Austin, a bit of a newcomer, but still killing the game. I mean, I lived there for f***'s sake. I love the place. But if Mia Mia scores higher than a 13, Los Angeles wins the competition. All right, texture, nine, five. Flavor though, solid, 9.4 out of 10. This is a banger. That means LA winner only won. It is what it is. Here's what I'll say. We've been all over. Every single place has blown out our expectations. Every single place that we ate at easily has gotten the highest ratings that we've ever done, period, out of any video. We've eaten all over the globe. By far, this video, we've rated food the highest of all time. So I think everyone deserves a round of applause. Great food doesn't have to be made over a shiny cooktop. Just needs to be made with great ingredients and some good intention. We love you, subscribe, bye.