Emilia follows Ross’ recommendation and tries out some street food in Fitzroy!

Press PLAY to listen to Emilia’s full review!

Frankie’s Tortas and Tacos

30 Johnston St

Fitzroy 

After a discussion earlier this week about street food, Ross told me, “you should definitely go to some street food for your food review this week”.

You don’t have to tell me twice!

Tortas and Tacos was the ultimate street food for a long time, with a taco truck on Smith Street in a former kebab kiosk since 2019.

Naturally with really good street food often comes with a line, fear not though they’ve had to upgrade to a proper shopfront on Johnston Street so we can circumnavigate that little issue.

It still has the taco truck vibe but now a little more diner-y; metal tables, hand painted signs, new specials every week. 

The name is a spoiler for what you’ll find when you open up the menu. They use the best, Melbourne-based ingredients as the base for their meals.

The tacos they use are La Tortilleria corn tortillas, handmade in Kensington; the process at La Tortilleria uses two ingredients, wholegrain corn & a pinch of sea salt and a traditional 3,000 year old recipe and process.

La Tortilleria has a fourth-generation nixtamal tortilla maker from Coahuila, Mexico, on their team, ensuring that every tortilla produced remains faithful to this ancient practice. It also means that it’s coincidentally gluten-free.  

Start with the chicharron – Pork scratching with salsa verde and bar corn nuts (which was out of stock when I went this time but have had in the past). Once my palate was whet, I tried almost all the tacos on the menu, for the good of the audience, of course. Chicken, beef, mushroom and fish. 

My favourite had to be the fish pescadillas which is a traditional Mexican dish, originally from Acapulco. It’s a deep fried taco with fish and potato filling that is then fried in its entirety until golden and crispy and served with salsa verde on the side. Be warned, they bring it out fresh so it’s hot, very hot. 

The other tacos did not disappoint, the grilled chicken taco was laid on a bed of mango habanero salsa, and topped with pickled red onion, coriander and lime wedge. 

The beef taco used grilled marinated flank steak, and they top it with a generous serving of chimichurri and fresh white onion.

Lastly, for the vegetarian/vegans I tried the grilled mushroom, morita salsa (made using roasted tomatoes and morita chilli and it has a smoky flavour), this one is also topped with pickled red onion and coriander. I was pleasantly surprised by how much flavour was injected into mushrooms.

Considering Melbourne is inundated with sandwich shops on every corner, the Mexican style tortas on the menu have a lot to live up to.

They use a bolillo or pan frances which is half size baguette, crispy and crumbly on the outside and soft and light on the inside, much like a banh mi baguette. 

At the server’s recommendation, I tried the Al Pastor Torta loaded with grilled pork, Oaxacan cheese, smeared with refried beans, lettuce/cabbage, pickled red onion, Frankie’s red hot sauce & salsa verde.

They don’t scrimp on ingredients, the cheese was grilled and melted to the top layer of the torta. It’s not a clean meal to eat, good street food never is.

There’s plenty of booze to choose from, naturally, plenty of good agave; back bar of mezcal and tequila, imported (and local) beers, local natural wine list, cocktails, and even a house red that I tried. Not half bad!

Another example of them using fabulous, local ingredients is proven in their dessert offerings. I was so excited to discover they serve my favourite Melbourne ice cream, Billy Van Creamy ice cream tacos!

Get adventurous with a Caramel & Guajillo Chilli or stay safe with a Choc & Cinnamon. Couldn’t think of a better collaboration.

No bookings, just walk in – they’re open 11-9pm (everyday except Sunday where they close at 8pm) seven days a week.

My tip is to go with someone else and share an order of four tacos, you can mix two kinds together that way and pay $30, that’s $7.5 a taco.

They load up the protein so unless you’re starving you won’t need much more. The other option is to get three of the same taco for $24. The tortas sit tight on $20.

Tortas and Tacos do everything a good street eat should. The menu is simple, authentic, locally produced, fresh everyday and they don’t take themselves too seriously, experimenting with new flavours every week.

A street eat should feel a part of the community because that’s who they feel week on week, Frankie’s Tortas and Tacos do just that.