Joe and I are committed to tacos (le duh, as my six-year-old niece Katie says with pitch-perfect pre-tween blasé affectation), but we have our affairs with tortas. Unfortunately, many of these Mexican sandwiches are slapped together into obscene portions or made with lame bread, so I generally avoid them. There is an exception to this rule and they are the tortas at La Torta Gorda* (2833 24th St/Bryant St., 415-642-9600). There, they make tortas with thoughtful restraint and toast them lightly on a panini press: They are tortas I consider perfection.
La Torta Gorda is one of those places that frustrates me about San Francisco. It’s located on 24th Street, in the increasingly hipster’ed up part of the deep Mission (still one of my favorite parts of the city), just a few doors down from St. Francis Fountain where on any given weekend morning, you’ll find clicks of hungover hipsters slouching around on the sidewalk waiting to get into the American diner to sop up last night’s boozefest with breakfast.
Why they’re not at La Torta Gorda, which never has a line (and deserves to), baffles me. Not only does La Torta Gorda have a cool old counter (just like St. Francis Fountain) and a nice back patio, but tortas make excellent corpse revivers. The joint also does a decent hueveos rancheros as well as a pretty decent American breakfast of eggs, bacon and toast, too. And if good coffee is your priority, then grap a cup of Four Barrel over at Dynamo Donut.
(A side note to all this is that the hard-working and friendly owner is from Puebla so you’ll find interesting dishes on the menu such as mole, but also squash blossom and huitlacoche (a.k.a. corn smut—such a better way to put it) quesadillas.)
Our regular order is the junior enchilada pierna torta made with a pulled pork of sorts. Don’t get greedy and go for the bigger torta. We’ve come to realize that the smaller one means that the bread gets more toasty—and the crunch of the soft, white bread is what you need to contrast with the soft layers of avocado, refried beans, cheese and melty pork. I like a lot of pickled jalapenos in mine for a little kick and crunch. And make sure to ask for the brick-red salsa, which they serve in a squeeze bottle. Squeeze a little of the rather incendiary sauce on your torta with every bite. Swig a sip of coffee (or if you’re Joe, bottled Mexican Coke) and you’ve got the best Mission District breakfast with no wait, but definitely worth waiting for.
* Full disclosure: La Torta Gorda is, not coincidentally, on 7×7’s Big Eat SF list, as well as in its “Best Of” listings. What can I say? I’m like a La Torta Gorda infomercial.