Max Taco in Santa Rosa, CA: A Restaurant Review

Max Taco, you giveth, and you taketh away. On the one hand, you giveth some seriously fat burritos made with ingredients that taste like they are genuinely fresh. On the other hand, you taketh a rather exorbitant amount of loot from my wallet for what is essentially just taqueria food, and you taketh away menu options and sizing choices that are pretty much a requisite at all other Mexican eateries.

The owner/main chef of Max Taco is the same guy that owns and operates Max Cafe down at the other end of the mall. And as with Max Cafe, all the beverages are both crazily overpriced and don't have prices listed. Now, I don't know what the deal is here. I don't know if rent at Coddingtown is just stratospheric and this is what this guy has to do to pay his bills, or if it's a "what the market will bear" thing, but the fact remains that even the most overpriced eateries in San Francisco's Financial District don't have the grapes to charge $3 for a regular-sized bottle of Orangina or $2 for bottled water. But both of these places sure do.

If you can get past the crazy drink prices - usually by simply not ordering one - you're greeted by higher-than-average (but not-quite-as-jacked-as-the-drinks) food prices. This I'm a little more lenient on, as you genuinely do get pretty big portions, and the ingredients do seem to be of good quality. The preparation is also a little better than your standard taqueria.

Unfortunately, the price to pay for this enhanced preparation is that serving options are entirely out of your hands. There's only one burrito size - ginormous - and it costs about $8.50. No baby burritos for the lighter appetites or thinner wallets. Also, all burritos here are served by default in the "wet" style, with sour cream and avocado drizzled all over the top rather than inside. This means that you are forced into eating the burrito with knife and fork. While I appreciate that the burritos are huge enough to fill the tortilla so full that it would be impossible to pick up anyway, I'm really not a knife-and-fork kind of guy. Also, a lot of the burrito stuffing here appears to be rice, with relatively little meat making a showing. It tastes good, but somehow seems like unsubstantial filler given the price being charged.

If this was an area with less Mexican dining options, I might be more forgiving in my assessment. But Santa Rosa is really quite Mexican, and not only is it not hard to find taquerias and such around here, there's quite a few better ones. Of course, it's the only one in Coddingtown. So there's that.