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1. The Term “Street Tacos”
Tacos are tacos, son. You can have regional varieties (the taco acorazado, the taco árabe, the puffy, hard-shelled, or soft taco) but only people who don't live among Mexicans or are trying to convince said people to shell out $9 for three tiny tacos ever use the term “street tacos,” the latest in a long line of exotified terms (others: hot tamales, “authentic”, “Tex-Mex”) used by gabachos to sell watered-down version of Mexican food to gabachos. Tell you what, foodies: if we can eradicate this term in 2011, I promise to turn more ant-immigrant than Joe Arpayaso…for a minute.
2. Red Velvet Anything
I love red velvet anything–cupcakes, cookies, cakes, muffins, you name it. But is this the only regional American dessert that deserves such an obsession? Whither the New Mexican bizcochito? The Kentuckian Derby pie? Hawaiian shave ice? Move on, red velvet, and give others a couple of seconds in the spotlight.
3. Sweet Potato Fries
Another food I like but that makes me roll my eyes whenever I see it on menus. There are other foodstuffs restaurateurs can fry into finger-thick rectangles to crunchy ecstasy, you know–yucca, purple potatoes, even sugarcane. Okay, maybe not the last entry, but it should. Sweet potato fries are just a shortcut toward respectability for new chefs who claim they're organically minded and gastropub-leaning, itself long-dead trends.
4. Bacon
The obsession people have with bacon is downright Freudian, which means it's the product of a coked-out mind desperately trying to return to an infantile state before Daddy ruined everything. Bacon is good–we get it.
5. The Luxe-Lonchera Cult
Not the luxe-loncheras, mind you: they will live and die by the quality of their food, and that's fair. But can we get over the excitement over luxe-lonchera gatherings, the self-celebration by everyone involved that they're participating in something innovative? Hey, acolytes: for the last time, MEXICANS HAVE BEEN DOING IT FOR A GOOD THREE DECADES AND WE NEVER MADE A PINCHE BIG DEAL OUT OF IT. And, while we're at it: “gourmet food truck” is a misnomer, as they have to park in the same commissaries as those supposed roach coaches, dontcha know.