If there is something capable of bringing people together, it is the aroma of a good strong coffee and that of a dish prepared with love. That’s what Robert Resendez and Nick Martínez offer at Masamigos, their new mobile taqueria in San Bernardino.
The two entrepreneurs opened their business in September, but they say that they have wanted to work together for many years, since they both grew up in the Inland Empire and have been best friends since high school.
“It was a great decision to settle in San Bernardino because, in addition to being from here, we have all heard stories or gossip about how bad the area is, but not everything is like that, so we say we contribute something positive to the community,” Resendez said.
Martínez says that, for most of their lives, he and Resendez were inseparable; But after graduating high school, he joined the military while Resendez studied music in college.
“For years we didn’t find the right time, since we had different schedules and there was a time when we didn’t live in the same state, but this year everything happened as it should have,” says Martínez, 34 years old.
At first they thought about following in the footsteps of Martínez’s family business, which operates an air conditioning store, but they both knew they wanted something different and their own. It was then when, together with Resendez’s fiancée, Pamela Cormier, they decided to unite their passion for coffee and Mexican tacos.
“We wanted everything to be very simple and direct, just the way we are,” Resendez said. “We wanted to offer the purest form of coffee and tacos, do our best with the little we had. We didn’t want an overwhelming, confusing menu.”
At Masamigos you will find five taco options, including breakfast tacos, which are served in traditional yellow corn tortillas and can include Mexican-style eggs, chorizo and other fillings. One of their customers’ favorite tacos is the barbacoa, prepared in a handmade blue corn tortilla and filled with beef slow-cooked, for 6 to twelve hours, in a guajillo ancho chili sauce.
On top they add spoonfuls of their green and red sauces, homemade pico de gallo and a few drops of lemon. With a single bite you can sense the love put into each taco: simple to look at, but with an explosion of flavors and just the right touch of spice that invites you to come back for more.
Both the coffee and the ingredients for its dishes are purchased within the community itself. The coffee comes from Paper Boy Roasting, a company based in Fontana, while the native corn dough from Masienda is harvested in Mexico and sold on both sides of the border.
“Being able to offer them something simple, but of quality is our priority,” said Martínez.
Their recipes are simple and the flavors are inspired by dishes that they themselves have tried throughout their lives, but also by the seasoning of their grandmothers: Juanita from Guadalajara and Gloria from Mexico City.
Pamela, Resendez’s fiancee, is in charge of cooking most of the dishes with recipes based on what her grandmother taught her, while Resendez relies on the memory of the dishes, also from her grandmother.
“I recently lost my grandmother, so I always think about her. Many of the dishes on the menu remind me of the food she prepared for me when I was little: they were very simple recipes, with simple ingredients, but made with a lot of love,” recalls Reséndez, who has adapted one of those recipes with his own touch. “The fried dough on our menu is inspired by her, because I always fried quesadillas by hand.”
From the shop window you can watch him take a fistful of dough and roll it between his hands until it forms a perfect ball. Then he places it in the tortillero, fills it with Oaxaca cheese and chorizo, seals it with precision around the edges and fries it for a few minutes. The result: a crunchy bite on the outside and creamy on the inside.
“We put it on the menu and luckily everyone loved it and enjoys it as much as I did when I was a kid,” Resendez said. “It’s also a way to reconnect with my culture, because growing up I felt like I had lost a lot of it and that I had become very Americanized, but as I’ve gotten older I’ve tried to connect more with my roots and honor it with the food we make.”
For the three of them, the mobile taqueria has been a dream that did not come easy, but that they were able to realize together.
“I love doing this. I have the privilege of working with the two people I appreciate the most,” Resendez said. “It’s a great blessing to be able to do it with them.”
Schedules
For now, Masamigos is open five days a week, closing on Sundays and Wednesdays. It is located at 324 W 40th St, San Bernardino, CA 92407