The Taco Factory: Affordable Mexican food in New Westminster
In the last few years, I’ve been really into guacamole and tacos so I’m always down to try an affordable Mexican restaurant.
The Taco Factory first caught my eye when I was researching for places to order/cater for parties. They offer a taco roulette on their menu 😮 – 20 mixed tacos with guac, chips and salsa for $88. But before I order 20 tacos, I have to eat one of their tacos for myself to see if they are actually decent.
Located in New Westminster, I paid The Taco Factory a visit for a weekday dinner since I saw their menu prices were pretty affordable. This review is based on our in-dining experience back in February 2024.
The Taco Factory
418 E Columbia St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3W9
The vibe
The interior of The Taco Factory is pretty spacious. They have several large dining tables in the front that can seat 6+ people, followed with some bar seating and booth seating.
We came on a weekday (it was actually leap day 🤪!) and the place was pretty empty, but the few tables that were there got seated in the comfy booth seating. The booths were very plush and spacious for 2 people.
I liked the colourful decorations inside and felt it would be good for parties with children. There was also some cool photos printed on the walls too showcasing Mexican celebrities and culture.
Food review
Here is everything we ordered for 2 people. Prices are in CAD and rounded to the nearest dollar for simplicity.
Queso fundido ($16)
My partner really likes queso dip but I usually prefer guacamole or salsa. That night, I decided to let him order his queso 😌.
It came to our table delivered in a small and very hot skillet. Inside, there is melted mozzarella cheese and chorizo sprinkled on top. It is served with some corn tortillas, and 2 small condiments of pico de gallo and another type of salsa.
So the cheese pull on this queso fundido is pretty good, but not gonna lie, I did struggle to get it off my fork and onto the soft corn tortillas 😥. I feel like a harder chip would have done the job better as there were a few moments where the hot cheese slid off my corn tortilla and touched my skin and burned me a little.
The chorizo sprinkled on top was a nice touch.
Tacos ($15)
We came here to try some tacos and that’s exactly what we both ordered. For an order of 3 mixed tacos, it is $15.40 and you can choose between a taco filling list of 9 options.
We actually both chose the same 3 taco fillings: fish, pastor and chorizo.
There are 2 layers of the corn tortillas. The tacos are on the smaller side, but I believe the filling is a reasonable amount.
The fish taco uses deep fried basa fish and I felt it was decently fried and paired nicely with some tartar sauce. The amount of cabbage slaw/veggie is on the leaner side, but I always love myself a fish taco.
The pastor taco was probably my favourite out of the 3. It has pork marinated with achiote and chunks of pineapple – savoury and citrus!
Lastly, the chorizo was pretty similar to the chorizo on our queso from before. I felt it was pretty average.
When you order the 3 tacos or any of the main dishes on their menu, it also comes with a side dish: fries, chips, beans or rice.
One of us chose chips and the other one chose fries. Usually, chip would be the better choice since we are at a Mexican eatery. The chips seemed pretty good and they are homemade – has that thicker crunch – but I was a little disappointed with the portion size.
Fries tasted similar to the ones you can get from Costco but I felt like there were more fries than chips.
Flan ($8)
For dessert, our server highly recommended the Mexican flan with the special homemade sauce. My partner and I both love flan and puddings in general, so we were excited to try it even though we were pretty full.
The flan arrived and it was much bigger than we expected. Look-wise, it is a little unassuming with rough edges but the texture is certainly there. My only critique is that the sauce was too sweet for me 😖.
Final thoughts
Loewe’s rating: ⭐⭐⭐
My rating for The Taco Factory hovers between 3-4 stars and that is mostly because the food is pretty good and the prices are reasonable. We were quite full on our 3 tacos and that would have been around $15 a person. So I think for the price, you get your value.
I personally wouldn’t order the queso fundido again, but I certainly would order the 3 tacos as well as try other items on their menu like the tostadas, guac, and the taco roulette for parties.
I do want to give a shout out to our server because she was just very attentive and gave us a lot of positive energy 😊. She seemed very passionate about Mexican food and we had some nice chats with her.
Sincerely, Loewe