At Sins of Sal in Amsterdam, you’ll eat the best tacos of your life
Tacos are Mexico City’s ultimate street food: they’re delicious, nutritious and cheap. And if you love tacos, you have to go to Latin street food bar Sins of Sal in Amsterdam. The tacos here aren’t as cheap as they are in Mexico City, but they’re at least as nutritious and insanely delicious. Sinning has never been more heavenly.
The bad girl
In Mexico, you’ll find a huge variety of tacos, and the Netflix series Las Crónicas Del Taco pays tribute to them. It’s impossible to watch an episode without immediately wanting to book a ticket to Mexico. It’s cheaper to go to Sins of Sal, and without the risk of ‘Montezuma’s revenge’, too. If you’ve never heard of it, this is the infamous combination of diarrhoea, vomiting and nausea that affects around 80% of Mexican tourists…
That’s why we head to Sins of Sal on the hottest Saturday of the year, on Westerstraat in Amsterdam. And you can’t miss it; from the outside, Sins of Sal looks completely different from the other businesses here. Everything is black, and inside you eat in the twilight beneath red fluorescent lighting.
Sins of Sal is the bad girl sister of Salmuera, the Latin American restaurant and mezcaleria run by brothers Vincent and Thomas Uzcudun in Amsterdam. Everything that isn’t allowed there, they do here. So expect daring dishes with sometimes bizarre combinations. And healthy? Meh, it’s mainly deliciously fatty and rich. Sinfull food, you know. And is that an image of Santa Muerte—the Saint of Death—with candles around it?
Not for sensitive viewers
Sins of Sal is inspired by Tarantino’s film From Dusk Till Dawn, which is set in Mexico’s ‘Titty Twister’ nightclub. Critics tore the film apart at the time (it was released in 1996). Bad taste, misogyny and excessive violence—that was the bitter verdict. Perhaps the film was less suitable for oversensitive viewers, just as Sins of Sal isn’t suitable for vegans or health freaks.
But we’re in the right place and kick things off with an incredibly thirst-quenching cocktail, the Elote Paloma: an extremely refreshing tequila and mezcal cocktail, garnished with fresh dill and an eye-catching ice cube that takes up the entire length of the long drink. Heavenly! It goes down like lemonade—we’re warning you now.
Mezcal and pisco
We start with oysters with leche de tigre (or tiger’s milk: a citrus-based marinade such as the one used in traditional Peruvian ceviche). Very fresh with a kick. Once you’ve eaten the oysters, they pour a little mezcal or pisco into the shell to prepare your palate for the next bite.
Then the first tacos arrive: Tacos Orellana—fried oyster mushrooms glazed with chipotle, on top of a fennel and apple salad. Beautifully decorated with a little flower, too. The whole thing is fresh, crunchy and smooth—heavenly!
Sweetbreads with Coca-Cola
‘The best is yet to come,’ says the friendly Sonia when we tell her how delicious it was. And she’s right, because the Molleja Tostadas—fried tacos with sweetbreads, glazed with Coca-Cola and topped with a dollop of sour cream—are truly amazing. Especially with a smear of 9th gate salsa, which is spicy but brings the rather rich little dish beautifully into balance.
With veal cheek
Next come the Cheeky Flautas: rolled, fried tacos filled with veal cheek, beautifully decorated with mole and sour cream on top of a tomatillo ketchup salsa. A flavourful but intense dish. Veal cheek is already very tender, but as a stew it’s now really an awful lot in one bite.
While we’re intensely enjoying the best tacos ever, the playlist of nineties hip hop is also a pleasure. We order another cocktail, because although natural wines are also on the menu, it’s still hot outside. The Cosmic Colada is a mix between a cosmopolitan and a Piña Colada. With a cranberry cordial and infused with toasted coconut, this slush is refreshing and strong, and just as juicy as it is tropical.
Tacos with pulled pork
According to Sonia, we can’t leave without trying the Birria Tacos: fried tacos with pulled pork, Gouda cheese, birria stock and, for those who want it, bone marrow. They come with a little bowl of coriander and raw onion. Sonia was right—we wouldn’t have wanted to miss these. A taco filled with pulled pork and cheese, fried, dipped in a special broth, dipped again, but this time in bone marrow. What a fantastic combination. And what a bomb of a dish, too.
Tuna tacos
We’d like more, but we can’t manage any more. A shame, because even more delicious and original tacos are appearing beside us. We take one more photo of the ones with tuna in a crispy shell. We’ll definitely order those next time.
Sins of Sal, Westerstraat 86, Amsterdam
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