El Toro Taco

El Toro Taco occupies a corner spot at 1 South Krome Avenue in the heart of downtown Homestead, combining a full service Mexican restaurant with an attached Mexican and Latin American grocery market under one roof. The pairing of restaurant and mercado is typical of how many Mexican families run businesses that serve both the dine in customer and the household cook looking for masa, dried chiles, or Mexican pantry staples not stocked at a mainstream supermarket. Business directory listings indicate the restaurant has operated for close to four decades, putting its opening not long after Homestead’s Mexican and Central American population began growing significantly around the Redland’s farm labor economy.

The menu draws on Sinaloa-style cooking, a regional Mexican Pacific coast tradition, and reflects that identity more than the generic combination plate style found at some Tex-Mex restaurants. Expect items like carne asada, seafood cocktails, ceviche, and a range of tacos alongside the enchiladas and burritos familiar to most diners. The attached market side sells fresh tortillas, Mexican produce, spices, and packaged goods, and it is common to see customers leaving with grocery bags as much as with a takeout order from the restaurant counter.

Homestead’s downtown, centered on Krome Avenue, grew historically around the Florida East Coast Railway and the packing houses that processed produce from surrounding farms, and it remains the commercial spine of the old town even as newer shopping centers have opened along US-1 and further east. El Toro Taco’s location right on Krome Avenue puts it among the handful of longstanding independent restaurants that have anchored that stretch for decades.

The dining room has the look of a neighborhood restaurant built for repeat customers rather than a design forward space aimed at food tourism: simple tables, a steady lunch crowd of local workers, and a menu written for people who eat there regularly rather than for visitors trying Mexican food for the first time. That makes it a useful stop for anyone wanting a sense of what Homestead’s downtown Mexican food scene looks like day to day, distinct from the more tourist oriented spots near the Everglades entrance.

Hours run from mid morning into the evening seven days a week, and the restaurant handles a mix of dine in, takeout, and grocery customers throughout the day. Because it functions as both a restaurant and a market, parking and foot traffic can be heavier around lunchtime and on weekends when families stock up on groceries after eating. Anyone visiting downtown Homestead’s Krome Avenue corridor for the historic Seminole Theatre or the surrounding shops will likely pass, or step into, El Toro Taco along the way.