Chef : Nick James
Address : He lives in the Avenues of SLC, but there is no restaurant 😉
Phone : Shall not be listed
4 stars out of 5
A week or so ago I received an email from my good friend Nick that he wanted to make tacos for a group of friends so that they could be reviewed by a proper taco taco journalist such as myself :
I was stewing up some chicken thigh for tacos this morning, and it reminded me that I want to make you tacos sometime.
Included in the email was the incredible photo above that Nick had taken of his tacos. Could I say no? Of course I couldn’t. We planned it out and on a magical Taco Tuesday Nick went to work and improvised on his latest taco recipes to create us some incredible chicken and pork tacos.
All week long I was anxious to try Nick’s tacos. Nick is an extremely creative person and having mentioned to me that he had been continually changing and improving on his improvised taco recipes I was very curious to see what he would share with us. Nick is a great artist (you can see his work at http://nickjam.es/) but until that night I had not had the opportunity to taste any of his cooking.
Nick has told me that his enjoyment and approach in cooking is very much like that in his artwork. Once he is comfortable with a medium whether it be pencils or chipotle sauce he feel comfortable to experiment and lose himself in his creation and in cooking for example he feels no need to follow a recipe or make precise measurements.
I stalked around the kitchen behind Nick as he worked and explained to taco enthusiasts Dave, Ryan and myself about what he was doing and how much longer we would have to wait. We circled him like hungry sharks until he told us to grab our plates and started throwing freshly warmed tortillas onto them.
Now that we were finally ready, I filmed Nick presenting them to us :
These tacos were amazing. All 3 of our judges were impressed. Here are their responses :
My personal favorite was the pork taco recipe. The flavor was complex and constantly changing from initial bite to its after taste. The orange juice certainly helped to bring out the tenderness and develop a unique flavor. The chicken tacos were delicious as well. When I say that the pork was my favorite, it was like choosing between two children. The chicken had just the right amount of picante-ness so that it was spicy but at the same time it was sweet like candy.
The morale of this story is that when Nick asks you if you’d like to try his tacos, you say YESSSSS! If you don’t have this luxury, stay tunes because I will post the recipes later this week.
4 stars out of 5.
SLC Tacos 
I disagree with the 4 out of 5 rating. These were possibly….no not possibly, these WERE the best tacos I’ve consumed. I suppose I’m no gastronomical guru, and I certainly say this with due humility to Senior Taco Journalisto, or whatever, but 5 out of 5 is the only appropriate score here.
Sincerely,
The Rogue Taco Vigilante
Dear Dave-
I agree with you that these were amazing tacos. I can’t tell you how many times I hit the BACKSPACE key on my keyboard trying to decide between a 4 and a 5. In the end, I chose to preserve Nick’s safety. I was worried that one of the thousands of taco enthusiasts that reads this site might actually attempt to kidnap Nick and force him to make tacos a la ‘MISERY’. So in order to make sure that Nick did not end up in the basement of some crazy person cooking tacos until they inevitably smashed both his legs with a sledgehammer, I elected to protect him by awarding a mere 4. 🙂
Burgersmoke,
Your concern for Nick is touching, and not entirely unfounded. I have on several occasions considered restraining Nick against his will in my home by anchoring him to this or that piece of stationary furniture. Not for the tacos, though this may be a nice side benefit, but simply because he is polite company. And we would conversate:
Me – It’s sure nice to have you here Nick. You certainly are polite company. Certainly.
Nick – I’m tied to a piano and you’ve smashed my legs with the blunt end of an axe.
Me- POLITE COMPANY!
The smashing of the legs would likely be the product of a some trivial dispute regarding the anatomical correctness of small porcelain unicorns, of which I have a vast and impressive collection. Nick didn’t think so.
Taking all this into account, I can see your reasoning for the sub-perfect score. I also want you to know, you are under no obligation to approve this confession so that others may view it. I just wanted to tell you. Because you seem like such polite company.
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