HEB Breakfast Flautas

Let me give them their full name.

H‑E‑B Select Ingredients Flautas For Breakfast Sausage Egg & Cheese

These are pretty good.  Most of the stuff you buy from the prepared frozen (or should that be frozen prepared?) breakfast items assortment are relatively bad.  Mostly, they just do not taste the same as the fresh equivalent.

The example that comes to mind is a major brand English Muffin with Egg, Canadian Bacon and Cheese sandwich, which comes out of the microwave as a true mess.  The biggest problem with all these products is that if they include anything that comes under the "bread" heading (bread, muffins, tortillas, pitas, etc.) then they are lost to the effects of a microwave oven.

I think is was Hot Pockets that pioneered the use of the "crisping sleeve" which only partially fixes the problem.  The true answer is the toaster oven.  Let me demonstrate.

The flautas above, which are a house brand of the HEB grocery chain which is very common in Central Texas, come with crisping sleeves.  You put two flautas into the sleeve and put them in the microwave for 1:30 (minutes).  They come out hot, all the way through, but all you have to do is touch the tortilla wrapper (carefully, they are hot) to know that the tortilla is not crisp by any reasonable definition.

So, take them and pop them directly onto the rack in your toaster over, and set it to one standard toast cycle.  When the toaster oven dings, the tortillas will be crispy on the outside.  Be careful, they are still very hot.  A few minutes on a plate is all it takes to let them cool slightly to crispy delicious.

And they are really good.  The eggs taste fluffy (can things taste fluffy?), and the ensemble is very satisfying.  I think they could use a little picante sauce, but you will have to be the judge of that.

Fast Breakfast Tacos Done Right

Taco Cabana

517 MLK Blvd

Austin, TX 78701

(512) 478-0875

So, in a recent review I mentioned Taco Cabana in passing, and I thought I would give them a full review for their breakfast tacos. Taco Cabana's standard breakfast taco combo is $3.29 for two tacos and a drink. If you look back at my previous breakfast taco review, you might see that I paid $3.25 for those two tacos, with no drink.

The real beauty of the Taco Cabana taco is that it is constructed after you order it. Fresh tortilla (they make their own) loaded with eggs and bacon and then wrapped up just for you. Of course, the eggs and bacon are cooked before you ordered it, but the whole thing isn't assembled ahead of time, and then stuck in a warmer.

Fresh food is always better, and so the mass produced tacos of the taco truck just are not going to fair well in comparison...and they don't.

I like the Taco Cabana salsa and I like to order cheese on the side. You can order the cheese on the taco, but I found that the amount of cheese they add to the taco is very small, but if you order it on the side they give you a little tub of cheese which is plenty for two tacos.

There may be better breakfast tacos in Austin, but they aren't close to my work, and they don't have a drive-thru.

Breakfast Taco Shootout

Taqueria Morelos

3100 S. Hwy 183

Austin, TX  78744

(512) 386-7863

EastSide Tacos

4602 Tanney St.

Austin, TX 78721-2526

When I take the bus, I end up walking up 17th Street from San Jacinto up to Brazos, where I can get into the back of the William B. Travis Building, where I work.  Back more at the end of summer, there were two competing taco trucks on 17th Street.  Now, don't think big food truck, these were both pickup trucks selling tacos.

Now, my breakfast taco preference is for egg, bacon and cheese, but neither had that, so I had to get potato, egg and bacon.  Morelos didn't have any cheese, and Eastside had cheese on the side, but I didn't get any.

Size and Price

Morelos was the larger of the two tacos and it was $1.50.  Eastside, smaller and $1.75.

Presentation

East Side had bags, and red sauce.  They also had a big sign that stood up out of the back of the pickup bed.  Morelos has a sign on the door of the truck.

Taste

I tried them first without sauce.  Morelos was really more like eating a potato taco.  That was the overwhelming flavor.  It wasn't bad, but you could barely taste the egg or bacon.

The Eastside taco was smaller because there was less potato.  There was more egg. but not enough bacon.   The sauce was good.  I was not offered cheese, which was offered to the gentleman in front of me.  So, they lose a point for customer service.  The taco was a little tasteless.  I could barely taste the potatoes and there is something the tiniest bit off about the eggs, not necessarily bad, just a little funky.  It might be the tortilla, but I cannot tell.  This slightly funky flavor mixed with the egg is the major flavor, and there isn't enough bacon.  I also noticed that the bacon is a little pink, which suggests that it wasn't cooked enough. 

When I was eating the Morelos taco, I thought that the Eastside Taco had to be better, but then as I ate the Eastside taco I wasn't so sure.  But....I cannot really recommend either of them.