Eat traditional Mexican street food — and watch them make it — at Julieta

Yes, first, it’s the food at Julieta taco shop. You’ll notice it. It’s good. It’s tradition front and center. It honors Mexico, and its flavors aren’t some mashup crossover taco concoctions.

It’s not even Tex-Mex. It’s street food straight out of Mexico City and Guanajuato. Trust us, eat it. You’ll like it. Pay attention to the chile forward salsa — layer upon flavor layer that makes salsa less a complement and more a star on a dinner table. The tortillas’ corn is ground in house. None of that coming-out-of-a-plastic-bag-grocery-store-bought stuff.

But this — pay attention right here when you walk inside the beautiful-tiled taco stand that’s part of the renovated Stutz building — this is the biggest, most important part of their story.

Family.

Two chefs’ families influencing their work ethic and the food they have created for Indianapolis. The relatives of chefs Esteban Rosas and Gabriel Sanudo and their traditions have come together side by side to make this restaurant and its dishes possible.

You can see it at the trompo of al pastor meat. And at the tortilla press behind the ordering counter. That’s where you’ll notice the chefs’ parents working at Julieta, which opened in late July.

“This has been one of the hardest, proudest and life-changing things I’ve done in my culinary career,” Rosas said. “Having my parents to share these moments with has been amazing.”

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Rosas’ parents quit their jobs and moved to Indy to help in the taco shop. His mother, Yolanda, makes fresh tortillas, much like she did when she was 9 years old for her family. Heirloom dried corn, sourced from small farms in Mexico, arrive in red, yellow, white, blue, or pink kernels giving diners an immediate connection to the history and land. A volcanic stone grinder makes the masa base for a tortilla.

Yolanda Rosas then cooks them on the flattop grill as you watch and wait for the taco masterpiece you ordered (FYI, toasted corn is the first thing you smell when you walk in Julieta’s door).

Esteban Rosas taught his father, Alfonso, how to prepare the al pastor. It is a process that takes two days to build. Alfonso Rosas slices 60 pounds of pork shoulder and marinates each slice overnight in an adobo chile paste made of guajillos, spices and vinegar. The next day the meat is layered on a vertical skewer and then placed in a rotating spit called a trompo where it caramelizes as it spins leaving the inside succulent.

When a taco is ordered the outside slightly crispy edges of the al pastor are sliced off and nestled into a tortilla. The taco is topped with fresh pineapple, cilantro and lime providing a vibrant tapestry of flavors from sweet to spicy to savory. You taste generations of tradition.

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Sanudo’s mother, Blanca Barrera, has been cooking all her life. Sanudo says she taught him how to cook and, with Julieta as her middle name, she is also one of his biggest inspirations. Like his mother, Gabriel Sanudo has been cooking since he was a child, making meals for the family on weekends and joining his mother in her own restaurants in Mexico when he was 14.

Barrera and Jaime, Gabriel Sanudo’s father who is an architect by trade, make four different salsas requiring blends of chiles and spices with tomatillos, tomatoes or other vegetables. The pasilla salsa, from a dried chilaca pepper, is medium hot and popular in Mexican cuisine. Roja is a fresh tomato-based salsa. Verde is tangy, mild and made of tomatillos and green chiles. And morita is from vine ripened jalapenos dried and smoked less than chipotles and spicier. Each salsa is a delicious layering of hot, cold, spicy, earth.

“Our salsas are recipes that Esteban and I have been making for a while and our moms’. There’s no secret to them, just finding the right balance of ingredients,“ Gabriel Sanudo said.

For nearly a decade, the chefs worked at high-end restaurants across Indianapolis such as Black Market, Milktooth and Meridian Hills Country Club where they met. They dreamed big, personal dreams of their own place one day. They planned a walk-up taco shop, drawing from the classic Mexican slow-cooked flavors of their mothers. They had time to practice and hone their recipes with their popular taco pop-up Con Todo.

Now comes Julieta, named after Gabriel Sanudo’s grandmother who represents family, strength and endurance for the restaurant owners. She was a single mother of six. She had polio. She never stopped taking care of her family, Gabriel Sanudo said.

“She's always been an example of relentlessness and love for our family and even though we never met I've always felt a strong connection to her,” he said.

The flavors and preparation methods of Julieta’s offerings have been honed over time and generations, carrying with them a sense of history, heritage and authenticity. Their story stands as a heartwarming testament to the power of tradition, family and a shared love of food.

“I love having our parents around,” Gabriel Sanudo said. “We get to share our success and know that they will support us no matter what. It's a true blessing to be able to share this experience with them, and we are very grateful for that.”

Julieta likely will be popular. It has a great location. It has a great social media presence. And food worthy of tasting.But inside the restaurant is a personal story of two chefs working their tails off, finding themselves as cooks and not forgetting where they come from.

That’s the flavor you won’t find in other joints.

What to know about Julieta taco shop inside the Stutz building

Address: 1060 N. Capitol Ave., Indianapolis

Hours: Tuesday-Thursday lunch 11 a.m.-2 p.m., dinner 3 p.m.-8 p.m.; Friday and Saturday lunch 11 a.m.-2 p.m., dinner 3 p.m.-10 p.m.; Closed Sunday and Monday

Instagram: @julieta_tacoshop

What to eat: Must try – al pastor tacos vampiro (with cheese) a squeeze of lime and a splash of morita salsa; carnitas tacos with salsa verde and guacamole; and birria lamb tacos (a sometimes Saturday only special).

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Celebrate National Taco Day with Julieta for authentic flavors