I see it’s shown on a platter. I’ve never seen that in the wild. The taco holders are always just plonked on the table so you can’t help make a mess while you eat.
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I will wait for Mark’s quarterly kitchen gadget clearance sale. He does have those right? Otherwise I can’t imagine where he stores all the gadgets he buys. I have to imagine that the lifetime cost of California real estate to store this is many multiples of the purchase price.
Taco holders make sense, maybe, at restaurants. If you’re making them at home, why would you make more than one at a time?
Eat that one, then make another.
Never, ever put it down!
Buys? You don’t think he gets them free for running these ads as content?
Ok, kids, we need to use at least one inexpensive Amazon gadget every day. Let’s see, how about spiral zucchini Monday, Taco holder Tuesday? Maybe sous-vide chicken soup Wednesdays - too expensive? Maybe corn holders Wednesday, it is summer, after all…
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Calling the Jack in the Box taco a “taco” is like putting a Pop-Tart in front of The Great British Bake Off’s Mary Berry and calling it a mille-feuille.
Hey GQ
I’d argue what we considered an American taco to be a variation on the flauta or taquito. Which is at least as old as 1940’s when cookbooks in Mexico showcased them. Not necessarily an everyday food, they’re more of a festive food to serve at a party. (because frying up a bunch of little tortillas is a big messy pain in the neck). Both flour and masa were fried this way. Usually rolled up like a flute (flauta) but frying a bunch of U-shaped shells and stuffing them later let people make a more substantial portion and the frying could be done in advance (the night before even).
The huge popularity of a hard shell taco is an U.S. thing, but it’s not a wholly un-Mexican food.
I still recommend a traditional soft Mexican taco as a meal. It’s less greasy. And there is often several choices for meat. I would put a Mexican taco up there as a lunch staple like the ham sandwich or turkey sandwich. Quick, easy, cheap, & tasty.
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Is this where I confess that I ate a hot dog in a corn tortilla last night? 
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Legit i’ve done this but with flour tortillas, but i probably have less of an excuse because i seriously hate hot dogs and i still did it.
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Technically, I would classify it as a variation of the “taco dorado” except you fry the tortilla before you put the ingredients in. The shell is reminiscent of modern day tostadas as I’ve posted elsewhere, it is not without precedence in Mexican cooking and its heritage is recognizable and certainly belongs somewhere in the taco continuum.
The thing that, to my mind anyway, resists categorization alongside the SMT (Standard Mexican Taco) is that it is a very specific recipe: Ground beef, spices, and cheese. This is the default which means that this taco is too different in preparation and too narrow an implementation to be just a taco, which is really a catch all term for just about anything wrapped inside a tortilla.
As a Mexican I realize I’m biased, and maybe all that really irks me is that it’s an accident of history that the American taco is the standard for tacos in the US, and that you have to add a qualifier to the Mexican taco as if it weren’t the real deal in the first place.
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I’ll concede there. You’ve put your finger on the typical crunchy taco that Americans make, including my Scotch-Irish mother.
As is the American pizza. Italians are sometimes irked by this too. But it’s not a uniquely American phenomena. Japanese Tonkatsu is really an emulation of a typical European fried beef or pork cutlet not unlike Wienerschnitzel, but it sort of grew into it’s own thing in Japan. And something as American as potato salad is really a German dish, and there are variation throughout Eastern Europe and Russia, almost all called potato salad in their native languages. (noted exception is Russia’s beloved Salat Olivye is named after a Belgian-French chef who created it)
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