Pickosito
Address: North Lotts, Dublin 1, D01 K8N3
Telephone: N/A
Cuisine: Mexican
Website: https://www.instagram.com/pickosito.taqueria/Opens in new window
Cost: €€
My heart leaps the minute I walk into Pickosito, the Mexican restaurant on North Lotts, just off Liffey Street in Dublin city centre. Iris Gaspar is working at a counter near the entrance, bowls of dough lined up in front of her. She pinches off small balls of dough, rolls them with a palote – a long, slim rolling pin – ready to be cooked on the flat-top griddle nearby. Already it feels like my type of restaurant.
My daughters, accomplished scouts when it comes to restaurants, have been telling me about Pickosito since it was in its original premises on Mary Street. It is a favourite of Katherine’s, who warns me the servings are generous, so any effort to get a sense of the menu will require additional sets of gnashers.
It was opened in 2024 by Edlyn Garcia Morán and Raquel Hernández Rodríguez, two women from northern Mexico (Torreón and Sabinas, both in the state of Coahuila). Hernández Rodríguez, the head chef, was raised on a ranch where she learned how to cook over open fire and make wheat flour tortillas.
Food writer Diana Kennedy spent half a century arguing that there was no such thing as “Mexican cuisine”, only the cuisines of Mexico. “The regional dishes of Sonora, or Jalisco, have practically nothing in common with those of Yucatán and Campeche; neither have those of Nuevo León with those of Chiapas and Michoacán,” she writes in The Cuisines of Mexico. Outside Mexico, we tend to think of its cooking as a single cuisine. However, in the northern states of Coahuila and Sonora, the cooking is quite different from that of central and southern Mexico. Vast cattle ranches mean beef is the dominant meat, and the dry climate is better suited to wheat than corn. So tortillas here are made from wheat flour, not corn.
At first glance, the menu at Pickosito, mixing northern Mexican dishes with classics from elsewhere, looks extensive, so a large plate of nachos especiales (€13.50) is the perfect thing to stave off hunger as we strategise how best to work through the menu. Though the tortilla chips are not home-made, the nachos are excellent, one of the most generously topped plates I’ve encountered on these shores. Queso, sour cream, guacamole and salsa verde are piled on top, with more queso hidden underneath. Our aguas frescas (€4.20), all made in-house, include mango, hibiscus and horchata, the cooling, gently sweet rice-and-cinnamon drink inspired by Valencia’s tiger nut horchata.
The system is straightforward. For mains, there is a choice of tacos (flour or corn), tacotones (oversized tacos) or burritos/bowls, and you then pick one of the fillings listed: barbacoa, adobada, carne asada, chorizo, vegetables or chilli sin carne. There are further options from the traditional plates section – enchiladas, enmoladas and chilaquiles, which are sizeable plates with rice.
Four flour tacos filled with crumbled home-made chorizo (€15.90), topped with chopped onion and coriander, are a northern Mexican staple. The tortillas taste as though they have just come off the griddle: warm, pliable and salted to just the right point. The opposite of the cardboard supermarket ones. The chorizo is spicy, sharpened by a squeeze of lime. Cubed chips are served alongside, as they are with most dishes.
For vegetarians and vegans, the tacotón chilli sin carne (€13.90) is a large flour tortilla, gloriously blistered and filled with caramelised onions and a soy mince chilli that would even convert sceptics. Simmered with chilli peppers, spices and pinto beans, it packs plenty of heat.
There is no way we can skip the burrito percheron (€16.90). I mean, the menu describes it, in large capitals, as “everyone’s favourite”. Packed with carne asada (grilled beef), guacamole, bacon, refried beans and grilled onions, all wrapped in a home-made flour tortilla, it even contains chips, just to be sure you don’t go hungry. It’s enough for two.
Nachos Especiales at Pickosito. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times 
Barbacoa and Carne Asada Tacos at Pickosito. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times
Pickosito co-owners Edlyn García Morán and Raquel Hernández Rodríguez (chef). Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times
Our final main course from the traditional section is enmoladas (€17.50) – tortillas filled with shredded chicken, topped with a glossy mole sauce served on Mexican rice.
Leftovers go into takeaway boxes and we just about manage a simple cheesecake (€6.90) topped with mango compote, shared between the four of us.
Pickosito gets an extraordinary amount right. The house-made flour tortillas lift almost every dish, making it easier to overlook the fact that neither the chicken nor the pork is free-range. It’s a menu that would take many visits to work through. One visit is enough to understand why so many diners become regulars.
Dinner for four with four drinks was €101.40.
The verdict: A superb Mexican restaurant
Food provenance: Beef and chicken (not free range), Pak Halal Meat; pork (not free range), Lynas; vegetables, Fresh Point
Vegetarian options: Flautas, plain quesadilla, loaded papa nachos, chilli sin carne tacos, mixed vegetable burrito
Wheelchair access: Accessible room with no accessible toilet
Music: Música Norteña, a blend of Mexican folk traditions
Barbacoa and Carne Asada Tacos and Nachos Especiales at Pickosito. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times 
Exterior of Pickosito. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times