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JOURNAL
LOCAL INTELLIGENCE
Milpas Street runs through the Eastside, and it is where people who live in Santa Barbara go to eat. Taquerias, mariscos counters, panaderias, markets, all of it on one street and most of it family-run for a long time. Portions are generous, the lines move, and you will pay a fraction of what the same meal costs a few blocks west on State.
The format is the thing to understand. At most of these places you order at a window or a counter, you pay before you eat, and you find your own table or take it back to the house. There is no host, no wine list and no one checking in on you. That is not a lesser version of a restaurant. It is a different one, and it is the one this street does better than anywhere else on the coast.
What to get depends on the counter. Tacos and burritos at the taquerias. Seafood cocktails, ceviche and whole fried fish at the mariscos places. Pan dulce, conchas and a coffee at a panaderia, where you take a tray and tongs and pick your own off the rack.
Lunch is the peak. If you turn up in the middle of the day expect a line, and understand that the line is a good sign rather than a problem, because it moves and because the food comes out fast. If you want the quiet version, go early or eat late in the afternoon between the two rushes. Panaderias are best in the morning, when what is on the rack came out of the oven recently.
Some counters are cash only and some card readers are unreliable. Carry cash and you never have to find out which. Parking is on the street and on the side streets off Milpas, and it takes a lap or two at busy hours. That is the whole extent of the difficulty.
Do not try to research the definitive best one. The gap between the top places on this street is small and the gap between any of them and a mediocre downtown lunch is enormous. Walk it, look at who is inside, and go there. If you want a recommendation with more conviction than that, your local manager eats on this street and will give you one.