Regino “Gino” Rojas’ passion as a chef is incomparable. With the intensity of a mad scientist, he makes some of the best tacos in North Texas. Years after opening Revolver Taco Lounge in Deep Ellum, Rojas has now cleared out the main dining area and turned it into a taco tasting room. This new concept opened last week as La Resistencia.
“It’s not about money or my name,” Rojas says. “It’s all about exposing my culture the most proper way.”
Indeed, this makes three restaurant concepts in a space that used to house just one. Selling tacos from the pickup window, Revolver has continued to operate during the pandemic. The tasting room in the back known as Purepecha is on hold for now, but Rojas promises it will be back.
“There are so many tacos in Mexico that I could make a new one every day and not repeat myself for years,” Rojas says. “Mexican food is huge. Here in the States we only know a very small percentage of it, mostly from the northern part of Mexico. Learn, respect and create are the most basic steps with Mexican food.”
There is a corn-grinding machine in the backroom because La Resistencia focuses on showcasing the heirloom corns of Mexico.
“The corn that we eat here in the States, and many parts of Mexico as well, is not real corn,” Rojas says. “It’s corn that has been genetically manipulated to grow beautiful and fast. But Indigenous people still have the seeds and plant this real corn without pesticides that gets water only from the rain.”
Rojas, who normally makes regular trips to Mexico, uses corn from small backyard farms he located in Indigenous communities. His mother, Juanita Rojas, uses this corn to make tortillas with a long and ancient process. These yellow and blue corn tortillas have a lot of flavor and — fingers crossed — Rojas says he may eventually start selling them as a grocery item.
The pandemic was on Rojas’ mind when he created this new concept featuring a $65 six-course meal. Revolver’s front room used to have one large table to encourage communal eating. Now that the world has changed, La Resistencia has four small, socially distanced tables that seat two people each. Guests have their temperatures checked at the door and are required to wear masks, which can only be removed while seated. A reservation is needed, and diners will get a reference sheet instead of a menu, which Rojas expects to alter on a monthly basis.
Expect traditional signature recipes, including tacos with red snapper and octopus, from several different regions of Mexico. These gourmet tacos are elevated with original techniques and very specific ingredients. The queso menonita on a taco with roasted mushrooms from a specialty mushroom farm in Arlington, for example, is otherworldly by Texas standards — and delicious. Rojas obsessively tracked down the cheese, which was created by a community of Mennonites in Chihuahua.
A starter like grilled watermelon, papaya and mango with scallop and caviar will be surprising to many, but Rojas insists that he is not creating anything new.
“Mexican chefs have no recipes,” he says. “The recipes are part of the culture, and we’re just the channels to express those techniques.”
The new decor features a Japanese grill with the words “Mexican fine dine is in the tradition!!” spray-painted on it by restaurant staff.
The Deep Ellum building was not vandalized during the recent protests, and Rojas thinks that may have had something to do with the name of the restaurant. But he swears that if his building had been vandalized, La Resistencia would have remained as is. He would not have even bothered sweeping the glass off the floor, he says.
“It’s our way of responding to the new world,” Rojas says when asked about the name La Resistencia, which means “the resistance.” “We will still maintain our roots. It’s a way of telling the corporate world that we are still here, and we can do it better than you, without your money and without your power.
“The corporate world has been choking the cultural side of expressing our way, as far as food,” he says. “Cuisines have been exploited here in the United States without expressing our culture. People with money who use my culture as a prostitute, I call them pimps.”
