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Taco trailer’s gone, but Everett’s Ana Solorzano is back in the kitchen

Published 1:53 pm Monday, February 22, 2016

By Andrea Brown Herald Writer

Ana Solorzano puts the final touches on a pair of burritos at her burrito and taco shop inside the 76 gas station at the intersection of Rucker Avenue and 43rd Street SE in Everett on Friday. Solorzano, who used to own Ana’s Casita taco truck nearby, is open for lunch Tuesday to Friday.
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Ana Solorzano puts the final touches on a pair of burritos at her burrito and taco shop inside the 76 gas station at the intersection of Rucker Avenue and 43rd Street SE in Everett on Friday. Solorzano, who used to own Ana’s Casita taco truck nearby, is open for lunch Tuesday to Friday.

Ana Solorzano puts the final touches on a pair of burritos at her burrito and taco shop inside the 76 gas station at the intersection of Rucker Avenue and 43rd Street SE in Everett on Friday. Solorzano, who used to own Ana’s Casita taco truck nearby, is open for lunch Tuesday to Friday.
Located in the corner of a 76 gas station on Rucker Avenue, Ana Solorzano, who used to work out of a taco truck; now she has a space inside the station.
Ana Solorzano adds refried beans to burritos at her taco shop inside the 76 gas station at the intersection of Rucker Avenue and 43rd Street SE in Everett.

She was there.

And then she was gone.

Also gone were those bundles of burrito goodness from Ana’s Casita, the bright red taco trailer by the 76 gas station on Rucker Avenue in Everett.

No more braking at Ana’s for a midday fix of Mexican fare. The burrito addicts were forced to go elsewhere or do without.

Well, the burritos are back, minus the red trailer.

What’s up with that?

Ana Solorzano now cooks from a tiny kitchen inside the gas station. Many of her old disciples don’t know she’s there.

A divorce about two years ago led to the sale of the trailer, the sole means of income for Solorzano, 34, an Everett mother of four.

A customer recently started a “Let’s get Ana’s Food Cart Back!” GoFundMe campaign to raise $40,000 for her to buy a new taco truck.

“If it happens, it happens,” Solorzano said. “I’m pretty much going with the flow. I just want to be able to sell my food. I don’t mind where.”

At the gas station counter, she offers fewer items than before. The menu, scrawled on a sheet of lime green poster board, includes a veggie egg taco for $1.25 and a meat burrito for $4.99 at what is now called Ana’s Mexican Cuisine.

Her lunch service, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, generates a steady clientele, old and new.

She’s a one-woman show.

She has two burners. Two skillets. Two warmers. Two hands.

“I wish I had four hands,” Solorzano said.

She is flattered, not daunted, when customers line up. She works quickly and they wait patiently without a grumble or sigh, in a formation of respect for the chef who is a smidgen over 5 feet tall and 100 pounds.

“I’ll wait as long as it takes,” said Breonna Albro, a chicken burrito regular from Ana’s red trailer days. “The flavor of the food is just incredible. We all love Ana.”

From behind the counter, Solorzano piled toppings on a flour tortilla with one hand and squirted sauce on a burrito with the other. Without breaking the beat, she said “The usual?” to Albro, who was third in line.

“Yes, please,” Albro replied.

Albro did without burritos during Ana’s absence. She learned through a friend’s Facebook post that the stand had reopened and now comes three times a week.

On a recent day, four people waited behind Albro.

Some days, Solorzano fills 40 orders. “It is nice that they are willing to wait, I wish I could be faster,” she said. “It is fun wrapping burritos and cooking. Putting people in a good mood. When your stomach gets full, you’re happy. You’re, ‘I’m good, I can keep working.’”

After selling the red trailer, Solorzano worked as a housekeeper at a retirement center. She cooked for her four boys, ages 3 to 12. “Spaghetti. Mac and cheese. Beans and rice.”

She also achieved a long-time goal, with help from Everett Community College: “I got my GED, something I always wanted to do. For me, that was a big thing. I worked hard for it.”

At the request of Thinh Bui, owner of the gas station, she came back last summer, this time inside.

“Everybody was asking for her,” Bui said.

Solorzano missed feeding people.

“I remembered how people said they love the food,” she said.

Still, she worried.

“It is so hard to make it in business. When I first started I wasn’t sure if I was going to make it,” she said.

She credits her customers. “I’m glad they are giving me a job and keeping me in business.”

Her secret?

“I don’t have a recipe. Everything is fresh and made daily. I put a lot of vegetables in it.”

Cheryl Estes recently discovered Ana’s after admiring the burritos of a guy at work.

“She’s good,” Estes said. “It’s a little gem.”

Her first time she was ready to leave empty-handed.

“I didn’t know it was cash only,” Estes said. “She said, ‘Don’t worry. Just come back.’”

Solorzano won’t let you leave hungry.

“People are honest,” she said, “and they come back.”

Andrea Brown at 425-339-3443; abrown@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @reporterbrown.

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