El Charro
Café · Tucson & the Sky Islands
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El Charro Café is a Mexican restaurant in downtown Tucson, run by the same family since 1922 and billed as the nation's oldest continuously operating Mexican restaurant. It's known for traditional Mexican dishes and its claim as the birthplace of the chimichanga, served in a historic 1896 building decorated with Mexican murals and antiques. The downtown location offers patio and porch seating for outdoor dining, sitting amid Tucson's historic district as a natural food stop for riders downtown.
Monica Flin, one of Tucson's first women to run her own restaurant, kept El Charro going until she fell ill in 1972; her niece Carlotta Flores took over a few years later and still leads the kitchen today. Before settling on Court Avenue in 1968, the restaurant moved three times around downtown, starting on Fourth Avenue when Flin opened it in 1922. The kitchen's carne seca has been made the same way since Flin's own day: beef sun-dried in a wire cage on the roof, then shredded and grilled. It's the dish regulars order first, a Sonoran specialty that predates the chimichanga this place is more famous for.
What you see
The downtown dining rooms occupy a high-ceilinged house of black basalt quarried from Tucson's 'A' Mountain, built in 1896 by the founder's own father, a stonemason who worked across the surrounding historic district.
Practical
Open daily 11am to 9pm; street parking nearby is free after 5pm and on weekends, with a paid lot across the street.
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History & landmarks nearby
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Common questions
- Why stop at El Charro on a bike ride?
- El Charro Café is a Mexican restaurant in downtown Tucson, run by the same family since 1922 and billed as the nation's oldest continuously operating Mexican restaurant. It's known for traditional Mexican dishes and its claim as the birthplace of the chimichanga, served in a historic 1896 building decorated with Mexican murals and antiques. The downtown location offers patio and porch seating for outdoor dining, sitting amid Tucson's historic district as a natural food stop for riders downtown.
- When is El Charro open?
- Open daily 11am to 9pm; street parking nearby is free after 5pm and on weekends, with a paid lot across the street.