El Paso Taqueria   

An authentic taqueria, a Mexican restaurant or taco shop, usually doesn't have two-story high waterfalls or bottle service. Not that there's anything wrong with the city's upscale Mexican eateries, but it's places like this -- smaller, cheaper holes-in-the-wall with mostly Mexican cooks -- where you're likely to have the most authentic tacos in New York. There are two of these low-key joints in lower Harlem (the other is a few blocks away on East 97th Street). Typical of the tasty Tex-Mex cuisine offered is the steak, chicken and shrimp fajitas with handmade tortilla shells. Other regional specialties that straddle both sides of the Rio Grande include Carne a la tampiquena (a rib-eye steak with chile poblano and mole enchilada) and filete a la Veracruzana (sauteed striped bass filet with the namesake tomato, jalapeno, cilantro and white wine sauce). A lot of the traffic is takeout and delivery for the 6 train crowd, but the dining room has enough tables to sit and enjoy a sangria with your meal.