On the right, a regular birria taco; on the left, a birria tatemado taco, where the shredded beef is seared crisp

At first glance, the arrival of La Central Birrieria & Menuderia doesn’t seem momentous. Birria, after all, has spent the past few years becoming the most talked about Mexican meat dish on the planet. We’ve seen a crowd of birria restaurants (or birrerias) open up all around San Diego, so why should this one stand out? The reason comes into focus once you consider the restaurant’s alternate name: La Central by Miguel Fernandez.

That would be Miguel Fernandez, formerly of Ed Fernandez Restaurant, the local institution that made headlines a couple months back when it was named the number one taco shop in America by (the occasionally correct) Yelp.

Having worked in restaurants since their teens, Miguel and his brother Jorge opened that restaurant nearly 20 years ago, naming it after a dearly remembered middle brother. This was not long after their experiment selling birria out of a food truck on weekends saw sales numbers quadruple over the first several weeks, and well more than a decade before social media would take birria worldwide. Heck, the stuff wasn’t even prevalent in San Diego yet.

Fernandez Restaurant attracted lines long before the Yelp anointment, putting it just ahead of the South Bay Drive-In Theatre as the top destination in Nestor, a small border community squeezed in between Imperial Beach and San Ysidro. And if there’s anything surprising about the fact Miguel Fernandez has opened a new birrieria, it’s that he’s done so, once again, in Nestor, roughly 800 feet from his first.

The small, casual dining room of La Central Birrieria

The way Miguel tells it, he and Jorge had different ideas about growing their business, so a couple years ago, Miguel sold his stake in the restaurant to his brother. However, Miguel still felt very connected to Nestor, and to regular clientele he’d welcomed to the restaurant for so many years. Early in his career, Miguel had worked at the formative downtown restaurant, Dobson’s, where he learned the ways of its founder, Paul Dobson, known for maintaining a strong, personal presence in his dining room.

Miguel Fernandez operates the same way. I watched him warmly greet familiar faces as they walked in the door, and I got the same treatment as a newcomer, even before I told him who I work for. Miguel speculated 90-percent of his customers that day had been regulars at Fernandez Restaurant, and I believed him. For one thing, Fernandez is closed Monday and Tuesday, so for these days at least, La Central offers the unquestioned best birria in Nestor. Then there’s the whole Yelp thing. If Fernandez Restaurant was crazy busy before being named the country’s the best taco shop, imagine the effort it takes to find a seat now.

Naturally, I had to ask: is La Central’s birria the same recipe that gained so much success up the road? On this, Miguel hedges. The recipe’s not written down, he suggests, but La Central works with the same ingredients, and all his brothers learned to make birria in the same kitchen, cooking with their mom. So not precisely the same, maybe, but it might take eating at both places on the same morning to notice the difference. So, nice that the two shops are so close together.

El Comandante, a quesabirria taco made with birria tatemado and topped with a fried egg

The menus are quite similar, if not identical, including birria plates ($12-15), tacos ($3.25-$4.50), quesadillas ($3-8) and consomés ($3-6), with options to include cheese (quesabirria), beef tendon (con nirvio), or keto preparation (fried cheese, no tortilla). Given that birria’s often enjoyed as a breakfast food, there is likewise a birria taco featuring both cheese and fried egg (here it’s called the comandante, $6).

Perhaps more relevant, there’s the option to get your birria tatemado , meaning the braised, shredded beef is seared to a crispy finish, much like crispy carnitas. Due to the richer flavor of the sear, this way is my personal favorite. But whichever you choose, the homemade corn tortillas will be outstanding, and I can never stress enough: always order a side of consomé at any birrieria to dip your tacos!

La Central also serves birria bowls with rice and beans, birria burritos, birria tortas, and birria mulitas. And yes, it serves menudo — daily here, rather than just on weekends — but I still have yet to acquire a taste for tripe, so ask me again in ten years.

Starting at $3.25 for a basic birria taco, La Central’s prices prove slightly higher than its familial neighbor, though even when the lines do get long, Miguel has plans to streamline take-out orders to keep business at a crisp pace. He’s also expanding the concept into other venues. There’s already a La Central Beer & Wine Garden at the Chula Vista Center mall (serving birria on weekends), and a pair of La Central food trucks are coming soon to bring birria to corporate lunches and other events.

Once this Fernandez family birria is on the road, other fixed locations may follow. But first, Miguel will likely open another specialty shop next door to his Nestor birrieria. For this business, he wants to tackle carne asada.