Ricos Tacos' Beloved Chippendale Home Is Closing This Weekend

Just 18 months into its time on a sunny Chippendale corner, Ricos Tacos is on the move. Toby Wilson's beloved taco truck turned permanent Mexican eatery will officially be closing on Sunday, August 6. While this is sad news, Wilson and the team promise this is "see you soon" rather than "goodbye forever" with a bigger and better Ricos outpost set to open later this year.

"While we will miss our sunny little corner, greener pastures await," reads the post on the Ricos Instagram page. "We will soon be announcing details of our new store where we will be back to cooking tacos (and hash browns) for you all."

"The plan was always for that to be our production kitchen while we had the truck and the cart going," Wilson told Concrete Playground. "But after the second lockdown, things changed and that became our site. We never intended to have a 20-seater venue. Ricos was always meant to be something a bit bigger than that."

After spending time at Gelato Messina Rosebery, Rocker and Grifter Brewery, Ricos opened its first brick-and-mortar outpost at the beginning of 2022. Initially, just a casual breakfast and lunch spot, the inner-city restaurant expanded to serving dinner and hosting plenty of collaborations with Sydney favourites including Pizza Oltra and Baba's Place.

The Meagher Street spot has allowed Wilson to experiment with menu items, with the current slate of offerings including tacos, tortas, quesadillas, tostadas, hibiscus margaritas and the beloved aforementioned hash browns. He'll even be bringing back a fan-favourite menu item for just this weekend — the chorizo pancakes that were a hit during the second lockdown and the site's first few months serving breakfast.

"I loved the lockdown window. Pumping lunches out of that window we built in the front room," says Wilson.

The popular chef began serving up tacos to Sydneysiders in 2016 at Ghostboy Cantina, which was first set up in the Dixon House food court before moving to Tio's. From there, he went on to become a prolific member of the Sydney hospitality scene, starting Bad Hombres in Surry Hills, and also running kitchens out of The Duke of Enmore and The George, before taking his tacos on the road with the Ricos food truck.

While a new location for Ricos hasn't been locked in yet, it's sure to pack the same flavoursome punch that each iteration the Ricos name has been through to date. In the meantime, the cart at Grifter Brewery has finished up for the time being so you'll have to keep an eye on Ricos' Instagram for news on the new venue or another star-studded collab. Absence does make the heart grow fonder.

If you want to experience the Chippendale diner one last time, it will be open for dinner Wednesday–Saturday and lunch (including pancakes) Thursday–Sunday this week.

 

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Ricos Tacos is located at 15 Meagher Street, Chippendale and is set to close on Sunday, August 6. A new, bigger Ricos Tacos is set to open later this year.