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NEW BUSINESS: Tacos El Huracan promises to take people on ’flavor journey’

Tacos El Huracan food truck will make its debut on Saturday at 2 Eglin Parkway SE in Fort Walton Beach and promises to take local taco connoisseurs to a new level in their eating experience.

FORT WALTON BEACH — Cesar Diaz is chasing a feeling. Something that transports you to another place.

And he’s doing it in the most delicious way possible — with his family’s new food truck, Tacos El Huracan, which will have a grand opening on Saturday at 2 Eglin Parkway SE from 11 a.m. to “whenever the tacos run out” or 7 p.m. … whichever comes first.

Cesar will be the food truck’s manager and it’s owned by his mother, Eneida Diaz.

“It’s truly a family business, and we brought all of the flavors from the places we saw food trucks really thriving and in demand,” Cesar said. “In Southern California, where I was born and raised and people just love tacos, and in Mexico, where you always seem to end up at some corner taco shop where the food is just amazing … that’s kind of what we want to create. That kind of feeling.

“The thing we felt was missing from the area was something authentic as far as that eating experience. I and my parents are big into food and cooking, obviously, so I think our thought was, ‘Why not try something like this?'”

Cesar and his family first moved to the area in 2003 from Santa Barbara, California, and he’s lived here off-and-on since then, minus a short stretch in Nashville.

“Of course the name is ‘Hurricane Tacos’ and we’ve found kind of a clever way to tie that in with our salsas,” Cesar said. “We’ll have categories for the salsas, from our Category 5, which is about as hot as you can get all the way down from there.”

Tacos El Huracan will offer some of the basics to start with — the carne asada and al pastor tacos have been big hits in a few soft openings — along with some surprise dishes that will be unveiled at the grand opening and as time goes on.

“There are some dishes that are top secret,” Cesar said. “We hope people will love them.”

They’ll also have specialty drinks like horchata, and the ever-popular authentic Mexican Coca-Cola in glass bottles.

One thing Cesar has been doing ahead of the opening is promotion — he’s putting out videos in both English and Spanish.

Hours for the truck, at least initially, will be Tuesday-Saturday from 11 a.m.-7 p.m.

“We have a high population of Hispanic people in the area that love authentic Mexican food, especially when its recipes are family recipes,” Cesar said. “So our target is to reach English- and Spanish-speaking households alike, because who doesn’t like a bomb authentic taco?!

“We plan to bring flavors that remind Hispanic people of home and take everyone else on a flavor journey south of the border as if they were on vacation in Mexico and went to eat at a street taco stand … that’s our goal.”