Bret, you made me laugh with the NY "Mexican food"! If there's one thing our Yankee friends don't seem to grasp, at all, it's Mexican food. In fact, just about nowhere outside of Texas and the northern half of Mexico can one get anything close to the real deal. My wife and I watch a lot of food shows for entertainment and one memorable one was a taco joint in Brooklyn that is "world famous". They're most popular "taco" is basically pita bread with marinated, grilled beef and some kind of corn chowder sauce. WTH? A Mexican taco is a corn tortilla filled with seasoned (more on that later) ground beef, pork, chicken, or fried fish fillet, topped with shredded Monterrey Jack cheese, romaine lettuce, tomato, and typically Pico-de-Gallo made from chopped onion, tomato, jalepeno, and cilantro. It ain't fancy, and trying to "elevate" it is just not necessary. The corn tortilla for tacos can be soft-fried and greasy, or hard-fried and dry like a tortilla chip, in a u-shaped form. If you use a wheat-based tortilla, the thing becomes a Burrito automatically. If the corn tortilla is hard-fried flat, it's called a Chalupa and usually served like a "pie" with refried beans smeared on, maybe some seasoned meat, sliced avocado, chopped tomatoes/lettuce Pico, or salsa and you hold and nibble at the edges like a slice of pizza pie. Burritos can be deep-fried to become a Chimichanga, usually served on a plate drenched in Queso or a reddish beef/pepper sauce. There are other specialties such green chicken enchiladas, a proper deep-fried Chile Relleno, and my personal favorite, Carne Guisada. Carnitas are good if done right, and so is Barbacoa and some regional specialties like Nopales (cactus) from Coahila/Chihuahua. NEW Mexico has their own take on food, using a lot of green chili sauce, black beans, and whole-kernel yellow corn. IMO it's not good. New Mexico (and most regions) seems to forget entirely about red chili powder and comino, which are as essential to Mexican and Tex-Mex food as tumeric and coriander are to Indian food or oregano and rosemary are to Italian food.
By the same token, good luck finding a decent soft pretzel, bowl of NE clam chowder, or corned beef in Texas.