Salud Taqueria

Salud Taqueria opened on 2nd Avenue North in downtown Birmingham with a menu built around regional Mexican street food, a departure from the Tex-Mex combo plates that dominate much of the city’s Mexican dining scene. The taqueria has quickly become known locally for dishes rooted in specific Mexican culinary traditions, from birria to al pastor cooked on a trompo, rather than a generalized “Mexican restaurant” menu.

The heart of the menu is a rotating list of five-dollar tacos, including pastor al trompo, carne asada, chorizo, pollo, and nopal, with a suadero option available on weekdays only. On weekends, the kitchen adds a birria program, serving a torta-birria, quesa-birria quesadillas, and a plate of three birria tacos, each accompanied by the traditional consumé for dipping. That distinction between weekday and weekend offerings reflects a kitchen built around proper preparation times rather than a menu designed purely for speed.

Beyond the core taco list, Salud’s “Especiales” section offers heartier options: a Sonoran-style taco, a burrito del norte and burrito del sur, tortas, and two styles of quesadilla, including an Oaxaqueña version. Bowls named the Puebla Bowl and the Gringo Bowl give diners a rice-and-protein option outside the tortilla-based dishes, while loaded totopos or fries provide a shareable starter for the table. Sides lean into the traditional as well, with options like chicharrones, Mexi-fries, arroz poblano, and frijoles pintos rounding out a plate.

The drink menu keeps things authentically Mexican, pouring Jarritos, Mexican Coke, Sidral Mundet apple soda, and horchata-style agua frescas alongside mineral water and classic Mexican sodas like Squirt. Dessert options include churros, tres leches cake, and chocolate flan, familiar closers for a meal built around bold, well-seasoned street food.

Since opening, Salud has drawn coverage as one of the newer taquerias reshaping how Birmingham eats Mexican food, with local media describing it as a “must-visit” address for the city’s regional Mexican cooking. That attention has come alongside the restaurant’s location on 2nd Avenue North, a stretch of downtown that has seen a wave of new restaurant openings in recent years, putting Salud within easy walking distance of other newer concepts along the same corridor.

Salud is open seven days a week, with hours running from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Thursday, extending to midnight on Friday and Saturday, and a slightly shorter Sunday schedule from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. The restaurant offers both dine-in seating and online ordering for takeout, along with catering for larger groups. Its downtown address puts it close to the neighborhood’s other restaurant and bar destinations, making it an easy stop before or after an evening out.

For diners looking for tacos built on traditional Mexican technique rather than a Tex-Mex combo plate, Salud Taqueria has become one of the more talked-about additions to downtown Birmingham’s dining scene, built around a focused menu that treats each regional dish, from al pastor to weekend birria, with its own dedicated preparation.

The restaurant’s rise has also coincided with a broader shift in how Birmingham eats Mexican food, as diners increasingly seek out regionally specific dishes rather than a generalized combo-plate menu. Salud’s weekday and weekend menu split, with suadero available only on weekdays and birria reserved for weekends, reflects a kitchen built around proper technique and timing rather than trying to offer everything, every day, at the expense of quality.

That focus has helped Salud stand out on a downtown corridor that has seen a wave of new restaurant openings in recent years. Rather than competing directly with more elaborate, higher-priced concepts nearby, Salud has carved out its own identity as an accessible, affordable taqueria that treats its regional Mexican dishes with the same seriousness a fine dining kitchen might apply to a tasting menu, just at a five-dollar taco price point.