But now, fans have extra time to visit.
Since announcing the upcoming closure, CRUjiente has received an outpouring of support. Fans have shared their memories online and have also turned up in droves for a final visit. Every day since the announcement, chef and co-founder Richard Hinojosa says, there's been a line of customers waiting outside the door for the restaurant to open. Some customers have even flown in for a final meal.
"It’s basically been Cinco de Mayo every day, which every year, is our busiest day of the year," he says.
Hinojosa and Jason Morris opened the restaurant at 40th Street and Camelback Road in November 2016. Customers flock to the unique spot for its global spin on Mexican food, with dishes such as Korean fried chicken tacos, and its top-notch margaritas in unusual flavors such as cinnamon or passion fruit and serrano.
The restaurant was featured in James Beard Award-winning author Jose Ralat's book, “American Tacos: A History and Guide.” Food Network star Guy Fieri visited for an episode of "Diners Drive-Ins and Dives." It won multiple Best of Phoenix awards over the years, for everything from Best Margaritas in 2024 to Best Mexican Restaurant to Take a Scenester in 2018.
Chef Richard Hinojosa put his story, plus a decade of work, into CRUjiente Tacos. Now, the restaurant is looking toward the future.
CRUjiente Tacos
The support has worked. The restaurant's property management company has granted a 30-day extension on the lease, allowing CRUjiente to stay open through May.
Hinojosa says he's hopeful that the restaurant may be able to stay open even longer.
"We weren’t looking to shut down. We had no intention of closing the restaurant down," he said, explaining the closure was all connected to the restaurant's lease, and whether the owners of the restaurant and the building could come together.
"The outpouring of support tells me that CRUjiente provided a lot of color for the restaurant landscape of this area. But being an important part of the community is important, but it’s still a business," Hinojosa says.
Over the last two weeks, business has been booming.
"We’ve been seriously running out of food every day," the chef says.
The customers flooding in for one final visit now have time to stop by again. Hinojosa says the outpouring of love has made a typically "black-and-white" chef get a little emotional.
"CRUjiente was really a lot of my story. I created the restaurant, the concept, all the food was a story that I wanted to tell," he says, sharing gratitude for the customers who have enjoyed the flavors of that story for almost a decade.
"A thank you doesn’t express what I want to say to everybody, but you know, I’m a cook. I don’t know how to articulate it," he says. "But it means more than I can express."
