The gut-busting taco tour that left me begging for mercy was all Doug's fault. Doug, you see, is a warrior of the taco trail, a guy so swept up in the taco revolution that he has no problem tackling four, sometimes five, even six taco temples in the course of a day.

"Just one more place," he'll plead, while the rest of us wait for a crane to lift us from our gluttony.

Doug spends his weeks daydreaming of the next best taco - and his weekends trying to find it.

Which is how I ended up at El Patron, a fastidiously clean, bright and airy Mexican joint sandwiched between a sketchy liquor barn, funk-stenched carniceria, fish and chips den, and a Subway sandwich shop.

Pulling into the parking lot, the first thing you observe are the chromed motorcycles and behemoth trucks jacked up like Mount Everest on shiny struts.

Squatting on the sidewalk, just an engine's blast from their bumpers, is an al pastor spit that, when functioning (evenings and on Sunday afternoons), drips with juices from the chili-marinated pork that slowly spins under the drooping awning.

Inside, the Spanish-only digital jukebox blares with Mexican pop music, completely obliterating any shout of "Goal!" from the single flat-screen TV tuned to the futbol channel.

The customers, most of them Hispanic families, pack the canary-yellow dining room strewn with Corona and Bud Light flags and banners, potted plants with leafy vines, eclectic artwork and naked blond tables.

Fluorescent lights beat down like the Acapulco sun, which makes El Patron a better spot for lunch than dinner - unless you don't have an aversion to bright illumination, in which case, no problema.

Either way, night or day, the menu is the same, a Goliath-size selection of south-of-the-border offerings, with an emphasis on coastal seafood.

The code of etiquette is to wait for the owner - he who is the patron - to point to an available table; order your drinks, which often take a while to arrive; randomly point to a dish on the menu and order quickly. Otherwise you could sit there for hours, befuddled and bewildered by its sheer volume.

In time, bottles of Mexican Coke ($2), tall glasses of sweet, cinnamon-spiked iced horchata ($2.50) and cans of Tecate ($3) appear under your nose, followed by tortilla soup ($5.95), a steaming bowl fragrant with chiles and cilantro and heaped with cubed avocados, shredded pork and ribbons of tortilla chips.

If you're like Doug, however, you'll want to start with the bountiful tacos, four to a plate and assembled street-cart Mexican-style with two griddled corn tortillas to each taco. The tortillas aren't made in-house, but they're distinct with the aroma of masa, and come toppled with fillings such as carnitas ($9.95), moist, crisp-edged chops of pork shoulder graced with rings of fried onions, cilantro leaves, lime wedges and thin crescents of avocado.

Tacos de carne adobada ($9.95) lack the requisite assertive seasoning and shirt-staining red glow, but the tacos al pastor ($9.95), lightly charred carvings of pork exposed to the fire of a spit and bolstered by the faint sweetness of pineapple, might be as close as you can get to taco utopia.

All of the taco platters are accompanied by plates of stiff and often lukewarm refried beans, well-seasoned rice pelted with peas and corn and a duo of salsas, including an incendiary roasted jalapeno and habanero salsa that's all heat and a mellower, but still jolting, red salsa piquant with cilantro, onions and chiles.

You won't likely need the salsas for the shrimp cocktail ($13.95), a heavy glass goblet buoyant with plump shrimp bathing in a tomato-flushed sauce, tart with lime and amply spiced with a confetti of jalapenos and cilantro.

Nor does the Camarones a la Veracruzana ($13.95) require any embellishments, its gripping sauce augmented by chiles, olives, green peppers, silky onions and pudgy shrimp that taste of the sea.

To dig deeper into the ocean, anchor your spoon in the caldo seven mares ($17.95), an overflowing basin full of bay scallops, clams, shrimp, calamari, octopus and unwieldy crab legs in an aromatic broth squeezed with lime.

The mariscada ($17.95) also delivers seafood in abundance via a sizzling platter heaped with a school of sea critters and fried onions, blacker than a witch's cape.

It's simply prepared and lovely to behold.

El Patron isn't fancy, but it feeds people well, including my friend Doug, who asked for a wheelbarrow to roll him out the door.

El Patron

* Grade: B

* Address: 4690 Peoria St.

* Hours: 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Mon.-Thurs.; 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Fri.; 8 a.m.-10 p.m. Sat.; 8 a.m.-9 p.m. Sun.

* Food: Mexican; coastal seafood

* How much: $4.95-$50 main dishes; $1.25-$7.50 a la carte dishes

* Reservations: Not required

* Noise: Depends on the jukebox

* Information: 720-374-2232

* Parking: Complimentary lot directly in front