They know 57 ways to make your tortas

You can’t miss the big sign over Ya Ya’s Burgers: “Tortas, Tortas y Mas Tortas.”

Ya Ya’s isn’t kidding about all those tortas. This hard-working Huntington Park eatery, scarcely bigger than a burger stand, sells 57 varieties of Mexico City-style sandwiches. Its wall menu is like the giddier sort of deli sandwich list, apart from two things: Every sandwich includes avocado and jalapenos, and none is named after a celebrity.

They aren’t deli, and they aren’t all what you probably think of as tortas, either. My favorite is the alemana, made with an excellent, rather spicy link sausage plus bacon and American cheese. Rich, meaty, smoky and hot, it’s an impressive mouthful, though with all the avocado and jalapenos the only thing that makes it German (alemana) is the fact that Ya Ya’s calls it that.

Some of the tortas are infrequently ordered, to judge from the fact that the brisk, cheery cashier has to look on a list when you ask what’s in them, but that’s not the case with tepiquena, which she says is one of her favorites. The filling is roast pork marinated with spices -- quite hot peppers; it’s like roast pork turning into chorizo sausage.

Still, tortas are only a fraction of what Ya Ya’s sells. I count 174 nonbeverage items on its full menu, including 10 burgers, 14 standard lunch-counter sandwiches, 27 breakfasts (Mexican and American) and various burritos, Mexican dinners, seafood plates and salads. You can find anything from molletes (grilled bean-and-cheese sandwiches) to a classic American banana split.

The decor of the place was no more schemed out by a restaurant designer than the menu was. It includes yellowing movie posters and campy “Old West” saloon signs, motorcycle memorabilia, a poster from the Mexican revolution, bits of folk humor (“The management does not discriminate, everybody’s underpaid”), rusty horseshoes and an antique camera. A street sign just outside the door claims this to be the corner of Antojitos Mexicanos and Licuados Naturales (Mexican snacks and fruit drinks).

As for the hamburgers that give Ya Ya’s Burgers its name, they’re OK. The large, grilled patties come with plenty of lettuce and tomato in a secret sauce that seems to be Miracle Whip with a bit of ketchup and maybe mustard. The steak sandwich is more impressive, though. The thin-sliced steak, charred from the grill, comes on a grilled, foot-long roll. It’s so long they cut it in half to fit on the plate.

You can get the usual Mexican dishes, such as chicken enchiladas (the chicken boiled with onions and mild peppers) in a straightforward, dark-red sauce, with yellow rice and flavorful refried beans. There’s an interesting cheese taco (taco de panela), made by folding a tortilla around a slice of Mexican cheese and then deep-frying it. The cheese comes out appetizingly half-melted and the taco (lying on its side) is sprinkled with minced cabbage and carrot and accompanied by some tart tomatillo sauce.

None of these is a torta, of course.

The first dozen or so names on the torta list are familiar -- milanesa, jamon, carne asada and so on. But pretty soon you’re out of your depth and have to ask the cashier. Chachanilla, it turns out, has the same chorizo-like roast pork as tepiquena, but it gives a slightly milder effect, cheese moderating the spices somewhat. You can actually get roast pork mixed with crumbled chorizo if you want -- that’s torta mariachi; not bad.

La ahumada actually seems more German to me than the alemana -- it’s thin slices of cured, smoked pork chop, like the German kassler rippchen. If you feel like having this ham-like smoked pork with pineapple and American cheese, by the way, that’s the odd but pleasant torta que buena.

Media vuelta (which appears on the menu as 1/2 vuelta) is ham, pork and American cheese, a rather light and fresh-tasting sandwich. Francesa is a sort of cordon bleu: chicken breast, ham and cheese. Chilanga is milanesa plus ham; la mia is roast pork and a whole poblano chile. Azteca is carne asada plus cheese and cactus, and mixteca is ham, cheese and a fried egg, a sort of egg McTorta.

We’re not full yet, trust me -- we haven’t had dessert. So there’s flan and New York cheesecake and milkshakes (strawberry, pineapple, vanilla, chocolate or boysenberry). And that banana split: a banana, two scoops of vanilla ice cream and one of strawberry, plus chocolate and strawberry sauces, (canned) whipped cream and crushed peanuts.

Yeah, Ya Ya’s. Now we’re full.

*

Ya Ya’s Burgers No. 2

Location: 3202 E. Gage Ave., Huntington Park, (323) 581-2383.

Price: Tortas, $4.50 to $7.99; hamburgers and sandwiches, $1.79 to $5.25; Mexican dishes and plates, $2.59 to $8.99; desserts, 85 cents to $3.99; breakfasts, $2.29 to $5.25.

Best dishes: torta alemana, torta tepiquena, torta media vuelta, torta mariachi, steak sandwich.

Details: Open 9:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday-Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. No alcohol. Parking lot. No credit cards.