Con Amor: A Mexican Restaurant in Tampa You Need to Visit

Tampa has plenty of Mexican restaurants, but Con Amor in Seminole Heights is doing something genuinely different.

There's a difference between traditional Mexican cuisine and modern Mexican cooking. Both deserve appreciation, but what makes Con Amor interesting is how Chef Taylor Dillon approaches that difference.

At Con Amor, Mexican cuisine is the foundation. The ingredients, history and centuries-old cooking techniques are respected, but the finished dishes are entirely their own.

This isn't a restaurant trying to recreate familiar Mexican dishes with a fancier presentation. It's a kitchen where those traditions become the starting point for something original, and that originality is exactly what makes Con Amor one of the most interesting Mexican restaurants in Tampa.

Chef Taylor Dillon: an artist in the kitchen

Some chefs are excellent at preparing food. Others have an individual style you can recognize in what they create.

Chef Taylor Dillon is an artist, and his medium happens to be food. His approach to modern Mexican cuisine isn't about changing traditional recipes just to make them different. It's about understanding the ingredients and techniques well enough to take them somewhere new.

Look at the Gnocchi Colorado. Gnocchi is traditionally associated with Italian cooking. Dillon takes that familiar idea and makes it with masa, serving it with braised pork, huitlacoche, salsa colorado and queso fresco. The result isn't really Italian, or traditional Mexican. It's a dish that reflects his own perspective, built from ingredients deeply connected to Mexican cuisine.

Then there are the tacos. Rather than repeating the same combinations across the menu, each one has its own identity. Even familiar dishes get the same attention: the quesadillas are made with blue masa, and the tetela combines huitlacoche, Oaxacan cheese, black bean purée and corn chowder.

These aren't random combinations meant to look creative on Instagram. They're a chef developing his own cooking style, and that's what separates a restaurant with a good menu from one with a genuine culinary identity.

What is nixtamalization, and why does Con Amor make its own masa?

One of the most interesting parts of Con Amor is something many guests might not notice: the restaurant makes its own fresh masa through nixtamalization, something FOX 13 has covered too.

Nixtamalization is an ancient Mesoamerican technique: dried corn is cooked in an alkaline solution, traditionally water and cal (food-grade calcium hydroxide). The process changes the corn's texture, improves its nutritional value and develops the distinctive flavor of a real corn tortilla.

It's labor-intensive, and it makes a noticeable difference. At Con Amor, the kitchen starts the corn after service. It simmers for about an hour, rests overnight, and is rinsed and ground the next morning on a molino. That fresh masa becomes the foundation for the tortillas and much of the menu.

What makes it particularly interesting is how Dillon uses it. Rather than limiting masa to tortillas, he experiments with it in dishes from other cooking traditions, from the masa gnocchi to masa hush puppies with chorizo, jalapeño and corn.

It's a good example of what modern Mexican cuisine can be: an ancient technique preserved, and a chef free to create something personal with it.

What makes Con Amor different from other Mexican restaurants in Tampa?

It isn't about being better than traditional Mexican food. Traditional Mexican cuisine has an enormous history, with regional ingredients, techniques and recipes developed over generations. There's nothing that needs to be improved or replaced.

What Con Amor offers is a different interpretation. Chef Taylor Dillon takes that history seriously without feeling restricted to reproducing dishes exactly as they've always been made. There are influences from other cuisines, unexpected combinations, and an obvious willingness to experiment.

You can see it throughout the menu, from the masa gnocchi and individually developed tacos to desserts like the Taco Dulce, which turns a taco into an ice cream dessert with a waffle cone shell, chocolate sauce, whipped cream and pistachios. It's playful, but there's thought behind it.

For people who appreciate cooking as creative expression, that distinction matters. You aren't just visiting a Mexican restaurant to order something familiar. You're getting to try how one chef interprets Mexican ingredients and traditions.

Why we think Con Amor is worth visiting

Working in restaurant marketing and content creation in Tampa, we see a lot of restaurants from a perspective most customers don't. And one thing becomes clear: good food is important, but having your own identity is what makes a restaurant memorable.

Con Amor has that identity. Its food doesn't feel designed to follow a trend or imitate another successful restaurant. There's a clear creative direction behind the menu, and much of it comes from Chef Taylor Dillon's personal approach to cooking.

We appreciate restaurants that are comfortable being individual, especially when their creativity comes from a genuine understanding of the food they're working with. Con Amor is one of those places.

If you're searching for a Mexican restaurant in Tampa and want something beyond the usual, add this one to your list. Not because it's trying to reinvent Mexican cuisine, but because it lets you experience that cuisine through the perspective of a chef with something of his own to say. To us, that's what makes food interesting.

Visit Con Amor in Seminole Heights, Tampa

Con Amor is a modern Mexican restaurant in Tampa's Seminole Heights neighborhood, with a chef-driven menu, fresh house-made masa, creative cocktails and seasonal dishes.

• Address: 5240 N Florida Ave, Tampa, FL 33603
• Parking: a garage behind the building, on the first and second floors
• Cuisine: modern Mexican, with brunch on Sundays
• Chef: Taylor Dillon
• Hours: Tuesday 4–11pm, Wednesday and Thursday 4–9pm, Friday and Saturday 4–11pm, Sunday 11am–6pm, closed Monday (as listed on their website in November 2026)
• Website and reservations: conamorfl.com

Written by SHTROM Creative, a Tampa-based creative and restaurant marketing agency working with Con Amor. This article reflects our own perspective on the restaurant, its food, and Chef Taylor Dillon's approach to modern Mexican cuisine.