Latin Patio

I did a search and didn't find any mention of this place, so I think I'm okay posting this.

Saturday night, a friend invited me to a marimba festival at Latin Patio. The son of one of his friends was one of the performers, and he wanted to go show support for this friend.

The marimba "festival" was more of a concert since, as it was explained to us, the economy kept most of the competitors from coming to Chicago this year. But that was okay, as the ones we had were wonderful.

My friend's friend is Guatemalan, and Latin Patio is a Guatemalan restaurant. It was a very fun discovery -- and one I plan to return to, as there were many unfamiliar but delicious items on the menu. In addition to main courses that ranged from $4.99 to $7.99, there are lots of small items priced at $1.99, so it was easy to cover the table with a wide range of tasty options (though having two vegetarians in our group of six kind of cramped the style of those of us who would gladly have gotten a bit more carried away -- but, on the up side, we were able to feed them quite well).

Among the $1.99 items we sampled were the pupusas. If they didn't serve anything else, these would be worth going back for. (In fact, the menu states that someone has recognized them as having the best pupusas in Chicago -- though my Spanish is too limited to know to whom the comment was attributed.) My friend and I had pork pupusas, and we ordered cheese for the vegetarians. If you haven't had them, pupusas are small, soft, chubby, hand-made corn tortillas that are stuffed with whatever filling you choose -- puerco, chicharron, queso, vegetales, etc. Warm, really flavorful, and at $1.99 each, next time, I'll get a variety.

We ordered to pass (also at $1.99 each) tamalitos de elote (slightly sweet and yummy) and rellenitos (mashed plantain stuffed with black bean paste -- also slightly sweet and yummy).

Pulique was great -- a Guatemalan "stew" of chicken, potato, and chile-flavored sauce -- and I use quotation marks on "stew" simply because that word doesn't really convey what you get. It's more like a 1/4 chicken, stewed until fall-off-the-bone tender, sitting in a plate of red sauce dotted with potatoes and a few leaves of what appeared to be culantro. This was really fabulous.

The waitress told us she particularly liked the Carne Adobado, so we got that -- a slice of marinated, grilled pork served with rice and black beans. The flavor was lovely, but it was a bit dry -- but I think that might be because the place was packed with friends and family come to see the marimba players, all of whom descended on the place at the same time -- plus we ordered a fair number of items, and so this one dish may have been under a heat lamp while all the hand-made items (like the pupusas) were finished. I'd probably try it again -- well -- if I didn't get too carried away with pupusas.

I had hoped to get the yuca frita con chicharron, but I couldn't interest anyone else in that.

We also had a large, tasty steak burrito. Not worth a special trip, but good.

The friend's friend pointed out one item that was amusing -- "Chow Main Chapin." He explained that a lot of Chinese had settled in Guatemala, and this was a Gutemalan-Chinese dish with a base of spaghetti. I'd probably try that, just for the sake of exploring another non-Chinese Chinese dish -- but again, no one in our group was interested. (And there is only so much you can eat on one visit.)

The horchata was good -- but not like Mexican horchata -- didn't taste as "ricey." Because of the festival, there was someone from the group putting on the festival that had a little bar area set up, and we found that a shot of rum made the horchata sing. I don't believe alcohol would ordinarily be available, so you might want to ask if you can bring your own rum if you're planning a visit and want horchata.

Condiments included a mild, thin, red sauce; a thick, hot, green sauce; and a bowl of shredded cabbage (dressed, but very lightly, so not really like coleslaw).

A few of the people ordered choco bananas (chocolate-covered bananas) for dessert, but my very large horchata was all the sweet I needed.

So worth the trip for the pupusas, and I'll go back for those, but everything was fresh and good. And there are lots of things I didn't get to try, such as pepian and kak ik and that yuca frita con chicharron. So definitely hoping to return.

Latin Patio
3115 N. Central Avenue
Chicago, IL
773-812-4316 (though no guarantee that anyone will speak English)