El Rancho

A small and quaint restaurant tucked away on 118 avenue known as El Rancho serves Spanish and Salvadorean food on the daily (except Sundays and Mondays). It appeared to be family owned and introduced me to the amazingness known as pupusas. The food tasted very authentic at a reasonable price, and was very fresh! Everything was definitely made to order in house.

Kolashampan ($2.95): a Salvadorean soda that tastes like cream soda

For an appetizer, we each ordered a pupusa ($3 per). I regret this decision and wish I had ordered more. Pupusas are thick, flour corn tortillas filled with cheese, beans and shredded pork. There was also an option to fill your own pupusa. Tomato sauce accompanied it on the side and went perfectly with the pupusas. The pupusas were lightly fried with and made me want more!

For our main course, we decided to share the Antojitos platter for 2 ($17.95). It included 2 flautas, 2 soft shell tacos, and 2 enchiladas with a mixed salad. The flautas were deep fried rolled tacos filled with chicken, that were slathered with sour cream. Similar to a taquito but had a harder shell, the flautas were tasty. The soft shell tacos were served with shredded beef. Unfortunately, the tacos were a bit tasteless due to the dry beef and lack of sauce. On the other hand, the enchiladas were topped with a mixture of shredded chicken, cheese, and veggies on a crispy tortilla shell that bursted with flavour!

With some room left for dessert, we ordered both desserts that El Rancho offered. One was Mexican vanilla ice cream topped with cinnamon flakes that tasted much like cereal. The other was a Mexican cake that oozed condensed milk, and had strawberries in whipped cream on top. The cake was definitely the winner of the two items but both are good for anyone with a sweet tooth!

El Rancho is a hidden gem that I will come back to, just for those pupusas!