La Fiesta Latina
565 Somerset St. W., 613-712-1717,
lafiestalatina.ca
Open:
Tuesday to Saturday 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., Sunday 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., closed Monday
Prices:
up to $17 for dishes
Access:
Steps to front door
At La Fiesta Latina, our third time was a charm.
In December, we went twice to the Mexican-Latino restaurant that had opened in early November on Somerset Street West just west of Bay Street. At our initial try, the food was promising. But when we visited again, the bland food and slack service left us quite unimpressed.
Happily for us, and the business, a lunch last week was much more enjoyable. Tasty, homey, heaping plates and lively, engaged service were much more on point. We left wanting to return to explore the breadth of this unpretentious place’s picture-filled menus (all-day breakfast and all-day other dishes). Plus, where else can we go for food from Mexico, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador and elsewhere in the Americas, a good percentage of which are vegetarian.
The culinary diversity corresponds to what our charming server told us last week. The kitchen team is made up of “all kinds of brown people,” he said. The restaurant’s website shows photos of aproned women in the mostly-from-scratch kitchen, from which emerges not just tacos and enchiladas, but also — in our best experience — chicken enchiladas in a sumptuous mole sauce, appealing Colombian arepitas (unleavened patties of maize dough) and assorted plates heavily laden with seasoned rice, plantains, savoury black beans and proteins.
On our first go, we tried a selection of the restaurant’s tacos, all of which had the ring of authenticity. Braised meats had been steeped in bonafide, big-flavoured sauces before meeting their store-bought tortillas, and while some looked similar, they presented us with different flavours. These were not the more chef-y tacos that reign elsewhere, beautifully garnished and made with freshly pressed tortillas. But they provided the fundamental taco satisfactions, and an array of hot sauces will help if extra heat is your thing.
(I will note that a scan of La Fiesta Latina’s Facebook page shows more heavily garnished and even interesting tacos, including one made with stewed lamb.)
The Venezuelan platter came with white rice that had additional flavours cooked in, thick-cut slices of plantain and good, garlicky black beans, although the shredded pork was awfully dry, whether by design or as a result of being reheated or kept heated for a long time.
About the second visit, perhaps the less said, the better. I will mention that some egg-y breakfast items were lacklustre, and our generally inattentive and perfunctory server — he was, to be fair, beleaguered during a weekend brunch rush — deprived us of water, which we had ask for, and also chips and salsa on the house, which other tables received but we never did.
Closest to the plus side of the ledger at that brunch were the rustically tasty chicharrons (nuggets of fried pork), which were crunchy, meaty and fatty all in one and garnished with wedges of lime.
So let’s skip ahead to last week’s lunch. Redemption!
First, our spirits rose with the immediate arrival of complimentary corn chips, fresh house-made pico de gallo and salsa, courtesy of our lively, new-to-us server whose fun demeanour rubbed off on us.
Then, that chicken enchilada with mole sauce? A savoury, sweet, spicy, chocolate-y winner. You could have served me cardboard with that sauce and I would have enjoyed it.
Chunks of pork shoulder and house-made, somewhat spicy chorizo sausages were stars on two fully loaded plates. The La Fiesta Latina platter pleased, too, with chunky fresh guacamole, among its many components.
Arepitas filled with pork were toothsome. At the previous lunch, the egg-filled arepitas were tough — one, almost tooth-breakingly so.
A small bowl of Ajiaco soup — an appealing Colombian soup starring chicken and corn — was simple but delicious. It came with capers and cream on the side, which the server said were necessary to make the soup really sing. Funny, those accompaniments were absent when one of us ordered Ajiaco at our second visit.
After our third visit, I can recommend going to La Fiesta Latina for the kitchen’s desserts alone. A tall slab of tres leches cake was supremely moist, indulgent and sweet. Big pieces of chocoflan cake hit the spot with their fudge-y bottom and creamy top. Arroz con leche was a reliable pleasure for fans of rice pudding.
The restaurant is a bright, narrow, welcoming space of 26 seats split between chairs and a hard banquette flanking tables. Its white walls are decorated with a mish-mash of framed photos, evocative art pieces and sombreros. The eatery is also a mini-grocery with some canned and bottled Latin-American staples for sale.
Recently licensed, La Fiesta Latina serves beer as well as imported soft drinks.
I’m partial to humble, friendly, unique places that serve consistently good food representing faraway homelands. Until last week, I wasn’t convinced that La Fiesta Latina was one of them. After that pleasing lunch, I have my fingers crossed.
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