El Pollote has for a long time had a place in my heart. From their humble beginnings at Seven Dials market in Covent Garden, when I lived in London it was my go-to mid-range restaurant. Y’know, the sort of place you could go for lunch. I like a bit of fine dining as much as the next guy, but sometimes you just want to order something fried and spicy, something unpretentious, something that tickles your taste buds and brings a dirty ashtray for you to smoke into.
There is a vibrant essence about El Pollote, from the bright yellow colour scheme to the Latin American hip hop blasting out across the restaurant. Faux street art lines the walls, along with accolades from various wing festivals. Upstairs is brimming with energy, the kitchen on full show, while downstairs has a more dimmed and intimate vibe, a large bar and candles suggesting good date restaurant (despite wings not being ideal date food; no one can make slobbering buffalo sauce off your fingers sexy).
The chicharron arrives, a traditional pork belly dish from Spain. The charred crust brings a crispy texture to the fatty meat; spicy, umami flavours fighting with the lime and tamarind glaze, every flavour centre tingling with stimulation. It’s served with sweetcorn salsa and avocado mayo, over corn tortillas. These bring a great fresh juxtaposition to the juicy meatiness, and the corn tortillas aren’t particularly necessary but who doesn’t like crafting a little taco?
The buffanero (buffalo-habanero) wings are the real reason I’m here. Easily the greatest wings in London. They are hot, swimming in sauce, once again brimming over the top with Latin flavours. Somehow, despite being sauced beyond common reasoning, these wings are super crispy, still retaining shape and crunch 20 minutes after arrival. There’s an almost parmesan-like funk hiding under the hot buttery buffanero, suggesting maybe a lacto-fermentation of the habaneros. The sauce is sour and hot in equal measure, a proper face-scruncher of a wing. The insanity builds and builds with each bite. The peppery queso fresco they’re served with is halfway between cheese sauce and sour cream, and adds another layer of indulgence to the greatest quick bite in Soho.
Empanadas are a foodstuff that constantly enchants me – they are like little pasties crossed with croquettes crossed with oxtail beignets.
These empanadas were filled with slow cooked pulled beef, their potato-y dough encasing the rich, juicy meat. Served with an spring onion mayo, these are a great starter, and I’d happily munch them as a snack 24/7.
Arguably, El Pollote’s most innovative addition to chicken cannon is the dulche de leche wing. A wing coated in caramelised milk, untempered and just as sweet as that sounds. It weirdly works, served with crispy chicken scratchings, parmesan, and chilli dust, and baffles the taste buds into submission. Obviously it’s unbalanced, and beyond sweet – but served as part of a sharing-plate situation, it really works.
They also serve this caramel chicken as a burger – all of the above, plus pickles, in a vanilla glazed donut. I can’t quite face it. The idea alone of chicken in a donut begins to tighten my arteries, this grotesque perversion of salty-and-sweet clearly the logical conclusion to our collective obsession with salted caramel. I’m sure it tastes great, but I just can’t do it to my poor little heart. Maybe you, dear reader, are braver than me, and please report back if you try it.
The server gives us some free churros – which obviously can’t go wrong. They’re served with the same dulche de leche as the wings, and it’s a testament to Pollote’s ingenuity for flavours that both work perfectly. After these, I’m blind drunk on sugar, blacking out as I stand up, the perfect goodbye kiss to send me off into Soho.
