Omarcito's – Big Latin American Flavors Made With Big Love

Omarcito's certainly seems to be getting love — he recently won a Banchet for best counter service. Although I've only been once, I was so impressed I thought I should open up discussion with a dedicated thread.

It's a very unique architectural space, the kitchen is in a permanent food trailer in the courtyard of a modern building, whose function I couldn't quite figure out. There's ample outdoor seating around the courtyard, which looks like a pretty idyllic setting for afternoon cervezas to wash down empanadas and jibaritos. My lunch last week landed on a cold day of March roulette, so I ate inside a smallish dining space adjacent to the courtyard.

Immediately, Omarcito makes you feel like a part of the family, just the friendliest host, it's all terms of endearment even for a first timer. We chatted about our family's shared love of catfish and the declining fish populations in the Great Lakes. An immediate bestie.

His menu reflects his Cuban and Ecuadorian heritage with a decidedly Chicago accent – jibaritos and Marianao inspired steak sandwiches. There's some new school fusion like Quesa'ropa (a riff on quesabirria with ropa vieja) and classic meat, rice, and beans plates.



You guessed it, I got the fish sandwich, which had come highly recommended. I feel like fish sandwiches, in general, are underrated, though I can't name too many great ones in Chicago. Well, this is the best I've had – shatteringly crisp, highly seasoned cornmeal breading encasing juicy catfish. It was dressed pretty simply with a green mayo and a really nice pico-like Ecuadorian salsa criolla. There's two table sauces in squirt bottles, more of the green garlic mayo and an addictive emulsified salsa verde. It will be hard to order anything else, but I can't wait to get back there!

Omarcito’s Latin Cafe
3801 W Fullerton Ave, Chicago, IL 60647
(773) 698-6955
http://www.orderomarcitoslatincafe.com

This is going in the queue. I too love fish sandwiches/burritos/tacos whatever.

Also a working website is here: https://omarcitos.com/

I've stopped in twice and Omar is such a damn treasure. Treats you so damn well and the food being delicious is just a bonus! Fish sandwich is legit and I really enjoyed the ropa vieja and chicken flautas/taquitos

Can't wait to revisit during a warmer time of the year.

I love Omarcito's and Omar. When they first opened, I popped in after having not seen Omar for years (he used to be a manager at various Big & Little's locations). He immediately gave me a hug and asked how I'd been. Such a great guy. His food is also absolutely delicious, especially that green sauce that I douse everything in. Can't recommend this place enough.

I finally made it back to Omarcito's yesterday. I really wanted to order a jibarito but I had a busy day with logistical considerations — I needed a dish that would provide two meals without weighing me down (too much) on the front end. So I went for the lechon plate. I was torn in my choice for arroz and cavalierly asked if I could order the yellow rice with black beans on the side. Omar would not abide, the seasonings would clash, the mandate for black beans is white rice.



Nothing to complain about here. The pork had a deep citrusy marinade — Omar said oranges, good ones, lots of them! And it was crisped up super nicely with a tangle of onions. Beans and white rice were clean and simple and convinced me I was eating healthy. The beans had a nice tangy finish from what I would guess is a splash of vinegar. The best bites, satisfying my jibarito craving, were scoops of lechon on perfectly crisp tostones smothered in garlic mayo.

I hadn't seen this before my visit, but Omarcito's patio beckons in the warm months, as recently profiled by Chicago Mag.

I made it in for the first time yesterday with a friend. For some reason, despite being walkable to my place and highly recommended, I hadn't made my way over yet. Maybe I was hesitant about the outdoor seating during less suitable weather, but on a perfect summer day, there was no excuse.

We both got slushies: watermelon for my friend and limeade for me. I enjoyed both, but preferred the limeade as it had a little more tartness. This would be killer on an even hotter day.

I ordered the tacos dorados special and my friend the qusa'ropa. I thought the qusa'ropa was great. We opted for the garlic rice (which was very tasty) and tostones which were excellent. This just had a great punch and depth of flavor.

The dorado tacos (known to me as taquitos) were served crispy and the broth was piping hot. I found the broth fine, but tasted a bit heavily of bouillon type seasoning. Overall, I thought the dish could have used a little more acid and benefitted from the green spicy sauce.

I cannot overstate two things: 1) the moment you walk in to the courtyard, it smells amazing and 2) Omar is as friendly and passionate as I had heard. There were a whole host of things on the menu I was looking to try, so I am looking forward to returning soon - even if I was a little less than thrilled with my individual order. I'm that confident that other things will be delicious.

(I got tired of trying to locate an Omarcito thread so please feel free to merge if there is one.) I'm sorry it took me so long to make my first visit to omarcitos since I live very close, but that day was today. I had lunch with some friends, eating on the wonderfully mellow patio. The farm raised, cornmeal crusted catfish sandwich was superb. The seasoning was right on and didn't even need the delicious garlic mayo, or very spicy Serrano green sauce that Omar makes. The Maduros also were delicious- we splashed out on the ones that were topped with sour cream and Coquito cheese. and Omar himself was as welcoming as I was led to believe he'd be. The location is really special, and hard to describe. But it's basically two stories of storage containers forming a U-shaped around a patio. I can't wait to go back and order the fish again.

Agree about Omarcito’s. It’s on our lunch rotation. The jibaritos are as good as the ones of long ago Norky’s.

gastro gnome wrote:I made it in for the first time yesterday with a friend. For some reason, despite being walkable to my place and highly recommended, I hadn't made my way over yet. Maybe I was hesitant about the outdoor seating during less suitable weather, but on a perfect summer day, there was no excuse.

We both got slushies: watermelon for my friend and limeade for me. I enjoyed both, but preferred the limeade as it had a little more tartness. This would be killer on an even hotter day.

I ordered the tacos dorados special and my friend the qusa'ropa. I thought the qusa'ropa was great. We opted for the garlic rice (which was very tasty) and tostones which were excellent. This just had a great punch and depth of flavor.

The dorado tacos (known to me as taquitos) were served crispy and the broth was piping hot. I found the broth fine, but tasted a bit heavily of bouillon type seasoning. Overall, I thought the dish could have used a little more acid and benefitted from the green spicy sauce.

I cannot overstate two things: 1) the moment you walk in to the courtyard, it smells amazing and 2) Omar is as friendly and passionate as I had heard. There were a whole host of things on the menu I was looking to try, so I am looking forward to returning soon - even if I was a little less than thrilled with my individual order. I'm that confident that other things will be delicious.

there were no slushies on the menu when we were there today. Coffee coffee coffee which I don't drink, but Omar made me some English breakfast iced tea. I made the mistake of saying I would like a little sugar and he probably put a half a cup in there. so much I could barely drink it. I drank a little just to be polite but I will never make that mistake again. I always want to put my own sugar in tea. minor hiccup in an otherwise delightful meal.

I tried to bring a friend to omarcito yesterday. she was very excited to try the fish sandwich on her first visit. When we got there we found it was closed and they were setting up for a private event. We were also told that they were going to be on vacation till the 11th. Before posting this I double checked their website and there's no information about either closing so I sent Omar a respectful email reminding him that if you were going to have a website that one should keep it updated. It shows respect for your customers and their time. So FYI Omarcito, is closed until 11 September.

justjoan wrote:I tried to bring a friend to omarcito yesterday. she was very excited to try the fish sandwich on her first visit. When we got there we found it was closed and they were setting up for a private event. We were also told that they were going to be on vacation till the 11th. Before posting this I double checked their website and there's no information about either closing so I sent Omar a respectful email reminding him that if you were going to have a website that one should keep it updated. It shows respect for your customers and their time. So FYI Omarcito, is closed until 11 September.

It was posted last week and is the most recent post on both their FB and Instagram pages. Websites aren’t always easy to update for things like that—many businesses don't/can’t use them that way. Social media is much, much easier.

boudreaulicious wrote:

justjoan wrote:I tried to bring a friend to omarcito yesterday. she was very excited to try the fish sandwich on her first visit. When we got there we found it was closed and they were setting up for a private event. We were also told that they were going to be on vacation till the 11th. Before posting this I double checked their website and there's no information about either closing so I sent Omar a respectful email reminding him that if you were going to have a website that one should keep it updated. It shows respect for your customers and their time. So FYI Omarcito, is closed until 11 September.

It was posted last week and is the most recent post on both their FB and Instagram pages. Websites aren’t always easy to update for things like that—many businesses don't/can’t use them that way. Social media is much, much easier.

thanks for that info, Jen. But my response to that is if a Business has a website, Their responsibility to their customers is to keep it accurate. why have it otherwise? not everybody uses social media. take down your website if you are not going to keep it updated....

justjoan wrote:

boudreaulicious wrote:

justjoan wrote:I tried to bring a friend to omarcito yesterday. she was very excited to try the fish sandwich on her first visit. When we got there we found it was closed and they were setting up for a private event. We were also told that they were going to be on vacation till the 11th. Before posting this I double checked their website and there's no information about either closing so I sent Omar a respectful email reminding him that if you were going to have a website that one should keep it updated. It shows respect for your customers and their time. So FYI Omarcito, is closed until 11 September.

It was posted last week and is the most recent post on both their FB and Instagram pages. Websites aren’t always easy to update for things like that—many businesses don't/can’t use them that way. Social media is much, much easier.

thanks for that info, Jen. But my response to that is if a Business has a website, Their responsibility to their customers is to keep it accurate. why have it otherwise? not everybody uses social media. take down your website if you are not going to keep it updated....

Wow. Ok.

If you paid someone else to create and maintain your web site ( likely in this case ), then every change costs you money.

justjoan wrote:thanks for that info, Jen. But my response to that is if a Business has a website, Their responsibility to their customers is to keep it accurate. why have it otherwise? not everybody uses social media. take down your website if you are not going to keep it updated....

I agree with this. There's a duty not to mislead. The best way to get around this is to put a disclaimer on the website directing people to your social media pages as being far more reliable and up-to-date, saying you occasionally close for private events, etc. If updating your website is a burden, warn people before they can rely on it.

The reality, in this day and age, is that restaurants are leveraging social media to share their most up to date information.

If you choose not to leverage social media, I commend that. But it'll also lead to more situations like this.

On the plus side, the website will be accurate again tomorrow, so this glitch will have fixed itself.....

Do people really go to the website before eating out at neighborhood restaurants for anything other than a menu check? Even the person who posted the original complaint about this only went to the website AFTER she showed up and they were closed.

This is not a national chain—it’s highly unlikely that they've done much with the website since they created it. And it’s a pretty low blow to accuse them of deliberately misleading people because they’re not using a website for daily updates.

If you choose to ignore social media, that’s on you—seems like it could be said that it’s on the customer to use the medium on which this type of info is most commonly shared—not the other way around. But either way, unless you are going to restaurant websites to check if they’re open every time you go out to eat, this is all pretty silly.

boudreaulicious wrote:Do people really go to the website before eating out at neighborhood restaurants for anything other than a menu check? Even the person who posted the original complaint about this only went to the website AFTER she showed up and they were closed.

This is not a national chain—it’s highly unlikely that they've done much with the website since they created it. And it’s a pretty low blow to accuse them of deliberately misleading people because they’re not using a website for daily updates.

If you choose to ignore social media, that’s on you—seems like it could be said that it’s on the customer to use the medium on which this type of info is most commonly shared—not the other way around. But either way, unless you are going to restaurant websites to check if they’re open every time you go out to eat, this is all pretty silly.

just to set the record straight I did check the website before I went to omarcitos. in my OP I said that I double checked to make sure I hadn't missed anything on the website. we're just gonna have to Agree to disagree On how to use a restaurant's website.

I actively avoid social media but I do it with the understanding that by doing so, I'm definitely going to miss some useful stuff. That's the trade-off for bypassing a whole lot of noise. Pick your poison but social media isn't going away any time soon and for small businesses, websites aren't nearly as easy -- or cost effective -- to update as social media accounts are. That's just reality.

=R=

And now more than half of this thread about one of my favorite new restaurants is an argument about websites and social media...

Jefe wrote:And now more than half of this thread about one of my favorite new restaurants is an argument about websites and social media...

I'm going tomorrow so I'll post a food update!

I can post a very brief food update until then. First, it's been mentioned that the food takes a while to come out, which I can confirm. At least on summery weekends, I'd budget 1.5-2 hours to get your order, based on our visit.

The food was very good! Since jibaritos have been mentioned, I would advise against getting one with ropa vieja -- although the tostones were expertly fried, as you can see upthread (the jibaritos are built on those as opposed to lengthwise sliced plantains, so you get two separate sandwiches instead), the saucy filling very quickly reduced the sandwich to a soggy mess. The ropa vieja's good, but get it on bread or over rice.

cilantro wrote:I can post a very brief food update until then. First, it's been mentioned that the food takes a while to come out, which I can confirm. At least on summery weekends, I'd budget 1.5-2 hours to get your order, based on our visit.

The food was very good! Since jibaritos have been mentioned, I would advise against getting one with ropa vieja -- although the tostones were expertly fried, as you can see upthread (the jibaritos are built on those as opposed to lengthwise sliced plantains, so you get two separate sandwiches instead), the saucy filling very quickly reduced the sandwich to a soggy mess. The ropa vieja's good, but get it on bread or over rice.

I was there for lunch two weeks ago on a weekday and there were half a dozen occupied tables. I remember Being pleasantly Surprised at how quickly Our food arrived. so Mileage does vary depending on how busy they are. I realize that not everyone can go on a weekday but Service is quite efficient then.

I was very happy with my visit yesterday. I had the lechon plate with yellow rice and tostones. I also got a steak, cheese, and scallion empanada.

The lechon was silky and full of flavor. It went really well with the garlicky milder sauce. The tostones were just as good as last time. The empanada dough was tender and the filling delicious. Everything at well with the spicy green sauce.

My friends also got lechon (with white rice and maduros) and a bistec plate. I think we agreed the lechon was the winner, but they seemed happy. They declared the oatmeal shake to be excellent - better than other places around town. They remembered Omar from Big & Little's and were already planning a return visit.

I feel like my meal achieved the promise of the aroma I experienced on my first visit. Omar was just as friendly and the patio just as inviting.

For what it is worth, I think the wait for my food was somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 minutes in the 6 o'clock hour last night, but there were only a handful of occupied tables. I imagine the weekends could be a different story.

I'm glad this place is going strong and walkable for me. I look forward to returning and trying more of the menu.