Description
El Gallo Pinto may not seem like much, but some Nicaraguans drive 100 miles on weekends for the tripe stew mondongo, the plain beef-and-tuber casserole called baho, or the Indio Viejo, a mild yet undeniably exotic stew of the sort you might use to fortify yourself on a cool mountain night. And everybody eats the gallo pinto, Nicaraguan rice and beans served in big mounds shaped like family-sized cans of tuna, slightly oily, seasoned simply, with an intense, chocolate-like flavor from the sauteed beans. “This food is not fancy,” says owner Jose “Chepe” Cabrales, “but we Nicaraguans feel it in our bones.”
