Why go off-roading in the Barrens when Camden's right across the river? Be sure to take pockmarked and cratered River Avenue, bypassing valleys of decayed industrial might, passing hills of bustling auto shops until your Civic reaches the corner shop, beside the old ice house, with the wide window lit with neon and the awning colored the red white and blue of Puerto Rico and listing half a dozen fine entrees. Is this Camden's version of El Barrio? The space has nothing homey about it, it's just a big room full of cheap-cushioned chairs and different-sized tables. The steam table is the main attraction, massive and brooding, a stainless steel ENIAC, its slots filled with Hispanic stews, starches and staples we have grown to know and love. Primarily take-out, the steady flow of customers provides a nice slice o' South Jersey livin': you got the mechanic, the mail man, the construction worker - surprised to see no cops, but every man for himself and god against all in Camden, NJ!
And the food's as hearty and wholesome (and sometimes even a little 'over-proportioned') as El Borinqueno's customers. Order the pollo a brasa and the stout grandma behind the counter takes a serrated blade to a bronzed chicken, tanning in a bin with her girlfriends, cleaving off a Fred Flintstone mallet of moist leg and thigh covered in a light spice rub. The same blade makes a special guest appearance when one orders the roast pork, wherein the stout grandma nonchalantly hacks sizeable hunks of flesh off a massive pork wad. The pork looks and tastes great, with a golden, crisped skin shielding the glistening layer of fat covering the bashful white meat. The skin's the best part - a moist snap crackle pop of pig, not burnt but "cooked to perfection".
All meats come with a side of thick red beans and a choice of starch - fluffy white rice, salty yellow rice sprinkled with a shower of tiny pigeon peas and green peppers, and some sort of fried-looking rice. But, I'm just mad about saffron - there's nothing like yellow rice cooked right! I surely don't have the acumen or the patience for it, but someone here definitely earned her chops. Be sure to flood every item on your plate with lots of garlic sauce and vinegary hot sauce.
Obviously, the restaurant isn't South Beach Diet certified, and I'd avoid the beach if I ate here too often. You can even order deep fried empanadas for a "snack" - they're okay, a wide variety (pizza, cheesesteak, chicken, shrimp, beef). The beef empanada is stuffed with a beefy paste tasting like bolognese. Which is pretty decent, and worth wearing that tread mill out for! read more
![El Conuco - Today's plate, white rice, beans, maduros [fried yellow plantains] and pollo [chicken]](https://s3-media0.fl.yelpcdn.com/bphoto/xAMfP2tdAtjVjLxuv2b1iA/ls.jpg)
