At the beginning of the year, a Latin street food restaurant called El Camino opened in Mt. Lookout Square in the space formerly occupied by Annabele’s. I never made it to Annabele’s so I cannot comment on how the inside is different from before, but the first thing that jumped out at me was how small the dining room was. There can’t be much more than a handful of tables inside.

Inside

At the time of my visit on a Sunday just before 6:30 the tables were probably half full. Being that this is a counter order style restaurant I would expect tables to turn over pretty rapidly, but I just want to point out that there could easily be a time when you’d have to wait for a table. I placed my to go order  and waited just a few minutes for it to be prepared before taking dinner home to share with my wife.

Queso Blanco Dip

We started with the queso blanco dip with Mexican chorizo, served with house made tortilla chips ($6.95). The cheese was made with MadTree Lift and definitely had a distinct beer cheese flavor, which I liked. However it was a too thin for my liking and didn’t have as much chorizo as I would have hoped.

El Jefe Tacos

On the other hand, the El Jefe tacos were outstanding! These consist of pulled pork, pickled tomatoes, caramelized onions, sweet corn salsa, and fresh cilantro ($9.75 for 3). Of note here was the use of flour tortillas, which my wife really appreciated, as she isn’t particularly fond of corn tortillas. The pork was juicy and cooked perfectly, and the tomato and onion mixture really shined.

Cubano

We also tried the Cubano sandwich with braised pork shoulder, thinly sliced ham, Swiss cheese, house made mustard, and pickles served on Sixteen Bricks bread ($7.95). The fresh-baked bread was top-notch and overall this was one of the better Cuban sandwiches in Cincinnati. It was a fairly large sandwich and was very filling. I will definitely be back soon to sample some of their other sandwich and tapas offerings.