Cuban Food and Latin Food Restaurants: El Cochinito Restaurant, Los Angeles, California

Glenn: It may not be the biggest, but El Cochinito Restaurant may just be the best Cuban restaurant in Los Angeles. This small, 12-table restaurant turns out the most authentic Cuban food we have eaten in a long time.

Jorge: And no wonder, this is a family-run business where the owners, Victor and Gladys Gutierrez, take great personal pride in everything they serve.

Glenn: So many Cuban restaurants are run by professionally trained chefs who insist on turning simple Cuban fare into something gourmet and foreign.

Raúl: Let me tell you that some of the best Cuban restaurants are run by people who got all their training in the family kitchen...

Jorge: ...where Cuban food was first and foremost a passion and only secondarily became a business.

Raúl: Gladys Gutierrez got into the restaurant business preparing cantinas -- tin containers that were traditionally used by restaurants in Cuba to deliver hot food to people's homes -- for a loyal and growing list of customers.

Jorge: Working from her home, she soon ran afoul of the local authorities. Faced with the ultimatum -- find a professional kitchen or shut down -- Gladys almost left the business.

Glenn: Then the owner of a local Mexican restaurant on Sunset came to the rescue. She could use the kitchen at his restaurant in the early morning hours to prepare her cantinas.

Raúl: Four months later she came to her husband with a proposition. Why not buy the restaurant and get into the business full time?

Owner Victor Gutierrez and his most loyal employee are ready to take your order.

Glenn: More than 16 years later, Gladys still arrives at El Cochinito early every morning to prepare menu items for that day.

Jorge: Her dedication is evident in the rich frijoles negros, served thick and creamy like they should be, not plain and watery as they serve them at some places -- like a bad can of soup.

Raúl: It's obvious that she cares for every bean!

Jorge: El Cochinito features "homemade Cuban food" and by that they mean traditional Cuban cuisine as enjoyed by the average Cuban in pre-Castro Cuba.

Glenn: There is nothing fancy here, just good, hearty Cuban fare served without pretension.

Raúl: This is a restaurant for people who love to eat.

Glenn: We dug into a platter of tostones mashed as thin as we've ever seen and fried to crispy perfection -- dipped in the garlicky mojo, they dance a crazy mambo on the tongue.

Tostones and mojo sauce that will get your tongue hopping.

Jorge: The tamales here are rich with the basic flavor of fresh corn, smoky bits of pork, and plenty of garlic.

Raúl: Three tamales on a plate would make an excellent lunch, but why stop there? The pollo asado is a quarter chicken slow roasted to fall-off-the-bone perfection and finished on the plancha to make the skin so light and crispy...

Glenn: ... you'll wish you could just sit and eat chicken skin all day!

Jorge: The carne con papas is also a delight and it's obviously one of the dishes that Gladys so lovingly prepared this morning. The beef is tender and plentiful in a thick gravy with potatoes, peas and strips of red pepper.

Glenn: El Cochinto serves three of the most popular Cuban beef steak dishes: Bistec Salteado, Bistec Empanizado, and one of the most popular, Bistec de Palomilla

Raúl: The Palomilla Steak is cooked to order and arrives just the way I like it, smothered underneath a blanket of sharp, lightly sautéed onions.

Bistec de Palomilla served with creamy frijoles negros and white rice.

Glenn: El Cochinto gets their Cuban bread from a nearby bakery, and although it's not as good as Porto's Bakery bread, it does make great toast and sandwiches.

Jorge: The Sandwich Cubano, Pan con Bistec, and Pan con Lechón are all great choices at lunch time.

El Cochinito is small and cozy -- just the type of place we love.

Glenn: You wouldn't think that there could be anything easier than preparing plátanos maduros, but true Cuban food fanatics know that making great maduros is an art.

Raúl: The maduros here are so sweet you may want to order them for dessert.

Jorge: The Camarones al Ajillo are a nice serving of generously sized shrimp swimming in garlic sauce served over fluffy white rice.

Glenn: They also assemble a very respectable paella here -- Valencia style with meat and Marinera style with seafood.

Raúl: Tortillas -- Spanish-style omelettes -- are another menu feature that make a nice change of pace. The one with ham, potatoes and onions is a real treat.

Jorge: Wash everything down with a Cuban soda -- Materva, Iron Beer, Jupiña -- and finish your meal with a Cuban coffee and an arroz con leche and you'll think you're back in the 1950s in the Province of Havana .