Casa Margaritas Restaurant & Bar

The Bounty of Casa Margaritas | The New Yorker

"At Casa Margaritas, a new restaurant on the eastern edge of Queens in Bellerose, I was struck by the sheer generosity of portions and the Colombian focus of the menu from the Lopéz-Castaño family, who hail from Medellín in Antioquia. The tostones with guacamole and chicharrón surprised me — instead of dainty coins I got palm-sized smashed disks, golden and crisp, piled with lush whipped avocado and blanketings of fat, crunchy pork belly lardons. A “small” bowl of soup arrived as a meal: a thin, fragrant broth flecked with cilantro and loaded with beef that collapsed into supple shreds at the touch of a spoon, plus potato, yucca, and plantain, served alongside white rice lightly slicked with oil, maduros, and a shredded-romaine salad dressed in cilantro-lemon. The bandeja típica perfectly exemplifies the theme of bounty: a large plate packed with a sheet of carne asada, a hefty scored rasher of crackly chicharrón, sliced avocado, a small grilled white-corn arepa, a mound of rice topped with a perfect fried egg, and creamy pinto beans; you can supersize to the bandeja de la casa (which adds a quarter rotisserie chicken, a slab of grilled pork loin, and fries in place of the egg and avocado). If you prefer to focus on meat, the entraña arrives as glistening, umami-rich skirt steak with vivid green chimichurri, grilled potato, rice, and beans; the frijolada treats the beans as the main event by mixing them with hogao (salsa criolla) and serving them with rice, chicharrón, maduros, avocado, and an arepa. Don’t miss the arepitas de choclo — sweet-corn cakes topped with guacamole, pico de gallo, and shredded beef — compared with the plainer white-corn arepa that bears just a hint of smoky char. To broaden appeal the menu also includes burritos, enchiladas, and tacos, and the bar — equipped with a frozen-margarita machine the owners brought from restaurants they co-owned in Jackson Heights — offers margaritas in passion fruit, guava, or lulo (or mixed with prosecco or Corona); finish with a wedge of luscious house-made flan topped with whipped cream and a cherry. (Dishes $5.50–$38.95.)" - Hannah Goldfield