Sangrita shooter and a shot of tequila | Photo by Lori Midson
“We just want to keep feeding the neighborhood—especially a neighborhood that doesn’t have a lot of restaurants that serve brunch,” says Bryant Reyes, who runs the kitchen at Cochino Taco {3495 South Downing Street, 720.573.6174}, a rollicking, offbeat Mexican restaurant that Squeaky Bean founder Johnny Ballen opened late last summer in Englewood.
Reyes, who spent a few years in Mexico City and cooked at Pinche Tacos and Dos Santos before joining the kitchen crew at Cochino (the name means “pig” in Spanish), says he and Ballen collaborated on the recently debuted brunch menu—and the syllabus, much like Ballen, is quirky and playful, although there’s no mistaking the devout Mexican inspiration. “Johnny’s vision guided me,” notes Reyes, adding that their mission was to “offer dishes from various Mexican states, make the food rustic and laid-back and ensure that it’s a little different from what you’d find elsewhere while still keeping it delicious and approachable.”
To that end, there are no pancakes, no French toast, and no compartmentalized bacon-egg-and-toast basic breakfasts. Instead, the mid-morning menu, available from 10 am-2 pm on Saturday and Sunday, begins with a wonderland of things that are fried: bread sticks dusted with cinnamon; pork rinds showered with cheddar cheese powder; and a Mexican pastry with pork, sweetened with Nutella butter and whipped cream.
Cochino Rojo Taco. Photo: Lori Midson
Along with a trio of starters, there are soft corn tacos, which play a prominent role on the brunch roster: the Cochino Rojo—a tortilla surfaced with al pastor, soft-scrambled eggs, salsa verde, scraps of white onion, and cilantro—is particularly good, the pork slicked with a chile-stained marinade that awakens sleepy eyeballs.
The plate-spanning Chile Relleno, a fried poblano pepper enveloping melt-y asadero cheese, will likely swell your belly (for days), but if there’s one dish on the new brunch menu that stands above the rest, it’s this one. The poblano, festooned with a duo of fried eggs that spill yolk, onions, flecks of cilantro, and matchsticks of fried potatoes that add texture, is pooled in a bracing green chile trounced with jalapeños.
Cochino Chile Relleno | Photo by Lori Midson
Cochino’s Chicken and Churros–a twist on chicken and waffles—is an altitude-high skyscraper that requires a burly appetite. The chicken, dredged in flour mixed with toasted chile de arbol, is soaked in buttermilk before it’s plunged into the fryer. The result is burnished gold pieces with multilayered flavors of peppery heat, shattering crusts and scalding juice. The chicken’s savory flesh is offset by sugar-specked churros, swipes of Mexican caramel, and a cloud of whipped cream.
Chicken and Churros | Photo by Lori Midson
The Carnitas Benedicta, which swaps out the standard English muffin for housemade arepas—semi-thick spheres of corn-based flatbread–is stuffed with seared pork and arrives crowned with a poached egg and a river of hollandaise punctuated with serrano chiles to give it a slight lash of heat. The strips of sugar-slapped bacon that straddle the Benedict veer into pig candy territory. We wouldn’t fault you if you ordered an extra side of that bacon.
Carnitas Arepas Benedictas | Photo by Lori Midson
Lift your spirits with a margarita, a sangria shooter, family-style micheladas or the terrific Santeria, a boozy rum-based cocktail elevated with the creaminess and light sweetness of housemade horchata and a sprinkle of cinnamon.
Santeria cocktail | Photo by Lori Midson
By Lori Midson
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