El Coqui Ninja leaps into the flavors of Chino Boricua at their Curry Ford West charmer

The black rooster was replaced by a green frog — a sword-wielding, Puerto Rican ninja amphibian. It left more than a few taco fiends crowing in confusion. If this is beginning to sound like a passage from Naked Lunch, let me clarify.

The Curry Ford Road outpost of Black Rooster Taqueria closed last June and was replaced by El Coqui Ninja, a restaurant presenting a mashup of pan-Asian and Puerto Rican flavors. Its mascot is a green frog brandishing a blade, and its presence on the wall near the entrance all but erases any memory of Black Rooster’s Curry Ford experiment. This place is an explosion of reds, greens and tropical floral patterns blended with enough Chinoiserie and Japonisme to straddle the design line between tasteful and garish.

And our very late lunch (OK, it was linner) was hardly naked, but rather fully dressed — to the nines, in the case of the kung pao chicken mofongo ($17). The mash was served in a large pilón, the wood mortar in which fried green plantains are mixed with chicharrónes and garlic before being crushed. The accompanying pestle appeared on the plate, for show only (or perhaps as a tool to convince insistent Dominicans of the superiority of Borinqueño mofongo). Regardless, the plantains are crowned with a heap of saucy, wok-fried chicken crunched with peanuts and onions and lit with chili peppers. A long plantain chip propped upright inside the vessel and a small Puerto Rican flag skewering a morsel of chicken only added to the stylish ensemble. Ay, que rico.

Then our attention shifted to the rellenitos ($7) being enjoyed by a couple next to us. “They’re fried potato balls filled with ground beef and cheese,” said our delightful server-warrior, noticing our envious gawking. “Amaze-balls,” proclaimed my wife, after dipping one of the fat croquettes into garlic aioli and downing it.

I quite enjoyed the cuerno egg rolls ($8) filled with Puerto Rican corned beef — it’s sautéed with sofrito, tomato, olives and potato. Sweet plantains and mozzarella are also stuffed into the crispy fried shells, and I thought it was a prime example of Chino Boricua fare. My pal, however, couldn’t get past the texture of the meat: “Too mushy.” My own textural concern was with the costillas deshuesadas ($18), another dish made popular by the Chinese in Puerto Rico. The boneless ribs we got were dried out, unable to be salvaged by a sweet barbecue glaze.

A side of tostones al ajillo (topped with garlic-butter sauce), couldn’t have been done any better. Fried rice, the other side of our choosing, was a bit too greasy and clumpy to be fully enjoyed, even with its liberal amount of shrimp and smoked pork. It lacked the characteristic “wok hei,” an absence that plagued the lo mein as well. Odd, considering a sizable wok was fired to make both sides. Those noodles played sidekick to serviceable fried shrimp ($18), as did flawless sweet plantains.

I should mention that the restaurant’s fusion spin applied to the cutlery as well: A knife and fork were rolled into my guests’ napkins, while mine had a knife and chopsticks. Extra spoons were all that we required to fully enjoy El Coqui Ninja’s dense cheese flan ($8), an ending baked by our server and who clearly took great pride in the recipe. Thoughts of a second homemade dessert, crème brûlée ($10), were entertained, but we were practically bursting at the seams. In fact, I was tempted to channel my inner Chuck Barris and bang that gong on the wall to let everyone know we were done. But I didn’t. It was just the funny little frog in my throat.

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This article appears in Apr 30 – May 6, 2025.