Cuchara, the Mexico City-style bistro in Montrose, is probably best known for its lively brunches, usually replete with cocktails and mariachis. The bright and colorful restaurant also serves a fantastic lunch and dinner menu nearly every day of the week, featuring some of Mexico City’s greatest hits. You can dive into crispy chicken flautas with salsa verde, earthy and nutty fried huitlacoche quesadillas, or deeply aromatic and savory mole negro. We can’t get enough of the creamy chilatole masa soup with serranos, or the truly other-worldy empanadas de ate con queso for dessert. Those little guava and cheese pastries are so fluffy, rich, and sweet—imagine if a funnel cake and cream cheese danish had a little guava baby, and then topped it with powdered sugar. We’ll have another one, and some café de olla, please. Stroll into Cuchara for a casual weeknight dinner, a second or third date, or dinner with the fam. Or brave a margarita-fueled Sunday brunch with your besties.

photo credit: Richard Casteel

photo credit: Richard Casteel

photo credit: Richard Casteel

photo credit: Richard Casteel

If you want to extend your brunch experience to every day of week, the folks behind Cuchara  have opened Cucharita just one block up expressly to fulfill that desire. The breakfast and lunch cafe is open everyday and has a boatload of Mexican pastries you can snack on there or take home.

photo credit: Richard Casteel

Food Rundown

photo credit: Richard Casteel

Quesadillas De Huitlacoche

If you’ve never had huitlacoche—an earthy fungus that grows on corn kernels—start with this trio of fried, cheesy quesadillas. The sweet, mushroom-like flavor with the fresh cheese is a perfect pairing, especially when dunked into fresh salsa.

photo credit: Richard Casteel

Tasajo Y Huarache

This plate arrives with a long strip of cured and salted beef obscuring a large huarache made from masa dough smeared with beans and cream cheese. We like to tear strips of meat off and smush them into the huarache with extra salsa.

photo credit: Richard Casteel

Cinco Leches

Yeah, you’ve heard of Tres Leches, but Cuchara went totally wild and added two more milks making for an incredibly decadent and rich dessert. We want to fill our entire bodies with the pool of sweetened cream surrounding the cake. Do not waste a single drop.