I love finding a restaurant on my own, but I wholeheartedly welcome when someone introduces me to a place I haven’t discovered yet. My boyfriend is particularly good at this. He’ll mention a restaurant assuming I already know it, and when I tell him it’s either completely new to me or simply somewhere I haven’t made my way to yet, he gets excited. I get excited too. Not only because I have a new restaurant to try, but because I get to experience it with someone who is just as eager about food as I am.
That was the case with Evil Cooks in El Sereno.
Juan was introduced to the restaurant through his friends and enjoyed his first lunch there so much that he went back shortly afterward. Then came his third time, when he invited me to come along. One visit was all I needed to understand why he kept going back.
We started on the back patio with a Tepache ($7) in front of Juan and a cold bottle of Coke ($4) in front of me. Priorities. Before ordering, we looked over the menu, which immediately caught my attention. For first-time visitors, you’ll notice that it’s printed on an upcycled vinyl menu, carrying the heavy-metal aesthetic from the restaurant’s interior right to the table.
The menu itself, however, takes a little figuring out.
Some of the tacos are named after bands, including McSatan and The Simmons, so unless you’re already familiar with the menu, it’s worth asking what you’re actually ordering. Otherwise, you may find yourself choosing based entirely on a name and hoping for the best.
I wasn’t willing to leave that much to chance, so we started with the Enchilada Dumplings ($12). The name made me imagine traditional dumplings: little pockets of savory filling delicately pinched in dough. What arrived was something closer to a flattened ravioli, topped with requesón, potatoes, and crème fraîche and surrounded by rich enchilada sauce. Unsure of how to begin, we both simply dove into it and it was delicious.
The thin dumplings, creamy cheese, crispy potatoes, and bold enchilada sauce created a combination of textures that made every bite interesting. Smooth, creamy, crispy, savory. It had a little bit of everything in all the right ways.
But the dish that really had me excited to visit Evil Cooks was the Devil’s Pack ($25). The name doesn’t exactly tell you what you’re getting, but the plate includes three tacos: Poseidon, Rock Lobster, and Asesino featuring octopus, lobster, and octopus with al pastor.
The octopus tacos were incredible. A warm tortilla held perfectly cooked black octopus, topped with pineapple (only on the pastor taco), avocado crema, pickled red onions, and cilantro. The octopus had just the right texture, while the pineapple and crema brought sweetness and richness to the bite.
Then there was the Rock Lobster.
The rolled taco was generously filled with lobster and covered in a light verde sauce, onions, and cilantro. Thicker than a taquito and roughly the size of a flauta, it was exactly the kind of taco you grab with your hands and finish in a few bites. And every one of those bites was glorious.
That’s what I love about discovering restaurants, especially when someone else does the discovering for me. Juan introduced me to Evil Cooks, and I’m grateful he did. One visit was enough to understand why he kept going back and enough to make me want to do the same. Do I know when I’ll return? Not yet. But will it be soon? Definitely.
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Address: 3333 N Eastern Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90032
Phone: (323) 332-2336
Hours: Tuesday through Thursday – 4:00 to 9:00 pm, Saturday – 12:00 to 9:00 pm, Sunday – 12:00 to 5:00 pm, and closed on Monday.
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