Los Cocos Salvadoran Restaurant

I have been going to this restaurant since 1993! I had never had El Salvadorean food before and went with a friend who highly recommended it. It is family owned and operated. Parking can be difficult, but worth the trouble. They have a large selection of tradional dishes. Their papusas are excellent and available with corn or rice masa. She has many fillings including cheese with green chili, black beans, chicharones, etc. The cabbage topping is marinated with onions and imported spices from El Salador. The fried plantains are served with sweet cream or black beans and are delightful. All spices are imported from El Salvador for authentic flavor. It is a small restaurant with many pictures of El Salvador. I no longer work in Oakland, but still drive there to enjoy the wonderful food. Great for a low key business lunch too. Great place and I love to support small woman owned businesses!

Amazing service! Best Salvadorian Pupusas i have tasted! Horchata there tastes better than Mexican Horchata, and im Mexican and love my Horchata (:

Los Cocos is a true treasure of east bay restaurants and El Salvadorian food. The food is hand-​made before your eyes. The papusas are $ 2.70 for two. You can’t go wrong with any of choices – from the spinach, to the beans to the cheese and chicharrón. They come with a wonderful vinegary ‘slaw’ and homemade hot sauce. The papusa travel well if you are planning on taking them home for dinner or a party. The El Salvadorian tamales ($ 3 each) are soft, fluffy and I don’t know what they are filled with except that it’s wonderful. Be warned: they always have at least one olive (with the pit!) in them. The chile rellenos, the carne asada, the platanos con crema, and soups are all excellent. The black beans at Los Cocos are outstanding. Equally impressive is the Casamiento (rice mixed with onions and black beans) which is clearly the El Salvadorian version of Peruvian tacu-​tacu. The casamiento rice dish is so delicious it’s hard to describe. The ladies who cook and serve are delightfully kind and helpful. The restaurant is clean, warm and welcoming and there is street parking outside and around the block in this safe neighborhood. If you are looking for great, tasty food and a fun experience, Los Cocos is the place to go.

customer sevice sucks!!! llegue con hambre y salí con ulcera, el señor que hace de mesero necesita recargar las baterias.

Love their papusas! SOOOO good.

I’ve tried a lot a salvadorean food and I have to say this is the best food I’ve had in a long time. The pupusas are perfect! I was so impressed that everything I ate was done right. I had pupusas de chicharron, pupusas de queso y frijol and plátanos con crema y frijol. So yummy!!! My new spot

Aight so to be real I’m an Asian kid with no previous reference for what a pupusa is supposed to taste like.
Lol but dude these pupusa a are smacckkkkkin! The cheese is sooooo good and melty it tastes amazing! I got the chicken one with cheese.
Oooohhhhhmmmmmgggggggg I wish I got like a box of these things. I’m drooling right now as I’m typing this review.
I also got a steak enchilada which was soooo good too! Remember! This is Salvadoran food NOT Mexican food. So it’s not you average enchilada. The seasoning on their meats is stellar!
This is a little hole in the wall restaurant which you would probably miss if you weren’t looking for it. DONT hesitate in coming in though amazing food for even better prices.

Great place to go for salvadoran food. Me and my fiancé ordered pupusas with loroco! Very tasty!
They only take CASH! We had to walk about two blocks just to get cash-​hence giving only 4 stars. Service was friendly!

I love this family own restaurant. The pupusas are amazing and the curtido is the best in town. When you come here you have to try the orchata and the chan. Is delicious!!!

Customer servise here sucks. I was there on Friday with coworkers and i WILL NOT be coming here again.
We order pupusas before getting to the place because i figured it was better just in case it was packed. BIG MISTAKE. YES pupusas were ready but we order 2 to go and guy that works there brings all of them out and we told him immediately 2 were to go as we had already told him on the phone. He left them on out table and didn’t come back for them. Never came back to ask if everything was ok and we were the only ones there. :/​to make things worst ones ot was time to pay we ended up paying for extra curtido bcuz he told us that curtido that was on table was enough 4 eight pupusas.
I always go there bcuz i find pupusas to be ok good. Never again.
Thumbs down to no good customer service!

On behalf of Xicana Moratorium Coalition we want to appreciate Los Cocos for their donation to support the 36^th Annual Xicana Moratorium Day, where we will be bringing attention to the Third World Liberation – One Land One People, taking place August 30^th, 2015 from 12−5pm at San Antonio Park in Oakland. Their donation made possible this annual free event for people of color in the Bay Area.

I really liked the loroco pupusas with cheese. It was pretty filling. We went on a really hot day, so most people that came got theirs to go. The pickled cabbage was great on top and had just the right amount of spice. I was also in the mood for their caldo de res and decided to try it as it was recommended by a fellow Unilocaler. The caldo had a very flavorful broth (real bone broth) and had generous portions of meat and veggies, but the veggies didn’t seem fresh. Next time I will go for just the pupusas.

Best pupusas I’ve ever had! BUT they’re customer service is really bad! The owner lady is bipolar but Must say her husband is nice. When i balance all that out I keep coming back cause the pupusas are that good.

Super nice people, super authentic, super east oakland.
It’s pretty divey, but it’s all about the food. It was a little heavy on the oil, but the beans in the loroca pupusas were really good. I don’t know how they did that. The bathroom was clean, which is a sign that they take care of business, but this isn’t really a date place. The platanos had a good crisp, and a great, fresh juiciness, even though there was more oil than I usually use. If I’m down that way and want a good pupusa, I’ll be back.

This place is legit. Only one of the ladies that works there speaks english so you know its authentic! I had a big order, (50 pupusas!) and they had no problem with it! Not only that, they gave me 10% of my order! What a bunch of sweet hearts!
As far as pupusas go, these are big, flavorful and very cost effective being at least $ 0.25 cheaper than the competition for arguably a better pupusa. The curtido is freshly pickled and made in house, the salsa is made in house as well and comes in whatever large containers they find.
The smell. When you walk in is sooooo good. Made me 10X hungrier when the aroma hit my nostrils. omg…
General pupusa eating tip — eat them there! Pupusas are best fresh of the grill when the cheese is hot! If you take them to go the condensation builds up in the container and makes them a little soggy. Also, pupusas are meant to be eaten right away, they are never good reheated, even in a pan.
I cannot wait to go stuff my face at this place again. Plus, its good practice for my Spanish. I’m pretty sure I bring my family shame in being the only Salvadorian who can’t speak Spanish fluently…

Delicious pupusas… Grill flavor is absolute winner. Yum. Filling… Largeish
Very good ratio filling to masa, nice punchy Curtido pickled slaw.
Tried bean & cheese, & cheese

Pretty sure we tried just about everything on the menu. Good papusas, reasonable prices, and close to home. I will definitely be back when the craving for el salvadorian comes knocking again.

Deverian de cambiar la hora q tienen de cerrar por q fuimos alas 7 ayer y ya no nos atendieron q mal

Damn good pupusas.
Also, the Salvadorean tamales are fantastic.
(Cash only and closes early for dinner, so be prepared.)

I love me some hole-​in-​the-​wall Latin food and this place did not disappoint. The pupusas were great, as was the fried plantain with crema and black beans.
As a connoisseur of cheap restaurant ambiance, I found it to be just the right amount of dated and rundown but clean and comfortable. The server was pleasant and a good time was had by all!

The worst experience ever! Rude and bad service! Hair in food! Did not even take it off the bill!

Food is made to order, so there is a bit of a wait, but what you get is pretty good. I came here for the pupusas and the Horchata, but in the end I ended up loving the platanos with beans and sour cream. The beans were soft and savory, which perfectly complemented the sweet plantains and the tart sour cream.
Not to say that the pupusas were slouches – they were pretty good. I had the revueltos, the loroco and the plain cheese – all excellent. I didn’t care for the Horchata too much – I like mine with lots of cinnamon; this didn’t have that much zing.
I didn’t want to look for parking, so happily it is an easy walk from fruitvale bart, and is near bus stops for the 20, 1 and 51a AC transit lines.

These ladies are so sweet and they make the best papusas in Oakland! I love the Salvadorian tamales also. Support this local family run business. They have been around for many years and I hope they continue to serve the Oakland community.
Cash only.

You know the Land of Milk and Honey? Well Fruitvale area ain’t that by a long shot. It’s more like the land of Horchata and Taco trucks, which is a good thing. Actually 49% of the population in Fruitvale is Latino and it shows in the quality of how good the Latin food is here. Los Cocos Salvadoran Restaurant is a prime example of that.
Walking into Los Cocos feels like stepping into a sauna. The two friendly El Salvadorian ladies must like it because they seemed comfortable, but not me, I had to walk out of the restaurant after ordering. They greeted my wife and I with smiles and took our order. Best to use your «Espanol» here if possible.
We ordered six cheese, beans, and chicharron. She made six fresh, delicious, pupusas. There’s a reason why everyone should get fresh Pupusas at a place that specializes in making pretty much just that. Because they were thick, handmade corn, meat/​cheese/​beans stuffed hot pocket pancakes of joy. Not to mention the curtido and red sauce to top them off which made these a perfect meal.
If you go to Fruitvale, to Los Cocos, I promise you a land flowing with Curtido and Pupusas.