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There’s no feeling in America quite like gathering with your family and friends to watch "Sunday Night Football," even when you’re just a bandwagon fan like me.
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But you know what’s also very American?
Cheering on your favorite home team at 7 a.m. on a Tuesday during the World Cup.
Early yesterday, I met up with some of my How To LA colleagues. We swapped the usual sports fare of beers and wings for café y bolón de verde at La Casita de Cancún Olé in Hollywood to watch Ecuador play Senegal. La Casita is one of the unconventional places that Alex Sasayama highlighted for LAist a few weeks back so we HAD to go.
There we were, with sleep still in our eyes and half-full coffee cups in hand amidst already hyped-up fans decked out in yellow Ecuadorian jerseys and hats in this regular looking house.
When you walk through the front yard, you see tents up, tables set and lawn chairs down. A large TV is on. The vibrant yellow, blue and red Ecuadorian flag flaps on a staff in front of the house.
There’s a TV on the porch too and then, when you step inside, there’s three more TVs for people to watch. It’s an actual house with cushioned chairs, couches and a dining room table. They even have a Christmas tree!
Working hard in the kitchen to make bolones is Margarita Platon, the owner of the house and the restaurant. Alejandro Platon is who we meet at the entrance of the home. He calls himself a “designated volunteer” because this is his wife’s business.
They started serving Ecuadorian food about 30 years ago. Their original restaurant Cancún Olé was on Hollywood and Vermont. They became well-known at that location. But then, as Alejandro Platon explains, they got “gentrified.”
They now own a place in East L.A., but during the pandemic, they relocated their restaurant to their house and started doing the pop ups. They wanted to create a space for Ecuadorians to gather in a family-like atmosphere, and it worked. The people came. Sometimes, Margarita added, they never leave.
“We continue here because people ask for it,” Alejandro Platon said. “And…ironically, she does better here than she does at the [other] location.”
I talked to one super fan, Manuel Ochoa, who usually comes on Sundays when they have live music (I was told to come back and watch him sing and salsa dance!). But he’s here on this early Tuesday to watch the World Cup.
He’s a proud Ecuadorian who has been in Los Angeles, for 40 years. He was rooting for both his teams in two different matches — Ecuador and the U.S. The U.S won and Ecuador lost. Despite the home team's loss, Ochoa said he just had a really good time.
“I’m so happy to be back on track with my people with different nationalities from the USA, from Peru, from Colombia…from all over,” Ochoa said.
One special aspect I noticed about this familial environment was that it was intergenerational. Thalia Veintimilla, who is originally from Ecuador, brought her children to the watch party.
“I came to Los Angeles and I had kids,” Veintimilla said. “I just enjoy being able to share with others the community of Ecuadorians here because it's just a completely different culture. I think it's an opportunity for the kids without having to leave LA. We have a little bit of Ecuador here.”
As people were attentively watching the game, Martha Ramos served bolón de verde, green plantain balls stuffed with either cheese or chicharrones; empanadas and Cuáker, which is an Ecuadorian drink made of oatmeal, citrus, panela or brown sugar, water and cinnamon. She said she’s known Margarita Platon for over 25 years.
“I am helping my friend,” Ramos said. “No pay. Not anything. This is my heart for my Ecuadorian people. Every Sunday, I’m here.”
Our host Brian De Los Santos has more in the latest How To LA podcast episode. Check it out here.
As always, stay happy and healthy, folks. There’s more news below — just keep reading.
(After you stop hitting snooze)
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Okay, friends, despite all that delicious Ecuadorian food I ate earlier, I am still hungry. What’s a girl to do???
Ahh!!! I have the perfect solution. Hop in my yellow DeLorean coupe lowrider for a trip to a place that Orson Welles described like “being in the womb.”
At 102-years-old, Musso & Frank it’s the oldest restaurant in Hollywood. Everyone in the creative world in L.A. from literary giants like F. Scott Fitzgerald to Hollywood darlings like Marilyn Monroe would frequent this hotspot for a little exquisite fine wine and to dine with other talents. Could you imagine all of the conversations and happenings that took place within those walls?
Despite a recession and a pandemic and, now, inflation, Musso & Frank is still going strong.
In her article about the history of Musso & Frank for the restaurant's 100th birthday, Hadley Meares writes that the classic dishes from the early days of the restaurant still exist, even though so much has changed in the world.
Calf’s liver, grilled lamb kidneys, smoked tongue are all original items that are still on the menu. But I think it’s probably the steak and martinis that have people coming back.
Read more about how this L.A. restaurant survived the test of time throughout its 100 years of existence here.
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