Caracas Calling

Until I came upon a group of pedestrians dressed as bumblebees, I'd completely forgotten about gay pride. The streets of Chelsea were covered by the usual fallout from a weekend of parades and parties—garbage, rainbow flags and more garbage—that made the old girl look like she was due for a facial. Even the diners in Viceroy, a prototypical neighborhood bistro where pretty boys drink blue cocktails, looked wan and convalescent—especially when the bumblebees walked past.

I was on my way to meet a few friends at El Cocotero, a new Venzuelan restaurant in the neighborhood that survived the weekend agreeably unscathed. The interior was airy and clean, the sidewalk had escaped being trashed and the staff—consisting of cook and owner Luis Quintero, whose brother Arturo owns a flower shop next door, and his brother's boyfriend, a sweet strawberry blonde in a cropped top—were bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.

When my friends arrived, Luis began to ply us with tropical drinks. His attentive geniality extended from recommendations of papelon con limon ($2.75), homemade limeade with brown sugar; to parchita fria ($2.75), an overly sweet passion fruit juice; and tamarind juice ($2.75), the best of the three.

The small, affordable menu is dominated by stuffed arepas—Venezuelan corn-flour pancakes—salads and sandwiches, and offers little that you haven't seen before. Although the food here can be and is reproduced with equally good results elsewhere in the city—take the arepas at the East Village's Caracas Arepa Bar, or the stewed-meat special at any Cuban or Dominican diner that can hold its own—El Cocotero's stylish decor sets it apart. Rich touches, like a wall painted deep blue behind a banquette upholstered in a bordello wallpaper pattern, are offset by lazily rotating ceiling fans and rustling palm fronds. Add service that is warm and eager to please—"I love seeing these beautiful ladies at my tables!" shouted a gleeful Luis, making us squirm a bit—the impression conveyed is one of conviviality, an atmosphere that emphasizes the pleasures of leisure and friends and simple food.

The arepas, which are presumptively the main culinary draw, are good, but not great. Then again, I have never eaten an arepa that I've loved. Like others that I have tried in New York, these have a toughness to them that does not mix well with the essentially insubstantial flour, which is too thick to be a mere wrapper, like a pita, but too full of empty calories to be restoratively filling. Still, I wouldn't turn down a guyanaese ($5), an arepa with melty, vaguely stinky Venezuelan farmer's cheese. Also good (great picnic fare, come to think of it) is the reina pepiado ($5), an arepa stuffed with a traditional salad of chicken, avocado and cilantro. I would skip the domino ($4.50), an uninteresting rendering with refried beans and shredded white cheese.

Luis also encouraged us to try arepitas con nata, bite-sized arepas with anise seeds and Venezuelan sour cream ($4.25). Also on the plate was the guasacaca, a Venezuelan, more acidic, thinner version of guacamole. It turned out to be an insubstantial snack. I didn't detect any taste of anise in the petite corn cakes, each the size of a silver dollar, nor did they differ significantly from the full-sized arepas.

Canadians dip their French fries in mayo; Venezuelans dip their scrumptious yucca fries ($4) into thin sour cream. The yucca fries at El Cocotero aren't as good as the ones served at Esperanto, my favorite pan-Latin in the city, but are completely enjoyable nonetheless. Sufficiently salted, fluffy and a little bit waxy (as is the textural character of the root), the yucca fries make for a gratifying, addictive snack. Even more exciting is being instructed to dip something that has been fried into yet more fat. Certainly, the yucca fries went just fine with the cooling sour cream, but the devious combination of fat on fat made this alliance fun in its own right.

The aguacate salad ($6.95), a simple, ripe combination of vinaigrette, greens, avocado and tomato, offered a sufficient amount of freshness and astringency to cut through some of the richer items we had ordered.

The pabellon criollo ($12.95), the only item on the menu that costs more than $10, was a conventional but satiating plate of white rice, black beans, stewed flank steak and fried sweet plantains. And of course there's a pressed Cuban sandwich ($6.95), executed here with a little more panache than those at El Presidente in Washington Heights or El Malecon on the Upper West Side—but still not great enough to break the mold.

Another old standby, cafe con leche ($3.25), was good, served in a tall brown ceramic glass, an example of the charming crockery that sets this place apart from La Taza de Oro down the street, where the cafe con leche costs $1.50 but comes in a good old paper cup. It went well with a very yummy tres leches cake ($4.50), an overly abundant sponge soaked in a combination of evaporated and sweetened condensed milk, topped with sweetened whipped cream and more sweetened condensed milk drizzled on the plate. Pleasing a crème caramel-loving guest at the table was the quesillo ($4.50), a sweet and eggy flan that was humble, but hit the spot. o