Juanita's Restaurant

This is a great place for anyone coming to Ottumwa! The food is affordable, incredibly tasty, and served with the absolute best attitude and attention to detail you’ll find in Southeast Iowa! I recommend this place wholeheartedly to anyone interested in trying something a little different than what you might be used to with a typical Mexican restaurant that every town has. This is Salvadoran home cooking at it’s best!

The food here is on point. But unfortunately the portions are just to small. In particular the pupusas are very small when compared to other pupusas. Also the cabbage mix (curtido) is lacking some flavor compared to quality. I also don’t like that the restaurant is closed for most of June. Almost the entire kf month. Customer service is good. The price is a bit high for the size of pupusas you get in return. I would be happy to give 5 stars if they increased the size.

The staff is unbelievably friendly. So many of them stopped by just to see how we were doing. The food is great. I haven't had El Salvadorian this good since I lived with a friend from El Salvador who was going to open his own restaurant. It deserves a better location, but that does not really hurt the quality.

I had the loroco pupusa, bean & cheese pupusa, plantains with beans and horchata. My spouse had the fried fish dinner and a pineapple jarritos. All the food was amazing!! The pupusas were melt-in-my-mouth goodness and went perfectly with the slaw and vinegary hot sauce. The plantains were sweet, cooked perfectly and great dipped into the beans and sour cream. The fried fish with head intact was very fresh, crisp on the outside and tender on the inside. The meal was very satisfying and around $30 for all the food I listed above. The staff were very friendly and attentive. Will definitely be coming back!