El Portal Café Is a Colombian Restaurant and Bakery Hiding Out in Far North Dallas

El Portal Café in farthest North Dallas wants to be your gateway, as its name implies, to authentic Colombian fare. Along with a small bakery, there's a restaurant serving up such Colombian classics as bandeja paisa (a platter full of rice, beans, pork, fried egg and plantain, and grilled skirt steak, “The dish that made Paisa famous,” which should be a marketing slogan if it’s not already). El Portal also has sweet and savory baked goods such as almojábanas (little cuajada cheese and corn flour nuggets).

During the pandemic, the Observer included the bakery in one of the “Good To Go” articles, but El Portal should also be experienced for the savory dishes that its website claims will “…taste like abuelita’s cooking.” We never had an abuelita, but we’re confident that nonnas and grammas by any other name would feel proud to put their familial stamp of approval on El Portal’s food.

We went for lunch one Tuesday afternoon, and the place was surprisingly and happily packed. We took advantage of the special of the day, ajiaco, which is a traditional soup from Bogota that arrived in a good-sized bowl chock full of tender shredded chicken breast in an extremely flavorful, rich broth. It included three types of potatoes as well as a piece of corn cob; it was very reminiscent of caldo de pollo, but with a richer and more full-bodied base. The dish was served with a side plate of rice, lettuce, house-made salad dressing and crema. It was a wonderful eating experience for a rainy afternoon and was less than $11 to boot.
Our second lunch entrée was ropa vieja: a large plate of shredded beef, fried plantains, rice, beans and avocado that was under $15 and maybe too much food for lunch. Fortunately, we were up for the challenge. The beef was tender and juicy and full of flavor without being spicy.
Other options include perros calientes (Colombian-style hot dogs), tamales (though there were none that day), chuleta apanada (fried breaded pork) and various soups such as mondango (tripe). Among the beverage choices are bottled soft drinks like pony malta, agua de panela (brown sugar tea) and fruit juices.

We thought about trying some side dishes such as arepa or empanadas, but instead decided to raid the bakery, ordering one of everything to take home with us. We ended up with several bags of almojábanas, milhojas (mille-feuille with caramel,) alfajores (Colombian cookies,) guava- and caramel-filled empanadas, and a few other goodies.
El Portal Café’s website's mission statement proclaims that “you’ll be screaming ‘buen provecho!’, and we were. Abuelitas, nonnas and grandmothers everywhere would be proud.

2810 E. Trinity Mills Road, Carrollton; 10 a.m. – 7 p.m. Monday – Saturday; closed Sunday