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Ponce.- Located at upper part of Barrio Real Anón in Ponce, a rustic wooden establishment proudly displays a painting of the iconic Puerto Rican flag on one of its walls. You can hear Puerto Rican jíbaro music in the background, and the smell of wood and breeze wafting through the balconies evokes memories of life in the island’s rural areas. This is Restaurante El Patriota.

Inside one of the rooms that make up the establishment, dozens of black and white photographs hang on the walls. These were collected by Tomás Laboy Báez —the founder of the family business, who passed away in 2016— from some of the visitors he received during his tenure at the restaurant.

Laboy Báez, who was raised in the United States and later settled on the island as an adult, immersed himself in Puerto Rico’s history and advocated for its independence. His dream was to own a restaurant specializing in traditional Puerto Rican cuisine.

“When he finally started the business, he named it El Patriota. He was very devoted to the Virgen del Carmen and promised her that if he ever succeeded in finishing his business, he would offer a vow every December 25th in gratitude... In 1987, the business started as a small kiosk selling fried meat, empanadillitas (small turnovers), and a few sandwiches, but the specialty was the meat with tostones sold by the pound,” recounted Adrián Ortiz Echevarría, the current owner of the restaurant with his wife, Ivonne Marie Laboy Rivera.

Laboy Báez welcomed important figures from local politics and music such as Andrés Jiménez, Danny Rivera, Edgar Zayas, Rafael Hernández Colón and his family, comedian Luis Raúl, among others, to the cozy wooden cottage. The musicians ate the famous fried meat prepared at the establishment and ignited the atmosphere with their melodies.

After operating for 18 years, El Patriota faced a setback when heavy rains in December 2005 caused significant damage to the establishment, resulting in the government’s decision to expropriate the structure. Later, Ortiz Echevarría and Laboy Rivera ventured to purchase the restaurant and transformed El Patriota, now on a farm near where it was originally located, into a new restaurant with a broader gastronomic variety.

The concept was introduced with fresh culinary ideas, including meat, chicken, cheese, or seafood empanadillas; shrimp, conch, octopus, and seafood salad; rice with pigeon peas, beans, and mamposteao; tostones; mini mofongo balls, and sorullos (corn fritters).

The restaurant’s best-sellers include the Patriofongo, a mofongo made with green plantains, maduros (fried ripe plantains), potatoes, and cassava; and the house specialty: mofongo with fried meat. As for beverages, the Patriota sangria is the most popular choice.

The restaurant’s management is dedicated to supporting local producers, incorporating desserts from the Ponce-based company Flanes Lymar and sourcing ingredients like lettuce and cilantro from Siempre Verde. They also use the plantains from the 112-acre farm: Finca Yaní.

“He (Tomás Laboy) was very afraid that the concept would change. I would tell him: ‘I’ll keep what works’... He liked there for there to always be traditional music playing in the background, especially trova,’ reminisced Ortiz Echevarría, who occasionally brings troubadours to perform live on Sundays and during special occasions.