Pollo Loko Peruvian Cuisine

Yummy the place looks cra cra but the food was fab. I must visit again. I did not want to enter cause it did not look to good. But other reviews sounded great so I came, ate and enjoyed.

Great music! Seems awesome for us California transplants ! Lots of choices you would never expect in N Charleston let
alone SC! It feels like the awesome taco shops in Los Angeles without the crowds!
Now let’s talk food… Amazing and fresh!
Run don’t walk here, before the crowd and before
Kylo-​Ren becomes the

Just we expected. The chicken is outstanding. Flavor and spices are so good. Yellow rice, beans and cabbage salad. The cabbage salad was unexpectedly good. We also tried the yuca (and it was perfect) and the empanadas were nice. This is definite place to come try. Casual, but fabulous flavor.

Ok, so I’ve had my fair share of chargrilled chicken in my life to be able to distinguish between good, mediocre, and bad. Pollo loko, would be rated on the high end of my scale. Not the best but definitely pretty good and on par with places costing more. I ordered empenadas as well and they were good but on the small side. You can tell as soon as you pick it up that it’s a hundred percent handmade from what looks like corn and fried to a golden brown. It was crispy and the meat filling was good as well, especially with the included Pico and hot sauce. My main dish was the ribs and chicken combination. That includes corn tortillas, chicken, ribs, rice, salad, and beans. The ribs were definitely the highlight of my meal as the seasoning and flavor out surpassed the chicken. I could’ve had all ribs instead and been A ok Perfectly seasoned and fall off your bones. They are not drenched with sauce but instead more of a dry run finish. Rice was also delicious. All in all definitely worth a visit. A word of advice the place is located in a «rough» looking area but I wouldn’t pay it no mind as the food far outweighs it’s location. Andddddd the Horchata was also on point!

The chicken was pretty dry. My girlfriend and I ate it because we were real hungry. Rice and beans were mediocre at best. Salad was lifeless and not worth a damn thing. I have had Peruvian food in New York and in Miami (Pio Pio & Pollo Tropical). This Peruvian restaurant was no were near as good. It seamed like the chicken had been grilled early that morning or the day before and just reheated when I ordered it. My girlfriend even suggested to throw on a little mustard to help with the dryness. A rotisserie Chicken from Walmart or Publix has better flavor and is more juicy than this lifeless bird. Will never eat here again. 25 dollars down the drain. Save yourself the time and money. Don’t eat here. All the other reviews have probably been posted by employees or family members of the owners.

Enjoyed the meal but not as clean as would have liked. Staff and service was average.

I got the ¼ chicken, yellow rice, pinto beans, cabbage salad, and plantains. SO FREAKING GOOD. The chicken was seasoned just right and the pinto beans… taste like my grandmas beans. lol I didn’t really like the cabbage salad… but who cares. The plantains were soft and sweet with a hint of saltiness. I am a plantain freak… so I was very happy about this. I usually get them dry and hard and am very disappointed. Not this time. Anyway, it’s not in the best place, nor does it look the best, but it’s worth eating here for sure.

This is easily one of the worst meals I’ve ever had. I was really disappointed because there aren’t many Latin restaurants in the area, other than the occasional Mexican chain restaurant. But this place gives a bad rep to Latin food, especially for people who may be trying out Latin food for the first time. I ordered a Cuban sandwich, empanadas, flan, and tres leche cake for me and my wife. The Cuban wasn’t even a Cuban! The bread wasn’t pressed down, there was no pickles. What is this? For some reason it had eggs in it? It doesn’t even say it has eggs in the menu so I don’t know what that was about. The empanadas lacked flavor and tasted like they were frozen for a couple days. The tres leche had fruit in it, yet again this isn’t mentioned anywhere in the menu or by anyone. They just have the fruit hidden in the middle as if the buyer wants to be surprised in the middle of biting into it. With all that being said, I won’t even get into the consistency of the flan. At the end of the meal, my stomach was growling at me practically asking me why am I eating this.
Never coming back.
Stay away… for your own good

I think a lot of the other reviews cover the details so I’ll be brief: the chicken is OUT OF CONTROL delicious. Excellent service, all the sides have been good too. Sure, it’s divey looking, but the food is top-​notch. Well worth the trek off the peninsula.

Best chicken of my life! Highly recommend this place. Sure it’s not in the best spot nor is the inside great but your just going for the chicken so it’s ok. I’m guessing and grilled meat from here is probably good. Thinking this place will become a habit for us. Yum!

Probably the best Peruvian chicken place I’ve been to. Definitely not an upscale environment, but just consider that part of the authenticity. We got one of the sampler platters and everything was excellent.

Definitely worth a stop. The authentic food is very good and the staff is very friendly. I had the Cuban sandwich which was very good. Service was very fast even with a party of ten.

The location gets 1 star, the food get 9 stars. Average that out, you get 5 stars.
I saw lots of Unilocalers posting photos of the ¼ chicken so we figured it was a must try. We were right. You MUST try it. Possibly the best chicken I’ve had in my life. The sausage and carne asada are really tasty as well and the authentic style beans are lovable if you like latin beans. There was some flattened and fried thing on my plate that I couldn’t identify, even after several bites. It was maybe a whopping 2% of the plateful of food that I had so I just left it alone and still was more than happy with the meal. It ended up being slightly over our average price range but we BOTH got lunch out of it the next day.
Bring a policeman or pepper spray or whatever it takes to feel comfortable in a sketchy looking neighborhood because you can’t miss this food.

Delicious roasted chicken, plantains, yuca fries, etc!!!

Delicious! Reminds me of backyard or camping basic BBQ! Simple rubs with no extra sauce — by far the best way to do real BBQ.
The beans are authentic and the blend of peppers for their hot sauce was great! A little bit goes a long way — I asked and the owner said they used some Mexican peppers in the sauce tonight… which tasted similar to my mother-in-law’s enchiladas.
I will definitely make this a stop each time in charleston.
I could not make my mind up so I did the combo plate of chicken and pork ribs… nice choice for an undecided eater.

The food here is incredible and very different from your typical Latin American fare. This is not your proverbial Mexican restaurant with chips with salsa appetizers. It’s Peruvian food which has an altogether special flavor. I really like the spices and how they cook on charcoal. I especially like their ribs. The dining room is very simple and could definitely use a renovation. The staff speaks some English so that’s not a problem. They are extremely polite. They also sell Central and South American sodas /​juices for those so adventurous. My personal favorite is Chicha Morada (a purplish corn drink from Peru).

Give it a chance. The outside and inside may not be the prettiest thing to look at but the food is so worth the visit.
We had the empanadas appetizers which are not the traditional empanadas that I’ve had before. It is beef but the beef is more of a past then ground. Plus the pick /​vegetables you add as you bite into the empanada.
Now I originally ordered the ¼ slab of ribs but they were out which I was glad because I really wanted the «Bandeja Paisana (a traditional dish resembling a meat party from heaven” — Nicole P (ROTD 09/​16/​2013) as my meal instead after I saw it on the menu.
I was so glad that I did. It was a lot of food and everything was delicious. It even had the dark meat chicken so I was able to taste what everyone was raving about.
Do not judge this place by the scenery. It is Dorchester Rd and you don’t want to miss this delicious treat and experience.

Charleston is know for a lot of things: five centuries of history, Rhett Butler, stifling humidity, and of course it’s low country cuisine. Peruvian food? Not so much.
Pollo Loko when properly spelled (loco) means crazy chicken. I think they changed the name because they are not affiliated with the well known Pollo Loco chain. Whether you call it «Loco» or «Loko»; this food is «crazy good»!
I love low country food, don’t get me wrong, but I wanted to mix things up so I decided to get some «real Southern food» SOUTH AMERICAN that is. I punched up my trusty Unilocal App and proceeded to read the consistently outstanding reviews.
Make no doubt, this neighborhood isn’t like the Battery or historic Charleston; this is in a rundown «seen better days» mostly Latin strip mall. For the life of me, I couldn’t find the Pollo Loko sign but instead found a sign that had «Pollo» and the word «tropical» which looked like the letters had been removed.
It was after lunch so the place was empty and I was convinced that Unilocal had let me down and this place was actually closed down for good. I closed my eyes and thought WWABD. (What Would Anthony Bourdain Do?) You damned right, I marched in that friggin Pollo Loko/​Pollo Tropical or whatever the hell it was called and bravely grabbed a menu. A sweet Peruvian lady came out and confirmed I was in the right place. I ordered the quarter charcoal grilled chicken with yellow rice, cabbage salad, and beans. They had an assortment of Peruvian colas but my eyes widened as I spotted a Mexican Coke. I try to only have one «overly sweetened/​battery acid» Cokes a year and I just had a feeling that this cold cola sweetened with good old fashioned sugar would go perfectly with my Peruvian feast.
The restaurant was clean as were the bathrooms. The place looked like it could handle 50 people at a time but I was the only person in the place. I wiped the beads of sweat from my brow and said a prayer. When I opened my eyes a feast fit for an Inca King lay in front of me. I took a giant swig of my cola and devoured the moist smoky tender grilled chicken. Not normally a fan of cabbage, I scarfed it up. The rice and beans were simple yet delicious. The lady brought me some hot sauce which was probably Peruvian in origin. The food was mild but didn’t really need the hot sauce.
I brought my native Charlestonian GF here later that day and she ordered the ribs. The ribs were tender, a little crispy on the outside, and weren’t swimming in BBQ sauce. In fact, they had only Peruvian spices with zero of the sweet stuff. We both agreed they were fantastic. I ordered the empanadas but they were prepared «Colombian style». They tasted like they were made with masa harina instead of flour and were stuffed with a mostly bean filling. It was accompanied by homemade pico de gallo. Really recommend the empanadas!
If you come to visit this majestic city and you want to be adventurous, give my new friends at Pollo Loko a visit. After you finish that meal, neader on over to the boiled peanuts stand just feet away from Loko. They have three different flavors of boiled peanuts: regular, cajun, and ham. Great snacks for your ride home.

Wow. Harry R. and I went here for dinner last night on a whim, and we were totally blown away. The food was outstanding! We split a ½ roasted chicken, which was served with cabbage, beans, and rice, and it was absolutely amazing. The cabbage was out of this world, and the chicken is up there with the best I’ve ever eaten.
I also highly recommend the Yuca fries which were definitely the best I’ve ever had. Eat them with their house hot sauce and you’re all but guaranteed to have a great night.
I also recommend the meat empanadas. They were served very warm – straight out of the fryer – with some of the best pico I’ve ever gotten at a restaurant.
Everything was absolutely delicious and fresh tasting. I felt like I was having dinner at a friend’s house (assuming that friend is also a world-​class Peruvian chef). You can bet your huevos I’ll be coming back here again!

The grilled chicken is really good cooked on real wood coals so I really enjoyed it. Very delicious.